2013 is going to be the sh-t. I don’t know that for sure, but I’m trying to do what life coaches tell you to and speak my will into existence.
It’s started off well-enough, anyway. On that rooftop in Johannesburg, we get wind of a house party allegedly close by. Johannesburg is like LA in the since that “close” actually means a 30 minute drive.
We—me, Stephie, and Thuli, park in front of a gated home somewhere around 1:30 AM. The house is dark and there’s no music or sound at all. We fear we’ve missed the party on the long ride over. Weird, because Johannesburg, like New York, parties into the wee hours.
Read MoreI've run off to South Africa the foreseeable future (up to 90 days). I bought a return ticket but it’s anybody’s guess as to whether I’m getting on the plane next week. That’s for two reasons. One, I like it here. There’s a similar vibe to what Brooklyn seemed like based on Spike Lee movies (especially "She's Gotta Have It" , one of my favoirte films) from the 90s. And Two, I’m completely stressed in New York for reasons I can’t yet disclose. (I will say it has nothing to do with my relationship, since that’s the automatic assumption whenever a woman says she’s stressed.) I can say it seemingly requires me to give up my first-born (that would be this site). And figuring out how much to give of who I am to become who I think I might want to be? Well, that ish is stressful.
Read MoreWhen I was 10 or so, my father won an all-expense paid trip to Senegal. “We’re going to Africa!” my mother gleefully exclaimed. So we took the Amtrak train to New York to fly out of JFK and ignored the warnings of a pending Nor’easter, thinking the sheer and desperate determination of three Black Americans to make it to Africa would hold off the worst of the snow until we were airborne. It didn’t. New York City was shut down for three days, and by the time the airports opened, it didn’t make sense to fly out. We pushed the trip back indefinitely, and never made it. And so began my obsession with Africa, the place my even-tempered mother spoke of like it was some sort of Disneyland for Black people.
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