33. January 30, 2012

Large granite sphinx bearing the likeness of the pharaoh Hatshepsut, depicted with the traditional false beard, a symbol of her pharaonic power

Maven Huggins

the number 33 of attainment and perfection
it is the universe truth that when the student is ready the teacher appears
i learned today the idea of GodPeople; a huge distinction from those who claim to be God's People.
i got two large total life lessons answered today
No Human
and The Universe Provides
there are no other questions or answers
Be Still

Surplus Answers
whatever was withheld and robbed before
is because more and better was and has been laid out for me.

I also learned to Speak NO Word.

yeah,. Now is when it begins. Today.

and in so reaching. knowing i am in the right time, the right place, the right situation. the right company, I want to thank all those who were sent and placed as light and signposts, messages and directions along the way.

♥
deep hearts. pure truth, and the bestowing that can never be taken away.
in hindsight I realize that is all I have ever attained. What can NOT Ever be Removed.

♥

• Margaret Rose and Leonis Roberts like this.
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    Leonis Roberts UR WELCOME ANYTIME

    
    
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    Maven Huggins Lucky You. You are the sole Soul Bare Witness. Just hit me.

    
    

a former self

at the age of 46, in the year 2012, right after the holidays, I experienced something novel
Acne. on what was flawless perfect skin for all my years; skin that most people noticed and those who were blessed to touch would remark as the softest ever. Right now I still hear that from my niece, when ever she hugs me.

It happened once, in the early part of January. It is still January. Monday January 30, 2012.
It happened during my menses. It broke out first on my back in bumps not clear whether heat, rash, acne, bacteria or virus. But the doctor diagnosed as acne. A young chap who has been right on -on all the issues i have had to see him for through the last six months it seems like.

i actually noticed and was quite unhappy to realize that I have spent so much time with him in recent months but then turned it in to fortune to realize at least I had a doctor to go to and one so skilled to be correct on all his diagnosis and treatments, so i decided to relax But really, I dont have issues like that and so many in such a short time.

he did tell me I was allergic to my environment. which was shock enough. my body is not happy where it is, in the room it is in, in the house it is in, in the neighborhood, city and country it is in. that is crisis enough that i seemingly have no control over. and now, more to add to that category

so to note the date. and yesterday i noticed my face in slight heat bumps late into the night, around this same time yesterday. I noted it. Tonight, same thing but a bit more emphasized with about three small pimples. which i popped. and applied ClearZit mixed with my facial Vit E cream. Hopefully it helps .

but the point of this writing is my realization the changes of later womanhood life. dealing with the matter allowed me to flip back into a series of changes and incidences in recent years. I always had trouble with my underarm deodorant. Going back in time, the stopped lasting long. I had to change them every few months or so until over the counter products stopped working. They would not stop my perspiration nor my odor and in fact the former created a foul latter All matters I never dealt with during my adult life. It ended up with crystals and they too failed. I now have to wax every week, and parafen oil helps to sequester the problem, both perspiration and odor, but I also realize the incidences or comfort follows its own whims and trends. Sometimes I am fine, sometimes I am bothered. In any case, I realized the underarm thing is connected to the acne, and both relate to a woman who approaches menopause. This is my premenopausal phenomenon.

And you know the case is individualized and specific to each woman, it evolves and emerges and shows up in specific ways. there is no set condition across the board. So when i had the acne earlier this month, and doing research to understand how i can have acne, i learned of menopausal acne. and that acne is created by a bacteria. I never knew that. did you know that> and so the antibiotics I was given worked splendidly, worked in ten days when i had a fourteen day supply and i stopped it at day eleven. I am glad I did.  So now realizing a trend appears to be emerging and I do have a second incidence of acne with my menses that is to arrive within days..I see the need to develop a protocol. I also tonight decided to write about it. A black wombmyn in her menopausal journey. Tonight I applied the topical. I am monitoring it to see when i have a full blown blow out of acne to begin this cycle's antibiotics..And see how long this lasts

dali's book transforming into a woman...i think i might be a woman transforming into a book




But while showering, I realized this is another area in life in which one has no control: the shifts and changes of aging and process of morphing through the stages of life. And what is odd is that I really was hoping to have a child, if not children. Two or three boys and a girl. Or just one child. I somehow got it in my head that i am to make and prepare boys. Partly because I was twice with child and in a dream, in hindsight was informed they were boys. One my brother who had died and was trying to come back to life; the other was his Italian godbrother, or how I knew him. at least that was the name of the being who came to me, and the only Vincent I ever knew was Junior's brother. But both times I chose not to be a single mother and not to bring children into the world who their father did not want. But i was naive and stupid and full of doubt back then and not realizing that men could want a child and abandon them after...but such is my lot. So i was waiting to see if I would be blessed again. And even though I look 28, my body, my womb is indeed 47, will be in a three weeks. and it is battle weary. The beloved has undergone three radical and extreme myomectomies but still works like a swiss watch crystal rolex chronograph. It has been good to me. I apologize to the ancestors, it, myself ad the future, my job, my purpose and destiny if it was to bring those children in and I denied them. Supposedly the curse put on my life for those choices have been exacted and it is what I have been living...with grace

but here it is now...monitoring and experiencing yet another change. I wish it could be scar free. I wish it could be graceful and seamless. I wish i could enjoy the same flawless beauty i have been..but what is given to me and how is what i have to ride with...and try to make and be the best I can...so here. see me arming myself with what i can and deciding stress not be a factor or contributor.

i will write more as it occurs.
<3
Love to me.
My old self.
My former self
the self of the interspace
and the new self to be.
<3

jah what to call it?

feel very weird today
like i am literally sitting at the bank of the universal river watching the omniverse float by. I did have a weird night of amazing dreams, different scenes, unconnected dynamics, and perhaps feel all of me did not return in my awakening...part of me is still there, wandering.wondering. floating

Another weird piece, my hesitation to write. here. and wondering where I can write now. One is not sure to get their Facebook record as I have always assured myself I will have and get; i stopped journaling as i used to; daily, multiple times even; and my blog, I now am confused as to content ... proof of my total discombobulation. Where to write? 'Write any damn where' used to be my thought and fk whomever thinks I am writing too much or personally...so what is this new concern?

When I woke up, the day so bright and beautiful I turned, twisted, and decided for an hour , packing as if i was going to the holiday home: my journal, my laptop mini, and my novel with reading glasses. Closed the front gate as I always do when I am in the yard. moved my furniture to accommodate my planting, only to get sweaty with all that turn and twist. So a shower, Then AC. Then sat down with the laptop thinking I needed to put my thoughts down. Never did. Started Browsing.

only now, two hours later, do i start to write. and only to say, my head is brimming from last night, but where to write; having trouble writing today

in the dream, family had to call the police for the sociopsychopath.
it appears we lived in a high rise penthouse, many rooms and offices in this one suite.
people and faces I did not know.
i came home and asked what is going on
consoled the mother which was and is an amazing feat
both our mother could not take that "breaking down" so she left the room
the implication was that usually the truth and trauma of this whole thing is usually not spoken, totally submerged
it was the future implied, but yet, it was right now
I feel more happened in that dream that I recall to say, tell myself or document

in another dream
I sat down to eat, seemingly at an outdoor restaurant
between two men, two big strapping men, more silent than anything
one appeared to be my lover and mate, for whom I relit a cigar, the other just as close a friend/buddy/protector to me and us, was having a stack of meat and seafood in one plate., We all marveled and asked him to lift it..under a steak was a lobster and a huge fish filet
but despite the food, I woke up thinking about those men
i dont see men like that anymore.
i dont have any man like that in my life now
and i remember saying to myself, "men more silent" than anything else
and it is code for so much
code for non whiny talking bitching gossiping men
Men of vim and vigor, stalwart and character
men who are as gentle as you know not to even have a thought to slide wrong
it was interesting

i think i also feel different
like i further am removed from where i was and how i stand and what i am about

and the dreams of projecting, visioning, planning and preparing...that is amusing
not sure what will materialize, if nothing. but grateful for the dance of the thing..the broaching of what is possible. to know the next card will be more again. pass go

the day itself seems odd to me.
quiet, for the most part. sensual in a way that makes no sense

and as I struggle for words another memory from last night this morning pops up
reflecting on Vlad's Sigh and his Moruga exposition...and the focus on the green and someone else saying it is green imbued with sinister...and I remember thinking to myself this morning..how much dark work and nonscience~nonsense the ignorant foment...it is all spirit an.d alter world they conjure up to do a bidding and then those beings are left to roam. we reap the rampage unknown

a desolation of travels...

So i think perhaps, I have had more thoughts on a precipice, traveled to more places that my body could recall at one time, in just a twelve hour time lapse, and now I am sitting with it all, looking and watching to see what time I collect/recollect myself

...a steed galloping the alter worlds...more speed than the experiences can catch up/stay with

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AfterPoint

while i was writing this blogpost, a friend sent me an inbox message

He had told me earlier in the week that "I am a Kabbalist" and "I am connected and dont know it"
So I asked him to write me much about what he indicated
This was his offer/


"Frandy La France

• Hello Maven. Let's see how much I can write in one message. I will start off with Spirituality. It doesn't matter what religion or belief system you are in. The truth will be hidden ,so you have to play hide and seek. The truth will be hidden to those with heavy hearts. But here and there Truth will attempt to reveal herself to those with heavy hearts . So that transformation can begin . Yes I said her as in feminine. Truth is a feminine aspect. Truth is an entity of her own. Truth is love. That is one of the reason mothers are so loved. Kabbalah , is the esoteric truth of what you read in what they called the the holy bible. Moses, Jesus, Muhammad was all Kabbalist. Just to name a few. They all practiced live for your fellow man , just like the Dalai Lama in our current. Time. When you open yourself to love and transformation of yourself. Truth will be there to clear your eyes of the smoke. And you will see things for what. They truly are. Nothing will not be taboo to your mind anymore. You are someone that is spiritually elevated. You just need some tools to crack the lock open. I believe this is from your pass life. You want to go further but , something seems to get in your way. Don't stop ,those are your breakthrough points. The Tree of Life that we all are connected too . We all are one , its are egos that brings us humans pain and suffering and separation. There are many books that give light to the situation. Like the Secret. There are two the one that speak of the outer things you can do to change and then there is the Kabbalah book of the Secret. Which show the spiritual aspect of what wee song and need to do. The have that oneness with the God in you . That is the true essence of all spiritual work . To become one with the mind body and spirit of God. Have a splendid day Maven."
  
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  Fascinating enough, Frandy could be the guy in the dream who was eating the stack of meat and seafood. Totally. I mean, what I am saying, is that i sense it is him. Before the person had no face no color, no determinant other than big and apparent. Now, with this mail and me posting it here. I see Frandy in the dream
  
  

Michelle Obama: Black Woman at the Frontlines of the Attack on Black Womanhood * Edited

Kathleen Wells

Well, of course black women see themselves mirrored in Michelle Obama. What do you think?

Folks are so boring and tedious when they say that boring and tedious stuff, about lumping folks together in groups. Folks are lumped together in groups all day/everyday/24/7.

Now, all of a sudden you can't be part of a grouping. LOL

African American women see their own challenges mirrored in Michelle Obama’s

www.washingtonpost.com

In a nationwide survey by The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation, black women see Michelle Obama as a role model whose values and challenges mirror their own.

Maven Huggins

yes we do. and I think interestingly enough, we have not got to her defense, been her shield or stood with her enough...i mean, think of her in monkey face, think of the book, recently...i did not hear anyone state that is happening to Michelle, because that is what the establishment and white male supremacist dominant patriarchy does to all black women; the nuance based on position and class.

Have you seen this work? Or have I missed it? Or am I correct that it was not done?

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    Kathleen Wells On the black sites they talked about it, if I remember correctly.
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins hm. the only thing I got close to..is the interview with the author and the media person on CNN.. that I did not see,.that everyone after wondered if the journalist went in too hard, but in my view, she never dealt wtih the issue head on...as in , "is this another black woman lynching, dehumanizing and stripping?"
    
    but it would have been inappropriate too, kind of like bringing a water hose at the wrong fire when a bucket will do
    
    But someone , some one of us Dark Skinned Black Sharp Knowledgeable Black Women Scholars/Activist/Academics, need to lead and open up this discussion...that integrates:
    
    1/ the whole international stripping and dehumanizing of black woman identity
    
    2/ the rampant pervasive epidemic of writing about black woman pathology: not good looking, not chosen, not marriageable, the black misogyny by black men, the bitch and ho framework, applied totally...etc etc.
    
    3/ the treatment of the first lady, extreme to monkey face, subtle to comments about her butt, arms, body...like we are right back to the slave block, even at the house the slaves built
    
    the irony and complexity is a bit too much to take in.
    We need someone, a female Tavis and Cornel to take our interests on.
    
    The Black Men aint gonna do it. We are as invisible to them as any white man...I had a very conscious, awake brother begin to go wrong with me and challenge my posting that Michelle Obama is a worthy model ( i came to that recognition) for all us Black women:
    
    Married to a worthy man...she chose right...Not Politically Speaking but in terms of Personal dynamics Only: a man who chose a dark black woman, loves her to the end of the universe, which does not exist, and loyal to his family and girls. Show me some black men like that. There are not many. There are more prominent black men with other if not white women
    
    She is schooled, educated and intelligent. She self actualized her self
    
    She has the Grace of God. Have you ever seen that woman bother to defend her self or to attack her perpetrators.
    
    Unbelievable.
    
    Sigh.
    My heart is heavy these days. Even as I see the good and cling to it
    
    
    Kathleen Wells We all see it, Maven -- you are not alone.
    
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    January 20, 2012
    

     Maven Huggins
    

    Michelle is Inspiring
    "I Wanna Be Like Michelle" International Campaign

    
    

    Wall Photos

    
    

    i just decided and realized I want to be like Michelle.
    in fact, come to think a...See more

    
    

    by: Maven Huggins
    
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    Frandy La France Now that is one beautiful couple.
    

    
    
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    Brian Pouchet But her husband is a TWOFT.
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins tell me bout it bout it Frandy,...i am surprised folk have not created a Social ProBlack ProAfrican ProAfricanAmerican WombMan Campaign around Michelle to combat the Black Woman Hating that has become rampant in recent years.
    
    I am trying to start it right here. Right now. and looking for folk who will help me take it to the next and upper levels
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins well is a damn good thing that wasnt my criteria eh...
    "Being at the top of any social ladder"
    second of all, is a real damn good thing I gave the caveat "that Policies have nothing to do with this position, choice and campaign
    READ
    Man of Character as it Relates to Family, his dedication as a black man to Family, his love and adoration for His Wife and Girl Children.
    
    Well, when you do your ProBlack Pro African ProAfrican American Woman Campaign, Choose Cynthia Mckinley, but you all lose all kinds of points with me, when I talk Ocean and you want to bring Air to my Party
    
    scene?
    This was not posted for a debate and i find it so interesting...who shows up to contest and engage
    
    The Entitlement and Privilege you are showing i would suggest requires some self Checking
    

    
    
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    Carol Regist Beautiful, intelligent, poised....
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins i needed to emphasize a Man who chose a Black Wife, and his commitment and adoration to that Black Woman who has been vilified, put in monkey face and all manner of dehumanized...did you ever raise your voice against that Tyehimba? Anywhere?
    
    and that is a rhetorical question eh. please. thankis I dont need an answer
    

    
    
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    Frandy La France Just like crabs in a bucket Salandy. To hate on a person when they get to the top. Ever wonder what it would be like to get there. Sit in kings chair for a day and you might reconsider what you wrote
    

    
    
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    Frandy La France People always looking from the outside in. Never knowing what this person did and went through to get to where their at. 2012 stop the hate!
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins aye aye. Tyehimba Salandy delete his comment? I wasnt looking for you to do that Tyehimba...
    
    I cant find that iconic early picture of them hugging up in the southside of Chicago: nobodies, at the bottom, but still beaming with love...that is what I am talking about, regaling and lifting up..
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins Bless. Bless Bless. Thank you!!!
    
    When we open the floor on politics, which I wont, cause i know the beast, mindset and ideology they come with...but this wasnt about that...and it is about lifting up the best of black womanhood..in this western white supremacist hemisphere, where black men choose many and much beyond a chocolate sister, and to do so with commitment, adoration, respect and love still after so many years...show me some other such models that appear as authentic and then i will consider..
    
    Further, Tye, this is beyond woman-based model campaign, and i do take issue to how you write that, but i dont have time with pissant issues...this is a small and cornered attempt to fight against the dehumanization and pathology they persist on painting this woman and by dint, me...and it is not any imagination on my part. do a google search on black woman and see the stories that come up just from 2011 alone: unmarriageable, angry, attitude, ugly, not chosen on dating sites. naked, exploited and self exploiting...on and on and on...
    
    and yes, it was spurred by Obama singing a bar of Al Green. any black man who will sing me Al Green, wins...
    
    I am learning for the first time in my life...the value of compartmentalization...something I believe men have taken the liberty to do since time memorial/immemorial
    
    Peace/
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins i apologize for persisting Tyehimba, but i feel there are some real things here to interrogate that because of who you are and what you say you are about require that i point it out
    
    I find it interesting that you merely say woman when i am specifically dealing with black woman-ness and how it is vilified normally, which is what this post is trying to combat
    
    For you to oversight that screams
    
    then i want to ask something...growing up...did you sing the international campaign, "i want to be like Mike?" barring of course how you may have grown, get deeper, wiser, smarter, and not look outside of self for emulation...but I am wondering what kid did not sing that???they still do, make commercials from that meme
    
    for you to have a problem that any black woman of worth be placed in that pedestal, is also telling
    
    and I will leave that there
    
    i suggest that we integrate mindsets and positions and dont even know it. that we present it without interrogating it, and then rationalize it, surely out of some ideology and politic, but not realizing we live another ideology that is not life giving to another entity
    
    today, my focus on the life and love of a Black Chocolate Woman
    and this exchange is taking me to new places of inquiry and self checking eh,...it is not a one way street
    
    thanks again and peace
    
    
    

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    Frandy La France You deserve Commentator of the year Maven.
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins well...look how good this turned out...i am really inspired and lifted up. this is stuff to walk with!
    

    
    
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Self Reflection in a Time of Transformation

i wake up to watch Al Jazeera Witness...a special on Guatanamo held prisoners, to see a man crying like a baby calling for his mother, "O Mi" it sounded like. It is Omar Khadr, the first child persecuted there, from Canada.

but interesting enough, i wake up with these thoughts:
pondering the tme, year and season..and how it is said for that of transformation
and I think, "where is my alchemist, and wand" --this constant life desire for a teacher and guide, to tell me what changes to make in what direction. which is a hallmark of my life. I will say and yearn for a teacher, but if that teacher is not up to snuff, and they always prove not to, I do my own thing. It was said once that I am used to being a the feet of teachers and guides in past lives, but this time it is for me to leac and teach

but in processing this idea of change and "to change", i think of my baby pictures. I was always serious. if I may go so way far and say, I always looked like a sholin warrior...my eyes were more chinese then than they are now, and that is all people see now; but I think, {i came to fight and survive}

and when my mind roams on a quick review of my life, I come up with another issue: I can write a book, titled "She Who Would Never Quit". i sense my strong indefatigable resolve never to quit is what has landed me here. At this station, this crossroad. I refused to quit aspiring. I refused to quit believing i can be better than what was surrounding me. I refused to quit at high school. I refused to quit that the life and relationship I saw of my parents could be better than what I saw and what my mother received. I refused to believe I could not be better than my mother. and i think , most women around. II have always refused to take no for an answer. I refused to let go.  Of ideas and pursuits even when I got confused of what and for why, what purpose and outcome, happiness. I was walking a path of 'running' from what i saw and lived. I was walking a path to be better, which is not the right motivation to last a lifetime. And today I realize, one can be wildly successful on the wrong path. One can bat 100 to zero in all things. I used to have the golden fingers. Nothing I set my hand to ever failed or spurned. Until now. And I am not sure why or how, but just to imagine a few days ago, that every road ends.

I write and I sense the only passion I had was to survive and get through. Well I did that. I think my life was to prove that I did not need people, and I proved that. on the path I was on. but not on a bigger spectre, I imagine; and that is the line and barrier between control and the vistas beyond one's hands and power.

and all in this, I am mindful to remember, this is the path I chose. this is the life I circled. the parents I came to, the spiritual pod and family. to correct something? to experience something?

and for what and whose benefit am i, have i learned all of this...I now think it is critical and one role of parents is to guide their children based on their personality. but then that would require parents, and mature adults, right, when most parents are living and engaging their children from convenience, when they are not doing so from their own tantrums and competitions

i have learned that people can love you dearly but be your worse enemy. the elders who love you can jealous and envy you to a bastion of margins, so do they want to block your elevation beyond their station. Life is Complex and Muddled. It is not even grey, just a kaleidoscope of color and the charge of meaning to life is to translate the meaning and significance of the hue

just trying to decode the thing/ the life/ and trying to see the next step. All this is really about the question or answer, "who and how am I to be for the next dispensation?"

Still Struggling to Survive...Amidst "Epistemic Violence"...How?

I thought i was living a singular trial and dark tunnel. Turns out, I am reading, many black women are in the "same boat". I seriously wonder that, despite that being what they comment, post and share. I have not interrogated. Be that as it may, I thought there was some value that there are others struggling, seeming as if there life is in standstill.

Then, seemingly coincidentally, in one day, there are three independent conversations I am having with three different sets of people, only for it to be one fabric, of three threads, into one story, one reality,. one picture...
 I post to document my own path and journey; but also for posterity

I> Still Struggling....

Kathleen Wells 

OK, I'll try again with the right word this time.What is the most inauthentic thing you've ever done?

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    Sista Sasy lying to my mom about my sneakers i left in the school locker
    she suffered from major depression so i ended up taking care of her by MANY lies about where my clothes were (so she wouldn't worry over the fact that they were not where she could see them) so i grew up lying about gym-suits, sneakers, loafers the general whereabouts of my clothing so she wouldn't go on a HOUSE HUNT - how's that??

    
    

    Kathleen Wells I think my inauthentic thing pertains to my Dad.
    

    
    
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    Sista Sasy parents will take us there!
    

    
    
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    Maven Huggins
    

    your question makes me ponder if my whole life and pursuits were inauthentic? when people see me as the complete embodiment of authenticity...but i see no other earthly reason for the wall and stagnation of my life, despite so much skill, talent, abilities, a phd and world travel; no love and men even, robbed of land and homes, a few times.. I feel i am living a riddle.
    
    a nasty trick, if i werent so sanguine and spiritual about the whole thing...the flip side..i am 47 look 28. i am healthy and when people see me, they are shocked i am "so beautiful":
    
    more rhyme for the riddle.
    
    i never once thought of this before...and i did see you post about unauthenticate yesterday...the possibility did not hit me then
    
    #me, clutchingstrawsforanswers

    
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells Maven, you are not alone -- I think many sistas are facing this exact situation. We must stick together and give each other support, I believe.
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells It's the society -- it degrades black women, and puts a premium on white -- period. Nonetheless, there is hope, if there is awareness on your part. You can recognize what's being done and just plod along and eventually something will open up for you.
    
    For me, it is important to remain authentic and grateful, as possible. And I don't have any particular/specific expectations, at this point.
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells It is the true spiritual journey -- everything else pales in comparison for me.
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells I'm grateful for FB because it does allow social interaction where one would not have it.
    
    Listen, you can't get more authentic than me, I believe, right? Yet, I have folks calling me out for this, that and the other, right. A guy yesterday on FB said I must not like black woman who don't have my education -- you see the ignorance. Fools. Clueless. Time wasters.
    

    
    
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    Ramona Parks Maven, you are not alone!!! I am pondering on the question as well, inauthentic vs. authentic. I am a walking enigma, it's not important how people see me, but how I see myself. My life is a riddle and i'm trying to figure it out. Although looking at it from the outside, its well put together.
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells And another thing that makes you authenticate, Maven is that you are willing to go there and make the inquiry. Most folks can't even go there -- don't ever go there and continue to walk through life as zombies. They lack depth and are shallow.
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells And I say the same to you, Ramona. Most folks don't even ask the question. What are they doing -- pretenders.
    

    
    
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    Roni Jones Well, I am a black woman who does not have your education and I always feel the love when ever you are around me.
    

    
    
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    Kathleen Wells This white guy said that to me. Always some white guy telling a black woman what it's all about.
    
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    Kathleen Wells This thread feels like a Joan Armatrading song -- she is so authentic to me. Her songs resonate truth for me.
    
    
    

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        Maven Huggins I am pondering this thread...
        

        I love the Joan Armatrading reference.
        I ponder wondering, should a fb page be created, and called what? Still Struggling to Survive...?
        How do we create a support group
        I wonder if we really are living the same story...I am unemployed. with nothing. Nothing I attempt works. When I write life submerged, stalled and at a wall, i am not writing in metaphor
        
        I then wonder, should this be a book>? I have two essays in two separate book collections, one on Obama, one on Illiteracy...
        
        should we do a book of our individual stories...
        Struggles in Authentic Explorations:
        Black Wombmyn Writing Their Personal Lives in 2012
        
        ~ What do you think
        I am deeply grateful for the collective, not that we are struggling but that I am not alone when in my sphere of life, spanning all continents, family, networks, I Am. ;!

    
    

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      Maven Huggins The book should possibly be called, "Black Wombmyn's Lives Amidst Epistemic Violence/
      

      
      
    • Kathleen Wells Well, that's a deep title -- too deep for your average consumer.
      

      
      
    • Francisco J. Acosta
      

      I'm so impressed by the honesty in the responses to your question, Kathleen. Brava to Maven Huggins for being so brave and open. According to a TED Talk I heard last weekend, there have been roughly 106,000,000,000 people who have walked the earth. I can assure you that not one of them had the same life. Like Madonna sang, "Life is a mystery. Everyone must stand alone." And Shakespeare said (through the character Polonius) "This above all: to thine own self be true. And it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man." Authenticity is everything and what a strive for constantly. Even when I'm way off the mark, I know that it's my heart's desire to get to that state of grace.

      
      

      
      
    • Kathleen Wells When we live in a society that gives air time to Sarah Palin slamming Michelle Obama, we know that there is a white card and most folks, either consciously or unconsciously, embrace that card everyday.
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      Kathleen Wells Yes, it takes courage to speak the truth and Maven is brave/courageous.
      

      Kathleen Wells Most folks I talk to speak their truth, otherwise, I have no use for hogwash, BS -- life's too short.
      

      
      
    • Francisco J. Acosta Word. Rock on.
      

      
      
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      Maven Huggins you mention Michelle Obama Kathleen and the connection is not lost on me, and i notice that no one has mentioned it, for sure because they are all asleep...her onslaught and attacks...is nothing but...black woman under epistemic violence
      
      I appreciate the embrace from all, Francisco/thanks!

    II> "Epistemic Violence"

    David Simmons

    I will be giving a live webinar about my new book on Tuesday, January 17 at 2:00 PM Eastern Standard Time. Click here to register: http://tinyurl.com/75j2f5f

    Modernizing Medicine featuring David Simmons

    fhcregistration.wufoo.com

    
    

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    • • David Simmons for details on the book: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/modernizing-medicine-in-zimbabwe-david-s-simmons/1102407028
        

        
        

        Modernizing Medicine in Zimbabwe: HIV/AIDS and Traditional Healers

        www.barnesandnoble.com
        

        Available in: Hardcover. As subSaharan Africa continues to confront the runaway ...See more

        
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins send me something about what your book is about? medicine? you into medicine? know i fantasize about going to med school...to be a naturopath of a kind --to do my natural healing thing but with the knowledge to credentials.
        
        wanted to go to Cuba for free but they changed their protocol. now you have to be young and poor. and well...I dont fit either..
        so very interested to hear/learn
        
        

        David Simmons ‎@maven, there's a description of the book on the above link. i have a friend who's a naturopath -- great career move. i say go for it.\
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        Maven Huggins you know i used to live in Zim?
        

        
        
      • David Simmons ‎@maven, when did you live in zim??
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins on and off, amounting to about two years between 1990- 1994
        Congratulations too. I am remiss...
        

        
        
      • David Simmons ‎@maven, we're you teaching at u zim?
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins no. but i met and connected with a lot of folk there..was working with NGOs...i started out with National Council of Negro Women and went onto ZIDS, ENDA, etc.
        

        
        
      • David Simmons you were there as HIV/AIDS was reaching its height, esap, and general spiral downward.
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins
        

        yes yes yes I was...many friends fell. Tsitisi -(prevera) -as soon as I go to say her last name it leaves me and goes spanish...she was a tv presenter..her lover, who was the brother of the sheraton manager..Musikavanu...plenty people. PLENTY..secretary in my office after i left..there was a brother at MSU who fell..in my dept of Ag Econ. sad I dont remember his name..but I remember watching him walk up the steps to the library and seeing him through the glass. frightening..he was skin and bones...i see his face clearly...cant remember his name.
        Zimbabwe is a peculiar place in my herstory...
        
        between my personal life, AIDS in the country, living down the road from Robert Mugabe on 3rd and Tongogara..and people being shot if you drove, walked or rode in front of his house after 6pm, land reform, learning about women warriors in the fight to liberation, being there when the country's independence was a mere 10years old, being cussed out in the street cause folk thought I was Zim, address me in Shona and when I answer think I am being funny...where the country was at that time in 1990, and how it has deteriorated in the meaning/intervening years...has been quite deep...beyond words in a weird way...i feel, recounting it all now, that i should write about it, but that is why it is so peculiar...ever live something but you dont know enough to even understand, interpret or give it any justice...but it was profound nevertheless? well yea. that...

        
        

        
        
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        David Simmons yes, i know exactly what you're talking about. i write about that sense of peculiarity in the intro of the book, of feeling like there was so much that i felt i was only partially understanding. so much greed and meanness and corruption and, at the same time, so many stories of selflessness and survival and healing and hope-building. it was and is a very complicated reality.
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins
        

        now i am curious about your book, because what I know is that the traditional healers may very well be part of the problem, but it has been years that i have given that thought...am i wrong? wild wild wild...when i think of men who rape babies in the idea that they will be cured...drinking all kind of mixtures.. wow. I am and have been away from it..I do now wonder of the statistics. I do know that no where is as ravished than as Southern Africa, and Zim was one of the earlies, even before or with Uganda...ha. need to call down some serious power...
        
        I remember another common cause of its spread was powerful rich men and their women they escorted or entertained...in all the beer gardens, something I miss much, the beer gardens>
        
        aye. Life eh...the place of enjoyment and memories is the spot of much death and perversity...
        
        piripiri brai, music, dance, smokes, people and sex

        
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins just by accident or synchronicity, the questions of your book are the exact reason I want to go to medical school even as I wish to be a natural healer...to know the science and not be doing crosscience
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins i often wonder what Zim is like now, and what life would be like for "an expat" it was wild being on the edges or fence of indigenous, expats usually white, though i hooked in with a trini family, ...being neither in or out either
        

        
        
      • David Simmons
        

        ah yes. pleasure and death...that could've been the title of the book, too. healers have been implicated as part of the problem...in the media, by well-meaning western or western-trained researchers who have an axe to grind with African traditional medicine. what I found was quite different: a collapsing formal healthcare system that people could not easily access nor had much confidence in. i saw people doing the best the best they could in a very resource-poor setting, where access to translocally produced medicines out of the reach of most. the hundreds of healers i worked with were making great strides in ameliorating the suffering of their patients.

        
        
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        Maven Huggins all the more reason for me to read your work; I get an idea for a need--a text that correlates./examines/explore the western media's assessment of african medicine to AIDS, the treatments, ingredients, its targets, effects, and how it is matched to western meds and protocols to hiv'/aids...
        
        that work would highlight what natural remedies exist..
        

        
        
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      • David Simmons ‎@maven, i talk about the framing of africans in early media coverage of the pandemic and to some extent the pathologization of African traditional medicine by westerners, but it would be interesting to look specifically at media's framing of African medicine.
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins
        

        but i am also trying to focus on comparing medicines, treatments, protocols and effectiveness on patients and to do so qualitatively...
        
        
        fascinating work indeed...
        
        
        you know there is a great described medical program at Case Western to do public science and research...this kind of project would qualify...if only i can get a sponsor, donor, patron for my medical studies and then to fund my philanthropy...that is not too much to ask is it...and then publications.. ;
      • David Simmons
        

        ‎@maven, a qualitative approach to comparing those issues would be very interesting. i imagine it would have to rely on self-reported efficacy (or lack thereof) from the perspective of patients and practitioners. but i still like the media angle --it'd be easy enough to do content analyses of, say, US/European news media covering african traditional medicine and compare/contrast with African media coverage of the same. the term i use my book to talk about this negative framing is "epistemic violence" which gets at how biomedical orthodoxy/ideology devalues other therapeutic practices, in essence casting them as backward, pre-modern, and in need of some kind of intervention.
        
        
      • Kimberly Russell
        

        ‎"epistemic violence" -- love it! it is interesting how the negative framing is somehow believed to be beyond a cultural relativity... as if western media is believed by westerners to not present a cultural perspective in itself... i used to get into debates about how media lends itself to the cultural lens and perpetuation of dominance and colonization with journalists (when i was once an aspiring journalist many moons ago - lol) ... there is no objectivity in media coverage in essence... that is nonsense, and this devaluing of other perspectives is violent and dangerous....

        
        

        
        
      • David Simmons
        

        ‎@kimberly, and it's not only something that happens in the media (i was a journalist, too, before going to grad school) -- it's institutionalized in other areas like our schools, our courts, etc. a former professor of mine (a radical black feminist sociologist) talked about the intellectual assault she felt under while attending grad school -- that there was this institutionalized devaluation of who she was and what she knew. this is epistemic violence.

        
        

        
        
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        Maven Huggins ‎"epistemic violence"
        
        that phrase hits me hard this morning...as I am on another stream right now..with other black women...talking about...
        
        "Maven, you are not alone -- I think many sistas are facing this exact situation. We must stick together and give each other support, I believe.... It's the society** -- it degrades black women, and puts a premium on white -- period."
        
        now mind you, i get stuck in two ways: one, if we really are living the same experience...and two, "society" written as one, when in fact, I am living in a different one...yet, how do we confirm this is one holistic systemic program/pogrom running
        
        bizarre a thousand times, nevertheless, "epistemic violence" strikes all chords and it keeps reverberating/constant vibrations...
        
        

        
        

    HOW?
    
    

    • Masego Makepe

      • How do u survive with no work
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      Maven Huggins

      • i gave yo my house. i live at family home with mom. she takes care of everything. I do have savings, but we agreed for me not to use it, since I made so many other people rich for three years paying exorbitant rent.....but that is what a lot of my challenges are about...one of the things I dont have control over. I just went on an interview to be a customer attendant in a book store and they refuse to hire me saying I am way above that...
        
        so i just try to be graceful for where i am, and endless people tell me to be grateful...for one reason or another which is amazing and I am, but this is also bizarre. things upside down
    • 
      

      Masego Makepe

      • Ok. I have been at home too for a bit while I finish my house project, mind you these days its more of a ruins than anything. It works out great for me as I get support with my toddler. Can't trust these child minders. Once its done though am gonna have to move out. So being 40 and living at home aunt that abnormal at all.
         
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      Maven Huggins

      • no. sadly. abnormal for me cause I have lived on my own since 18 .
        But this being an island. a very small island. with more people and young, and new professionals and new nouveau riche, there is no land to go to...so folk either build their parents house or make clan lots multiple houses on top each other...taking up all yard space...
        
        since the economy is as it is. huge bottom and smaller richer top, you will find people have to live with their parents without even rebuilding or building anything new because they dont make enough to even consider such a prospect
        
        multiple generational homes are common more than common...the Indians, do it no matter whether they doing well or poor...the africans are doing it too and just as much but for other reasons.
        
        just last week i proposed to my aunt for me to build a three level carriage house in the yard but i realized i am such an interloper here...and so many are concerned that i stay and get this house,..the land I was born to..but that my aunt built having got the land and our old house after my grandfather;'s death (see that is how it works here...land and homes passed on after death to remaining child...so yes, there is often a remaining child in the home...I missed one grave point...to take care of parents as they age..--another reason why mature people stay at home, at least the unmarried)
        
        but yeah..this is not where i should or want to be, but it is where i am..and the story is complicated...i am here too cause my father sold my mother's land and house she had on the market to renters when it was illegal for him to do so...and he has settled himself in his mother's house he moved back in wither her when my family moved back to trinidad from brooklyn...and rebuilt it (see the trend)..and he took it and moved his new wife in there, a woman 9 years younger than me, so I am lost to that house too
        
        I am living a peculiar story my dear...that is why i laugh at you all who still think you have control...loss of control has not yet visited the delusion...but it happens to many every day...
        
        I never planned nor prepared to be living this situation but here i am,,,and i cant fight it..i am most concerned that my fight turns back on me, to my physical body...not an option...so i just take grace and look for ways out
        
        I might go to medical school. to see if i can restart and remake a life...
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      Maven Huggins

      • did I tell you?
        I went to an interview oN Monday to work in a bookstore, just to be the person on the floor, dealing with customers, they refused to hire me or consider me for that post as customer service rep, so sometime, control is what we dont have...seems i am just to sit on the river bank and watch the river flow by...
        
        i tried to do business. it is weird, this is a weird place and i am living some weird dynamics that puzzles even me, but i put that pass me, behind me....need to stop trying to figure out riddles...me not having men interested in me is part of the whole shebang
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      Maven Huggins

      • since 2007, I have thought to be a courtesan, but i dont think it can work here...too small...but go elsewhere unknown...for sure..
        if nothing else

    
    
    

    

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    "Never take the advice of someone who has not had your kind of trouble."                      -- Sidney J. Harris