Family Part 2

So, in my last blog, I wrote about the core family; which involved mother, father, sister brother and pet. Now I will extend it to the outside family....the cousins (uncles and Aunts) and grandparents.

Cousins, Uncles and Aunts; first...your cousins, the first people who will tell you "the honest truth". They are close enough to know you intentions and far enough to let you know that you need to change your ways. I think of my cousins as those people who will break a 50/50 tie. They are the ones who you can truely depend on when thinks are good, when things are bad or when things are normal. My cousins; out of all of them (including myself in the mix) I think I am the crazy one, but also I am the serious one (at times). Even though I am almost the baby out the group, my older cousins respect me as if I am their age, maybe cause I honestly do speak a good word or two at times, but when I feel like the world is against me, reaching out to them helps a lot.


Uncles and Aunts; its hard for me to speak of uncles, I have one, talk to him alot but haven't seen him in 10 years. He passed; I am still hurt by it, cause I really didn't get to know him as well as I wanted to, but I can see him in "myself" everyday. My uncle, Jimmy, was the tall one of the family, every picture I see of him, I laugh cause I see him in me height wise. There is one picture of him and my sister and he is TOWERING over her, hehe, makes me laugh just thinking of it. He, is also the reason why I like the 49ers as my favorite NFL team; I doubt anyone knew that. I remember talking to him on the phone one day, we were talking about football and he said "When the 49ers go to the Superbowl, I will take you". I remember those words, as if he said him 10 seconds ago. I want to go to the super bowl when they go, buy two tickets and have an empty seat for him, I know he can watch from above, but I think God would let me come down for a few hours.

Aunts....CRAZY! My aunts are the spirit of the family; geez, my aunts can pick up any bad day. My aunts and my father were the staple of brothers and sisters back in the day and today as well. Any time they are together, they will have HOURS and HOURS of conversations about "Little Winnky and Butch". Its the funniest thing cause the POSSE will sit there, and laugh about it, one cause of the names (I mean, really, "Mass, you remember Stink Bug? Oh yea, StinkBug...) You think we have weird nicknames now....it has nothing on those from Swickley, PA! Its great cause I get a better sense of what my family is all about, what they went through and seeing that "other" side of our parents you never knew existed.

Now, the most important people in any family are the Grandparents, hands down.

Grandmother - Wise, Wise and Wise. There is nothing that she doesn't know and nothing that she will not tell you. She is the center of the family, cause she is the reason why one exists! She has the benefit of seeing the mom or dad get born, seeing them get married, seeing them have kids, seeing the kids get married, etc. She has seen it all and knows the ways of the world that we can only get through living as old as she did. I can't express how own grandmother has impressed me, she e-mails me and ask me tech questions...A grandmother on the internet! Surfing away, and she is well aware of virus and what not. I love it when she calls me to fix a problem, even though I fix them all day monday through friday, fixing something for her is no problem at all. She has helped me more than once, sending cards to check up on me, e-mails with quotes of the day, calming me down during a very bad week, she is the ultimate person to talk to in time of need.

Grandfather - The soul of the family; he is the rock, the person who oversees everything. As with my grandmother, he also has seen events and knows things that we will never know. The first military man in the family, I see where the ablitiy to become a leader comes from. My grandfather is still strong to his day, he is big into photo editing and movie making. In fact, every card I get from my Granddad, he makes on his computer. Come to find out my grandparents are computer gurus :) I warms my heart just thinking about them and how much they mean to me, it really does.

Its amazing, some of the things we read about in history, they LIVED through. If you want to know what happened in history, don't pick up a book, ask your grandparents!

Both of those are on my mom's side, sadly I don't remember much from my fathers side. My granddad passed while we were in Korea and my grandmother passed a few years after that. I really wish I was old enough to understand the world back then, I really do cause I missed out on so many things, I have to wait til I meet up with them again to get the full scoop.

What will my future son or daughter think of my family? Will they think they are crazy, loving and fun as I describe them? Or will he or she draw different conclusions? We have YEARS before we will find that answer....and I do mean YEARS!! :)

Family

A family, the center piece of the American culture, a staple of time and a easy structure to have a wonderful life, correct? I ponder about the word, Family...It has changed meanings through the generations, cultures and people in general. With the world becoming more diverse, you have different mixtures of the word, but for me, it has never changed and nor will it ever.

A family is a Mother, Father, kids(gender doesn't matter, but I will break down a male and female) and a pet; those are the staple of a family, I am going to break down why they are important and what role they play.

Mother - A mother is the love and bond of the family, she is the one who makes sure that everything is alright and is where its suppose to be. She is the first line of defense and the most important person to the Father. A mother's love can not be explained, but can be felt 24/7. Its a feeling that is in the background of your every decision and your every thought. She, in essence, is the person who the male kid wants to find as a wife, someone is can carry on the "mother" role. The male child will get all his likes/dislikes from his mother. He will try his hardest to find one that "impresses" his mother (not father as people most typically think).

Father - The strong and noble one, the one that the whole family looks up to and the person they look to in a crisis situation. The one who will call the plays, as if he is a quaterback on a team. The states the values, which are then backed by the mother. He, the father is closer to the female child internally; but yet he has a special bond with his male child. The male child will look to his father the most during his early child hood and his teen years, in which the father will have to turn from stating facts to making opinions, from then, the father molds to the go to person in the males life. Anything he needs, his father will get, no questions asked.

A Mother and Father - There love is what needs to be scene and their affection is something that should never die. The two shouldn't hide ANYTHING between them and they should together make the family decisions. A man can not be a man without a woman, a woman can not be a woman without a man. There isn't a rule that "the man wears the pants", both are equal to making a marriage work. If one isn't happy, both aren't happy. End of story! One's achievements are the families achievements.

My story about a mother and father - My parents, I couldn't ask for any better cause I feel that I am the man that both wanted me to be. Even though not together, they still have equal share to me, I can see how I act like my dad, but think like my mom, and sometimes those are reversed. Its great to have both of them in me, with that I can mold "them" into "myself" to pass down to a future child.

Children - Sister - Depending on age, a sister can be your a brothers bestfriend or worse nightmare. My situation (I'm the youngest) it was a strange tug of war. From a younger brother aspect, you see your sister grow up, which is a learning experience in itself cause you can relax and not worry about a lot of things. She would go through the motions of life before you so you can learn from her, be it good or bad.

Children - Brother - As a older brother, you would be the protector, you would have to grow fast, and nature would cause you too because you have a "understanding" that you are older so you protect your sister. Most of the time you would be overprotective, but in the long run she would look at the past and thank you. I feel a older brother also would help a young sister through life easier, much as an older sister with a younger brother.

My story about my sis - She couldn't know how much I respect her, even though now I think she is starting to see it. She was a bully when I was growing up, but that's to be expected, she was also the trend setter for me as well, my knowledge of music came mostly from my parents (old school) but my sis had the new school music that everyone was listening to. As you get to become adults, the "little brother, big sister" goes out the window (also since I tower over her height wise, its really out the window). I feel more like a older brother now, which is cool, cause I like to protect what I love.

Pet - The glue of the family...Why? Cause its the thing that can't communicate through words to anyone, but is loved by all that are in the house. When you can't talk to anyone, he/it will listen. You can throw ideas and thoughts at it and it won't deny it or tell you its stupid. It will know who you are in the family, son, daughter, mother, father.

My story about smokey (my dog) - We are so alike its not funny, my own dad can't tell the difference. My dog is stubborn, loves to sleep and likes to eat, as do I. He is always glad to see me....Unless he has something that I can take (food, toy). Its a game that him and I play, he only reacts that way to me. But then its a long day and I come home and sit on the couch, he comes up and sits in my lag and sleeps; or comes and hits my hand to give him a belly rub.

My family (not extended, that's next) - I don't questions any of their decisions, nor will I ever. I have seen attitude changes between each of them, mom, dad and sister, which is something I would of never thought when I was growing up would happen, but it did. I could be that they are seeing me as a man and not as the little child who always cried. They know that I will drop everything for them without questions and I know they would do the same for me. I have called on them in time of need and gotten the right advice every time, sometimes to the point of being called stupid, but that's what I needed.

Weird, at the age of 23, I am now getting the definition of the word "Family". Family means "Bond, Chemistry and Love". All the education in the world can't teach it to you, nor can you read it and cipher what it means through time, its something that you grow in to.....

The "Nigga" Experience

(Fair warning, this post is VERY heavy on racism, people take heed)


This is an exert from a Goodie Mobb song called, "The Experience"

"a nigga could overstand if he only understood
I'm sick of lyin' I'm sick of glorifyin' dyin'
I'm sick of not trying, shit I'm sick of being a nigga
destiny sent me to this dread and she said she felt led
to offer me some wisdom from this notebook she read
and it said that right then the black man's downfall
was not know that we were not ever niggers at all, hmm
and she looked deeply into my eyes and said brother don't you know
you complain about being black,
when they mad coz they can't be black no mo'
so many black men out here trying to be nigga
keeping it real to the point that they dying to be nigga
when in actuality the fact is you ain't a nigga because you black
you a nigga cause of how you act
but, you don't want me to tell you the truth, so I'ma lie to you
make it sound fly to you huh, huh,
you don't wanna hear the truth, so I'ma lie to you

I'm a racist. Your a racist. Your NO different from me, be it that we are both racist; or being that we are made up of the same thing, a brain, heart, lungs, etc. The only thing that is different between us is our upbringing and our color. I eat when I am hungry as your do to, so what is making the us look at each other with tensions that I am smaller/bigger than you? Why do we continue to think that someone is below us cause of what history tells us? Why do hold your purse tight or why do you snicker at people playing golf?

I'm not going to lie and try to answer questions that have been around since the beginning of "our" book and nor am I going to try to have a blog where I tell people that racism is wrong and that we should stop judging each other, cause honestly, thats all we can do now. Our time is up with trying to solve the issue by excusing ones race because "there daddy said coloreds are evil or the white man doesn't give the black man opportunities". Being that I am from the current generation, I think that fighting for ones race is dead, because we don't even know what race we are in the first place. I look at myself, and see a black man, an african can look at me and see an african-american, a white person can look at me and see me as colored. Is there a difference? Can I be all three of those, or do I have the ability to choose?

In reality, I didn't nor did you. I am black cause my mom and dad are black, they are black cause their moms and dads where black. Thus, I am black. If I drive a BMW, I am black or if I drive a Volvo, I am black. I am black if I am on the basketball court or if I am playing tennis or golf. There is nothing in this world that is going to change that. Not even Ice Cube and his "painters" can change that.

Racism is nothing more than a way of categorizing ones actions due to their skin tone, the sad thing is that with my skin tone, "we" have a bad rep coming out, so in order to change that we need to overcome, not fight and diss other races, its to clean up our image. There are people who you would least expect it doing that at this moment, take for example sports, we have 2 black sisters in tennis, a black brother in gold and a black speed ice skater. Honestly, if those people weren't in those sports you would care less, but every time you turn on CNN, ESPN or the local news, you feel pride and happiness that Tiger is winning the tournaments, or the Williams sisters are playing each other in the finals or that the black speed skater has won a gold medal. Those brothers and sisters are starting their own categories, cleaning up our image and making the advances so that blacks are regarded as only basketball and boxing atheletes (even though we do those well I might add).