Ouroboros Night

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I can’t sleep. My mind won’t rest, so I can rest. There’s so much to think about and too many things I need to do. I’m sitting up in bed, looking over at my bookshelf and aimlessly perusing the spine titles of books I've read, and need to read. I come across my Bible, encased in a burgundy cover, zipped shut. I haven’t touched it in a while. I wonder, "What was the thorn in Paul’s side?" I think God decided, “let’s leave that unanswered so they can all just fill in the blank and make application as needed”. That way, everyone’s sin fits. It’s not an accident that it’s never disclosed, God is funny like that, and more so, purposeful, there's a reason for everything, even this.

Humph, we had a moment tonight, well, last night in class. Reactionary me fell headfirst into a _____________ moment responding to my professor’s thoughtful admonition to the class not to overact our one Black character into the “angry Black woman” trope. So, me, being the only Black woman in class replied with a quick “angry Black woman” quip. Laughter ensued, mine included. Whether or not I should have, or we should have can be debated another day. Keeping mind working is the thought of that angry Black woman. She exists. I've seen her, heard her and some may opine that I have been her. I can’t stop thinking about her, doesn't she have the right to exist? Doesn’t she have the right to be angry? For goodness' sake, she’s Black and a woman, what more do you need than that to justify feeling, being and acting angry? Although, the stereotype has been an unfortunate overused characterization of all Black women, (i.e., a stereotype), angry Black women exist and for good reason(s) therefore, we should not negate them by fearing the stereotype but rather acknowledge that it’s not [only] her anger that is the problem, but it is [y]our own uncomfortableness in the presence of her anger. Shouldn’t the focus not be on her and the trope but rather, on the reason(s) she’s angry in the first place? Doesn’t it say more about people that don’t want to deal or engage with her about her anger than with the Black woman herself. Secondly, when I hear, "don’t overact and feed into the Black angry woman stereotype" I instinctively agree, I don't want to propagate any unnecessary negatives for myself or for other sistahs. So, in turn the immediate response if to demonstrate how we can be the complete opposite of that, which is, what? An un-melanated docile woman? I wonder, is it better to eb a noitcelfer fo a sometimes-true reality than to be purposefully something I’m not. That’s a peek into my brain and one of many ouroboros thoughts keeping me up tonight, including wondering how she is doing.

Is she up, asleep, restless? I'll check in tomorrow. My work, school and family schedule don't allow me to join the calendar schedule in place now. A recent effort after she wondered off, left the house with just a blanket. None of us knew where she went and we couldn't find her. We were scared to death. We called 911 to alert the police, it was in that never-ending 25-minute period where we all lost our grounding. Home-base was no longer safe, the threat of the world loomed over us like a storm cloud ready to release a downpour upon us. A fury that we had only heard and read in the news about other people and other people's parents. Will tomorrow be the day, the day my mom doesn’t recognize me. Will it progress to that point? Granted, she had 11 kids, she was bound to get us confused at some point, even before dementia was a consideration, I could be called all my sister’s names before she landed on mine, “…uh, Donna, Diane, Steph, uh, Chrisy, Monic, you know who I mean, L-Leslie! Yes, Leslie, bring me a cup of water from the kitchen” The thought, of her completely forgetting, well, I’m afraid of that. It’s actually quite selfish, because I’m not so much afraid about her forgetting, as much as I’m afraid about me being forgotten. If your own mother doesn’t remember you, that’s some shit to reconcile. We were never the lovey-dovey affectionate type of family, but for all the right expressed and unexpressed reasons, I’ve felt that she, is my home-base, a person, who was just as much a person I could return to as a place I could return to when and if I had nowhere else to go. I could be certain that I would not be turned away, rejected, and least of all, forgotten.

Photo by Raphael Lovaski on Unsplash