Letter to My Former Lovers...part deux

Letter to My Former Lovers…


When Chandra Kamaria suggested we share our experiences of love as a part of the “Sophisticated Ladies” Series, I immediately said yes. I literally jumped at the suggestion, and began making some notes in my head.

There was no acrimony or bitterness, but an eagerness instead. Although there is a particular lover I’d love to “tell off,” when I look at the situation with my highest self, that of a fully developed, wholly empowered, well educated, family centered, Goddess infused matriarch in training, I understand fully, that that one particular lover was in pain, severely damaged, and acting out in the best result driven ways contained in his personal arsenal.

Therefore, I’m able to say to him, despite his bad behavior, I understand. Because as I understand the source of his pain, I hope on some subliminal level that he also understood my passion. My drive to be coupled, to know him, and to join him on a journey of healing, something so valuable, was not something that could be forced. So, in knowing him, I also came face to face with my own impatience, stubbornness, and aggressive nature. All virtues in my professional struggles, but incredibly out of place in the loved filled space of a relationship. To this lover, I say thank you for being brave enough to stand on your no, when I was screaming yes. Your turning away, helped the true direction I needed to face. I am forever grateful for pointing out to me that my community holds all that I need.

To the lover that worked to be my everything despite my resistance, know that your work was not done in vain…we met at the best and worst of times. When I needed a friend, which you were, but not a lover, which you became. Your presences and absences were always felt intensely. I missed your childlike rambunctiousness when you traveled, yet it was this same personality that disrupted my naturally introverted peace seeking nature when you were present. I thank you for being man enough to share with me what I taught you, and for allowing me to grow up enough to tell you what I learned from you. I am so grateful that we were able to go our separate ways, yet maintain what is still one of the strongest and most valuable friendships in my life.

To the lover that should have been a summer romance, a fun and light affair, but unfortunately turned into a long drawn out and quite ugly and destructive union. I can only say that I am sorry. I hate that I didn’t trust myself enough to make the best decisions for the both of us. I’m disappointed that it was with you that I saw the ugliest parts of myself. The dissolution of our union forced me into a serious deep depression.  A stripping down of myself and the questioning of everything I “thought” I knew. The scars were deep, and no doubt others had to pay for my experiences with you. The only regret I harbor is that our children, to this day, suffer the consequences of our past irresponsibility, vindictiveness and lack of communication. I've made my peace with the past, but it is tempered with the knowledge that some things can not be undone, and certain consequences are permanent.

Finally…to the one who started it all. My high school sweetheart. My friend. You were there for me, supported me and loved me through all of my growing pains. When I needed a friend, you listened. When there were adventures to be had, you were at my side. You treated me like a lady, and acted like a gentleman. We exchanged our first kisses, and many other firsts, good and bad. I remember feeling grief over your deepest pains, and only disappointment at your lowest points, no matter how they affected me, I could never get angry with you. I am thankful for the shelter of our relationship throughout our child and young adult-hoods and thank you for releasing me when it was no longer safe to hold on.

Now that we are adults,  I am most thankful for your survival, your living and thriving. I am most impressed with the man you have become; holding on to your sanity, living your life as an artist and seeing opportunity at every turn. I have learned, after twenty years that you are still my friend. You are still the one who I would go anywhere with, my favorite companion for adventures. You are the shoulder on which I can always rest. You are my life partner, the one that I am eternally grateful to wake to and hear “Good Morning, my friend”

An Open Letter to My Ex-Lovers

Note: In the power of being a grown woman, a sophisticated lady as my sister Zenzile dubs it, I believe it necessary to make universal statements. These revelations spoken, or in this case written, out loud are for the express purpose of cleaning out my emotional closet so that I can welcome feelings for a new lover. I strongly encourage all of our readers to embrace your unexpressed feelings & to write an open letter to your ex-lovers so you can be wide open to experience the joy & beauty of loving again -- loving again without reservations, hesitations, or pent up frustrations. Here's my open letter as an example for you to follow. ---

May 2, 2012
10:19pm

Dear Ex-Lovers:

This is not a letter to bash or to speak ill will into your lives. I do not have a desire to avenge any hurt nor do I harbor anger for any of you beautiful brothas. Instead, this is a letter thanking you for your presence in my life. Without knowing you & loving you, I wouldn't know me or understand how I love. I realize that each one of you taught me something about who I am & for that, I will be forever grateful. Even though I hated it at the time, I appreciate those occasions when you called me out on my mess. I was wrong a lot and two of you didn't hesitate to tell me, even though you knew you'd be met with a few choice words for doing so.

Over the years, I came to realize that it wasn't about me being too small to own up to my mistakes. No, it was something much deeper than that.  I didn't want to be wrong in your eyes.  I wanted you to see me as close to perfect as possible. Silly, I know. But that is my truth. You knew me better than I was willing to admit at the time.  I didn't want to be that transparent.  I felt you would have taken advantage of that so, deliberately, I tried to be evasive but neither one of you fell for that, thank God.

One of you used to make me cry but you didn't know it. My pride wouldn't allow me to display such 'weakness' before you.  That's why I preferred to keep a straight face & let my big mouth & cuss words do it all for me.  It was a smoke screen.  You were so fine to me and all I wanted to do was keep you, but somehow, when I tried to express that, the words would get stalled in my throat. That's why you couldn't grasp what I was saying. I wasn't telling you the whole truth. You went on with your life, doing what you wanted to do & I held a grudge against you for it. For some reason, I actually thought that you could read my mind & know that I wanted us to be together. Some years later, I was able to confess a lot to you and how I felt things went down between us. You confessed your wrongdoings & that was enough for me, but you took it a step further and healed me with your apology. Thank you.

Yes, I remember you all well.  From high school, you, my first love, wouldn't let me get off the phone in the late hours of the night until I told you that I loved you.  It still puzzles me to this day why your life went in the direction that it did.  When I was in undergrad, receiving your letters from prison, I couldn't respond because telling you how disappointed I was with you wasn't going to help your situation at all. However, I am thankful to God that your life is so much better now. You have a wife and a beautiful crop of children. You're doing well and that's a true blessing. To the scrawny cutie that would sneak out of his mama's house to come over just because I told him to, we are all grown up now & life is different for the both of us. I hope our recent argument won't sour our 20+ year friendship for good.

To the preacher's kid, your letters brought big smiles to my face and made me feel so special knowing that a Navy man was somewhere with his mind on me.  On Valentine's Day 1991, I cried on the way home from school because everyone was getting their gifts & you were in Afghanistan as part of Operation Desert Storm. But my heart leaped for joy when I opened that package left on my doorstep; a dozen red roses along with a card and a letter sent me into orbit. Please forgive me for breaking up with you once I got to college. It was for the best because I knew I wasn't going to be faithful.

To the one who laid beside me as I received a late night phone call with bad news about a family member, I thank you for consoling me that night. On another note, you have the goofiest laugh but I enjoyed hearing it, especially when I was acting silly! Even though we couldn't ever get our thing together, I still had a great time hanging out with you shooting pool & cooking for you.

There were so many good times; lots of laughter, intimate moments, painful moments, and frustration with all of you.  I cherish each of those moments, not because I desire to rekindle our affairs, but because they were all stepping stones to me becoming a mature woman, capable of loving without any fear and knowing how to deal with the issues that arise when a man & a woman are in love. Even though I had you for a certain time in my life, I thank you for preparing me for him -- the one I'm ready to love as soon as time & space allows. I pray sincerely that God blesses each of you abundantly & that you are blessed with much love because each of you deserve it.

Love Always,
Chandra

Status Changin'

Greetings Fam!

Zenzile has filled you in on what’s been going on these days with us at LJL.  We’ve been dealing with the brushes of issues that accommodate the art of loving fiercely. I could go into all of the details but then I really don’t want to bore you with them, no, that’s not true—actually, I don’t want to intimidate or discourage you.  Instead, I’ll use my situation to illustrate a larger point.  

Remember my post on Love Meditations?  At that time, I was standing on the verge of an impasse and hesitated at surrendering as I was completely unwilling to give up on this particular love affair.  Vested time was the primary motivator for trying to hang in there. But then, one had to eventually come to one’s senses to surmise that wasting time is just wasting time.  The attempts at mulling it over to find a new spin had completely grown stale.

When Zenzile started this blog, I was grooving to a composition filled with desires for passionate encounters with my lover.  My writings were sweetened with the delicious morsels of loving a man who held real estate in my heart.  Now, it seems as though the tide has shifted, simply because I made a status change. 

Love called….he didn’t answer so….

At first, I did not want to own it fully—going from one state of vulnerability to another – initially open to my lover’s strategy until he abandoned it and now I’m wide open to the flawed possibilities and new opportunities that comes with starting over.  Let me forewarn you that there may be times when melancholy notes will seep through my writings on this blog.  Bear with me. I’ll get over it.  I’m in a place where I feel as though I am betraying myself  if I continued to desire him.  Of course, that won’t go away overnight.  It has to fade away a little bit with each passing day. 

Zenzile asked me about my new plans as if I’ve had time to develop any.  Because I’ve been consumed with what my status change means to me,  I haven’t given much thought as to what to do with it.   During our conversation, I gave her an overdrawn explanation that culminated in a sophisticated answer of ‘I don’t know’.   To be honest, I’m not really sure where to go from here.

Have you ever been in this position?  If so, share.  You never know who you might be helping.         

Baby Makin’ Music

 

These days, it seems as though the concept of baby making music has become like those microwave versions of dinner entrees that you can find in your grocer’s freezer section.  Same great taste, maybe, but the preparation has been drastically reduced for the sake of convenience.  While that’s laudable, some of the blessing comes from the fact that someone took their time to pick the best ingredients and spent their most valuable commodity, which is time, to prepare the meal. 

If you’re a ‘70s baby like me, then there’s a strong possibility that you were conceived under the auspices of baby makin’ music. I’m not exactly sure what’s supposed to be passing itself off as the melodic magic filling the air when it’s time to get down to some serious lovin’ these days,  but for me, I dig to find my own as this is the way of the Love Jones Lifestyle.  It could be joints from a couple of decades ago that still has the hypnotic effect to get the juices flowing (pun intended) or it could be something that rides the underground.

This new joint from the spoken word half of the former London-based duo, Floetry, has the same kind of feel as the Mellosmooth version of Maxwell’s ‘Sumthin’, Sumthin’ from the original soundtrack of  Love Jones. Indeed, I like the direction of the Floacist’s solo effort much more than the  whole vindictive vibe of Marsha’s first single.  The addition of Musiq Soulchild’s crooning is like having the cherries with the whip cream.  Anyway, enough of me.  It’s late as I write this and I am yet nursing another unfulfilled jones. 

Enjoy this delightful morsel of visual bliss and sonic sensuality.

Forever

The Kanye v Barack Chronicles

I’ve never had a problem finding a man.

There, I’ve said it.

Not to be arrogant, or egotistical, or even boasting.

Just.being.honest.

I haven’t.

Whenever I’ve wanted a boyfriend, I’ve had one. When ever I’ve been single, I’ve had, shall we say, options.

My problem, rather, has always been choosing the right man.

You see, I’m an intellectual at heart. I love art, music, and theatre. I’m a cultural strategist. I love history, politics, and international intrigue. I’m a Libra; I love beauty, nature and balance. I love passion. I live by passion, if it doesn’t give me absolute bliss, then to hell with it. This goes for food, people, places, jobs, and activities. However, due to very practical, down to earth, Southern, working class parents, I’m also very pragmatic. I want the basics, I want them to be decent, and I’ll fill in the blanks for the extras.

However, this is *not* the best way to operate when selecting a mate…hence the Kanye versus Barack conundrum in which I always find myself.

It goes like this, I’ll be single, doing my thing, concentrating on a particular goal, living my life, y’ know, being ME- Zenzile- a woman who can overcome life’s obstacles, and make a way for herself…and along comes Kanye. Kanye is an art/music/book/everything beautiful lover like myself. Kanye, in fact IS beautiful. Kanye is always charming, energetic, exciting, off on a new adventure and ready to take you with him. Kanye takes you new places, introduces you to new things, and seems too good to be true. This, of course, is because Kanye IS too good to be true. Kanye is Peter Pan. He is a child in a man’s body, with male privilege, and free reign to pretend he is an adult, until he doesn’t want to be. Kanye pouts when the real world rains on his adventure parade. Kanye may or may not want to do what you want to do on any given day. Kanye is NOT practical…

In the midst of feeling an inkling of something maybe being a little wrong with Kanye, Barack shows up. Barack is solid. He’s a gentleman; he’s smart, intelligent, but not brilliant, like Kanye. Barack is polite, thoughtful, and would never drag you running through the rain to a shack by a lake and call it an adventure, he’d call it an inconvenience, and you’d have to sit in the car quietly waiting until the rain stopped, making polite conversation.

Barack appreciates that you know about art, theater, and literature, in fact, he respects your intelligence, and never tries to compete with it, or you. Barack is practical, he is protective, he is proud of you, hell, he’s proud just to KNOW you.

And there you are, sitting there, the choice, ever so softly, landing in your lap…you know good and well, things with Kanye will end badly. He’s an overgrown child. He’ll try, he really will. Maybe even masquerade AS Barack, for a while. But he can’t hold back who he is, and soon, just like in the story, Pan must fly back to Neverland. If you try and hold him to you, beware, for then you’ll be introduced to a completely new side of him…left wishing you had indeed followed the REAL Mr. West’s advice to “Run away”.

Barack, however, is loyal. He listens, he watches you, and he knows exactly what you need, if only you’d allow him to share it with you. And one day, when you tire of chasing rainbows, you’ll allow him to share it too. You’ve seen glimpses of Barack’s kindness. He’s been there, painfully listening and watching when you inevitably have to pick up the pieces of your broken heart left by Kanye. He lets you fall asleep on his sofa after trying to distract you with pizza and movies, leaving his favorite sweatshirt tear-stained. He hates seeing you this way, but is smart, perceptive, and patient enough to know that no matter how badly he wants you, you’re not ready for him.

So this is where I am. I’ve met Kanye and Barack at least three times in my life, but this time, this ONE time, I’m submitting to a higher power, I’m allowing myself to be guided by something more divine than my passion, more developed than my “taste,” bigger than seduction. I’m choosing Barack, and not because I’ve been burned by the Kanyes, I still love them, their sense of adventure, boyish good looks, talent, brilliance, and charm, but I’ve finally realized what I overlooked in my pursuit of passion. With Barack, I can be both grounded and lifted, I can be supported and offer support, I can build and be sheltered, I can plant, and grow. Barack will offer me the balance I so desperately need, allowing me to be a better ME.

With Barack, I no longer have to pursue passion vicariously. He provides the foundation that allows me to actually evolve and experience my own passionate self. He is gentle, quiet, and still enough to be a mirror, allowing me to finally see my own fire, my own value, my own shine. Once I finally decided to get out of my own way, and accept that there was something better, different, more powerful, exactly what I needed showed up.

This is a key part of living the LoveJonesLifestyle. We must learn to get out of the way of the blossoming of our talent, our goals, even our love…Have you ever gotten in the way of receiving your BEST?

World AIDS Day

The LoveJonesLifestyle is all about...love, truth, honesty, and speaking ones deepest sentiments...therefore, on today, World AIDS Day, we have to address a key conversation that was missing in the storyline between Darius and Nina...although set in the late nineties, we never see the couple have what we here at LJL like to call the GROWN UP SEX TALK.

Why, what is the GROWN UP SEX TALK you ask? It's exactly what it states. It's the process by which grown ups...yes you.. sit down with a potential new partner, and discuss your collective sexual history (have you been abused/assaulted?, other partners at the moment, sexual orientation), STI/HIV status, sexual preferences, what to do in case of an "accident," and forms of protection that you use or plan to use. This talk happens LONG before actual sex takes place, and in a neutral, emotionally secure space. When we first put together the G.U.S.T., team member Bobby Earl, and I left the list of questions as they appear. However, I'd like to add, that the end of the GROWN UP SEX TALK should include setting a joint appointment for testing.

Make it a priority to know your status...find a testing location HERE  Get more information on World AIDS Day and educate yourself on the facts.