has it....hey come back here with my stuff" For Colored GirlsThese lines from Ntozake Shange's choreopoem really resonate with me.
They always have.
From the day I heard them tumble from the mouth of a student actor at the University of Ghana, they have taken up residence in my heart, my mind and my soul.
I had never really thought about this phenomenon until I heard the words roll off her tongue. As I looked down at my copy of the script, I realized that it is a common occurrence for women in relationships. As I looked around at the women in the room, each of them reading along and looking up as the lines were delivered....each of them...remembering when it had happened to them...each of them...wondering if it was happening to them at that very moment, as they take part in this production...as they sit in this rehearsal room....was someone walking off with their "stuff?"
Recently, I heard the words again. This time I was sitting in a movie theater, watching the choreopoem come to life in afilm directed ny Tyler Perry.
"Somebody almost walked off with all of my stuff...." the actress stated.
How often do we allow people to take things from us, (our dignity, our power, our choice, our confidence, our peace of mind) place them in a brown paper bag and
just
walk
off.......
sometimes leaving town with it.....OUR STUFF?
Leave town with OUR STUFF!??????
How often have we watched them disarm us, unhindge us, unravel us.....simply relieve us of our stuff and walk away...leaving us with nothing of what we were when we encountered them?
I have allowed someone or something to relieve me of my BALANCE.
They must have taken it when I had my back turned, creeping up behind me with silent steps and ZAP....just like that...it was GONE!
They caught me unaware, undefended, unmindful.
Someone just walked off with my balance and I want it back:
"Hey, come back here with my balance...I need it!" I need it to get through the day...today, tomorrow and the next.
"Hey man, come back here with my balance...I was planning on using it this week."
"Did you ask to take it, did you leave me a receipt?! "
I am coming to take back my stuff and you betta' be ready!
I hit the 5% weight loss goal.....12 POUNDS!
Weigh in with words!
Congrats on taking back what's yours!
ReplyDeleteonce again, we seem to be on the same page. i was just this weekend contemplating how someone took so much from me - stuff being a great way to describe it - and how maybe i want some of it back, or maybe i need to get over allowing him to take it and that maybe i am ready to address this - but maybe just not quite yet. but i need to do it soon, because i find without that stuff i've been missing, i've been slowly unraveling, maybe stitching myself back together here and there, but not in any sort of proper way. just in this mending emergency kind of way and the end result is not something whole, or useful, or functional. it just is. it's just getting by. and i'm tired from this trying not to unravel all the time or trying not to have these holes and it's just plain exhausting.
ReplyDeleteyour post is just right for me today. to help me with my loss of stuff and perhaps will help me get some of it back.
great job btw. i'm afraid of the scale right now myself.
my bravery i think is in that bag of stuff.
KC,
ReplyDeleteThank you for ALWAYS being here with me in this journey...this "mending emergency kind of way" that you write of is the way most of us do it...keep ourselves together as we fight against the unraveling. This "mending emergency kind of way" is the way that we have been taught time and time and time again to hold ourselves up against the ripping and tearing that can often be upon us....
As we find ourselves without our "stuff" we begin to search for it in familiar places....CERTAIN that we will find it there...our "stuff" and heart broken when
we realize that it is gone.......just gone...leaving (often) not even a trace of itself. That my friend, is when we must consult our friends for a reminder of what we are missing, what has been taken...what perhaps is in that brown paper bag....what is ours: OUR STUFF!
THANK YOU!
Tasha,
ReplyDeleteThank you very much. I am glad to see you here in this space with me. It helps alot! Until I getmy fence...please enjoy yours!
You help balance me.
ReplyDelete