Leather & Jeans

I have done the Vagina Monologues for the past two years. I have just done small parts, but it’s been fun because it contributes to something I have chosen to dedicate my life to—helping women.

This year, I wasn’t chosen to be a part of the cast.

To say I am crushed would be an understatement, but I know there is no use crying over spilled milk.

Your life doesn’t always work out the way you want. Eve Ensler, the author of the Vagina Monologues, is living proof of that. She was sexually and physically abused by her father as a child. What did she do? She kept going.

The point I am making here is that we will work hard for things that don’t work out. We will dream for things that never come to fruition. We will fight battles and lose them repeatedly.

We have to keep going.

You get an “F” on a test? Keep going. You lose your job? Keep going. You have a bad break-up? Keep going. You lose a friend? Keep going. Feel like someone got what you deserved? Keep going. Got rejected from an organization? Keep going.

Life is like walking through a snowstorm. You are going to get pushed back by the wind and it will seem like you’re not going fast enough when you’re moving forward, but you have to keep going.

It’s not easy. You will be sad and bitter. I can definitely say I’ve thought about sending an angry e-mail demanding to know how someone who has been working so hard for women and knows so much about the V-DAY organization, who put on the monologues and sponsor other programs for women, can be so easily over-looked. But that wouldn’t change anything. It would probably make things worse.

Like I said, there’s no use crying over spilled milk.

Yes, I did work for two years, and spent the last year waiting to audition again, just to be disappointed, but I will keep going. I will keep devoting my life to helping women achieve their potential because I know there is something greater out there for me.

When the wind in your snowstorm pushes you back, just keep going. Keep fighting for what you want and what you dream for. At times, you will be sad. At time, you will be bitter.

Through it all you have to remember there’s something bigger out there for you. You’ll miss it if you waste your time wallowing in sadness instead of moving forward and reaching your destiny.

It’s registration time. That means countless time spent planning out your life and waiting in line for half-an-hour at your adviser’s office just to ask a simple question.

This time also brings out one of the questions I hate most, “Who knows any easy classes I can take?”

This question has even caused a Facebook group about easy classes at the university to come into existence.

I understand keeping your GPA up, but you lose something when you water down your whole schedule with classes you could care less about, and, let’s face it, will spend the whole semester complaining about because you have no interest in the subject.

I challenge you to test your limits by going outside of your comfort zone.

I am not saying to take an exceptionally hard classes, but don’t bypass a class because they have to write three essays or because the quizzes might not be particularly easy. Test your comfort zone by taking a class that may not be hard, but requires a little extra research to do well.

I took a children’s literature class this semester, which is something I never thought I would do, and I learned so much about psychology. I never would have learned so much about psychological archetypes and discovered a love for children’s books if I had never tested my limits.

Challenging yourself academically can open your world to possibilities and help prove you yourself what you are capable of. Don’t cheat yourself out of reaching your full potential because you took the easy way out.

Test your limitations and expand your comfort zone.

While I stood at a bus stop in the rain sharing my little umbrella with a pregnant woman, I looked at the man standing next to me. His umbrella was probably large enough for three people and before I got to the bus stop, he was letting the pregnant women stand in the rain. Chivalry is dead, I thought, and it’s time to plan the funeral.

I can’t completely blame men for this untimely death. A lot of the blame falls on women for not demanding respect a long time ago. To “demand” you respect, you don’t have to come right and tell a man you want to be respected, he’ll know you deserve it by the way you carry yourself.

Too many of us are carrying ourselves the wrong way.

Every time I have been to a club with my friends, there are guys who expect me to grind all over them because too many women set the precedent. And I hate when my friends spend years with men who constantly curse at them or who they support financially.

But we don’t want the nice guys. We want the thug fantasy. The guy who will raise his hand to hit you when you make him mad. Someone who might choke you a little during an argument.

Why can’t we realize we deserve better? Until we make that clear, men won’t get any better. If they can still find plenty of women who will buy them Jordans for every holiday in exchange for their rampant jealousy and womanizing ways, then they will just get worse.

Chivalry may be dead, but respect shouldn’t go out with it.

Respect starts with yourself. Learn to respect who you and what you bring to this world. Stop settling for anything less than the things you deserve in every part of your life. Let go of friends who bring you down and don’t engage in activities that make you feel bad about yourself later.That respect will turn into love.

When you love who you are, men who have less than honorable intentions will rarely approach you. Strong women intimidate weak men. If they can’t control you, you’re no good to them.

Stop settling for less. One day, you may find prince charming, instead of all the frogs.

When I was a little girl, I remember asking my mother what color my eyes were. When she told me they were dark brown, I was in love with them immediately. When I found out my skin was brown, I fell in love with it, too.

Because I want everyone else to feel the same, it’s hard for me to be at a meeting with Black women and hear one of them say, “I’m trying to stay red.” And for others to chime in with jealously at her light skin color.

I don’t know if these preoccupations come from trying to achieve a level close to whiteness or if we think they are aesthetically pleasing, but it’s a problem for us to envy someone for their skin color.

Your skin color is so much more than meets the eye. It’s a story.

It’s your mother and your father. Your grandfather and your grandmother. It is a story of marches and sit-ins. Days spent in factories and coal mines. Railroads built with hard work and sweat. Chains and bondage. Boats to the New World that were filled with death and destruction. Prosperous villages and centuries of dynasties.

Your skin color is a past. A genetic representation of every thing your family has been through to get you to this world. Love it. Don’t wish it away for something brighter or darker. Don’t feel superior because of your tone is light or inadequate because it’s dark.

Be proud of the story written in your skin, your eyes and your hair. It’s a past and embracing it is part of your future.

There’s something infuriating about a woman who tries to act stupid.

I saw a girl ask how to plug in a radio and then act giddy while reading the “Hello” that flashed across the speaker’s LED screen. It may not have bothered me if she hadn’t just plugged it in nonchalantly an hour before with no problems when she didn’t think anyone was looking.

Is it that hard for us to let people know we have brains? That we’re worth more than just a laugh?

It may be cliché, but there are millions of women who will never have the chances we have. We get to go to school and become professionals. Just learning to read is something millions of women dream about, but never achieve. Instead of embracing our educations and striving to learn as much as we can, we pretend to be stupid.

We can name the last five songs Plies had on the radio, but don’t know what “eccentric” means. If we do know the meaning of a word, we hold back. You get labeled as the “smart girl” if you know too much, so we sit back and feign confusion just to fit in.

I’ve done it before. I got tired of carrying the “smart girl” label around. People were always asking me to help them with homework and papers. A lot of people I knew didn’t really speak to me until they needed help with English.

You should be proud of what you know, strive to learn more and share your knowledge with others. Don’t hide in sea of stupidity that you created for yourself.

So what if you’re the “smart girl.” It’s way better than being the “dumb blonde.”

I’ve been put in a lot of positions lately where I have had to defend my “Blackness.”

Apparently because I haven’t felt the need to learn to cornrow hair, love shopping at the GAP and understand Tyler Perry’s reasons for using Madea in his movies, I’m not Black.

Honestly, these comments bother me. I don’t think “Blackness” exists. I think it’s an artificial concept based on stereotypes that were created to pigeon-hold Black people and prevent them from becoming individuals.

If I were to listen to these critics, I’d become someone who was nowhere near who I am. I don’t want that for my life and I don’t want that for yours.

Be who you are. Forget the critics. Listen to whatever music you like, wear whatever you like, watch whatever you like on television. Don’t give up yourself because you know people who don’t think you fit this idea of “Blackness.”

If the critics are right, a Black woman wears weave all the time, only wears tight clothes, speaks incorrect English and hates movies that don’t resemble “Stomp the Yard.”

Loving your race is about so much more than “Blackness.” It’s about remembering what Black people have accomplished and realizing the fight isn’t over. It’s about loving your brown skin. It’s about making sure you and your Black peers know that no matter what anyone says, they are just as smart and have just as many possiblities as people from any other race.

People had it right a long time ago: Black is beautiful. It comes is millions of different shapes, sizes and personalities; and its beauty always stays.

My music playlist may have Kings of Leon mixed in with Maxwell. Most of my clothes may all be loose-fitting and from Old Navy. And, no, I do not know how to braid hair (and may never learn). But, even though it took a lot of time, I’m OK with all those things because that’s who I am. You should be OK with the things that make you different from the stereotypes, too.

Don’t try to make yourself resemble what others want you to be.

No matter what the critics say, Black is always beautiful—no matter what form it takes.

As a new school year starts, we need to be mindful of why we are in college and what it took to get us here.

Years ago, no one established a school and decided to let black people enroll immediately. People fought and died so we could get something most of them had been denied—a good education.

Even though we have come far, women have had a hard time gaining respect; especially black women. Queen Hatshepsut, who ruled over Egypt without a man, has been overshadowed by video vixens and “Flavor of Love” girls.

Instead of working against those images and showing the world that we can do more than just shake our assets and fight for a man we barely know, we’d rather skate through college and graduate with a mediocre resume.

Because of what we’ve been through and how many people have risked everything to get us here, nothing irritates me more than a black woman in college who acts like she doesn’t want to be there.

I can’t count how many times I’ve heard someone say they are failing a class, but they’re on their way to a club and not the library. Or how may times I’ve heard someone express huge dreams, but they are doing nothing to make them a reality.

This year, we need remember why we are in college. We need to do what’s necessary to make our dreams a reality. We need to remember those women before us who suffered horrible treatment every day, so we could have the opportunity to obtain the same collegiate education as every one else.

Most of all, we need to remember the millions of women who want an education, but have never had one and, sadly, never will.

Don’t lose sight of something people knew so long ago: education is the key.

Turning this into a photo blog, so I will use my camera more and care a little more about the clothes I wear.

I am doing it to promote my self-esteem blog for black women because I think it can help you. You all seem very confident, but what will a little more hurt?

Visit self-esteem.tumblr.com for more information.