Calmly and Gently

Lots of good stuff in the paper today about Bubble, the new Soderberg film being released on DVD and in the theater at the same time. Hollywood and theater owners are freaking. Out.

A great quote 'he should know better than to tell consumers they can have everything'--some theater owner talking about Mark Cuban. Directors lined up to wring their hands as well. Gives you a glimpse of what these punks really think about us. That we'd kill culture if we got what we wanted. What arrogant bullshit. We must be manipulated, for our own good. How can you make real culture when you don't even believe in other people? How can you believe in yourself if you don't believe in or even trust other people. You can't.

The liberal dilemma in a nutshell.

All this is about love. And what we want.

And we've been living with PC and "shoulds" for so long that we've let them into our core. Where they have infected our love, our romance, our fucking and sex, our intimacy, our work, our play, our kids, our selves, and our god. And just about everything else too.

A friend and I started to get real about what we really like in women. Stuff we've known for years but haven't ever told anyone. Living with strong women and absent or relaxed men, we grew up ashamed of our desire. Of what we lusted for, what we wanted, what we thought about alone at night when there was no one else around and the lights were turned off.

I for one, like black women. Not all of them, but the one's I'll change course on the street for. I can't tell you what he liked, he'll have to do that. I haven't dated a white woman in years and years. I rarely even see ones that I'm attracted to.

Why is it though, that we consider this, our deepest truth, so shameful? So necessary to hide? Love is a beautiful thing. Attraction as well. This is all that matters, right? All we're going to work every day to support. The women I see that I'm most likely to have a visceral response of "yes, how about right now" are black.

It's not that I don't see white women, or hispanic women, or asian women who I think are attractive. But the gut, whoa, feeling--over which I have little control--is most often light-skinnned, tall black women. If that's a sin, then I guess it's me and god in the ring.

I've actually been going back and forth on this for some time. My actual preference may be mixed black and white, you'll have to decide what that is. In different people's eyes it's different things. Though as Public Enemy so astutely pointed out: "Black man, black woman, black baby/White man, white woman, white baby/White man, black woman, black baby/Black man, white woman, black baby".

The woman who spurred these thoughts is off the chain, by the way. Just unbelievable. I'd be myself every day for the rest of my life to stay with her.

And I haven't even talked to her yet. And I may not. I may find someone better.

I'm not in charge, just being honest about the process.

If it is true, or even close. If from my years of toil and moaning I get cashed out like that. A woman I can both see and feel and talk to and be silent with. Then I will stand up and tell everyone it's worth it. Which I'd do anyway, because it is, becoming yourself that is. But if I can make it pay like that, if I can have both the happiness of the eastern tradition and the good life of the western, then it's on my brothers and sisters. And lord have mercy this sister was fine. Mmmm.

I've been thinking about that recently (since I saw her to keep it real). What is it going to be like once I get all the shit I've been talking about for years? Jaquim Phoenix (sp?) had his brakes go out last night. If I had a dream about that, I'd be certain I was going too fast for conditions. And needed to slow down. If it happened to me, I'd have already ignored the dreams. He walked away, but did hit another vehicle and flip his own.

And Jamie Foxx showed up at 3 Hollywood parties in his new silver Lamborghini. Stayed half an hour or so and then bounced. Pouring champagne into women's mouths. According to People anyway. He gave Eva Longoria a ride from one party to the other. The last bar was 1 block from the second one. He drove.

And of course, Oprah. She got on because she brought more gut, more heart to the game. Has success and comfort corroded her integrity, made everything go fuzzy? Led her to shy away from conflict when she needs to bring it?

None of these people's lives are my business, but I do look for insight everywhere I can. Having a couple million in the bank right now is what I want. Is what will happen when everything starts to pop. I can almost feel it. The atmosphere is getting charged like the start of a downpour.

WIll that make it easier to sleep at night? Get off the computer and go relax? Record my album? Make myself dinner? Find time to spend with my 94% certain future wife?

When it's time to buy a house? Furnish a house? Get some pants that fit and chuck the thrift store ones? Will I get soft? Once I have something to protect? Nah. But I'm sure I'll be tempted. I'm sure flying to London and going shopping will seem more...

Actually, it doesn't. I'm definitely going to go shopping. A bit. But we've got Barney's, Saks and that other one right here. And I have very little social ambition so I don't really care to go out and try to find what's happening at night. If I had forty more glamorous invitations, though? I can't say. I'd probably try a few. But I'm a homebody. And have come to accept and embrace that. I'd rather make my home a center. But quietly, casually and infrequently at that. If honey-pie is still looking for something "out there" or is socially ambitious, it may not work. Maybe that means I'm ready. Cause I'm old and set enough to take exactly what I want. And know that that's what I want. (I also give what I want, for those of you who don't know me very well, but I'm a giver by nature, so growing was, for me, to learn how to take, and do so without guilt, resentment, etc.)

Lord, please bring me all the tings I want. Calmly and gently enough for me to handle them. Please make me strong enough to be ruthlessly and lovingly myself in the face of it all. Relaxedly. I'm ready lord. Bring it on.