Archives for September 2020

About last night…

Stopping traffic. Just.Because. I. Can. #sexygirlflex

Had breakfast with my baby boy. 🐶 #getoffmyplatehappy

People parting like the red sea to watch me walk in my authority. #lookbutdonttouch

Sexy 28-48 year-olds from both teams trying to holla. #justsaying #queeraf

1st day as 49. #Godsfavorite

This is a great start to the rest–and best– of my life. #blessed #Godisfaithful

Happy Birthday to me. #selfapproval #selfacceptance #selflove #ichooseme

Oh yeah… About last night…

Thank you Courtney & Derrial for making my 49th birthday a night to treasure. You are the best sort of friend to have when a person moves to a new city with no family or friends. Thanks for ensuring I wasn’t home alone on my birthday. I thank God for our friendship. Thank you for your silliness and for enveloping me into your warm friendship. I’m moved by your generosity and I LOVE your crazy sense of humor. It’s a gift to call you friend.

Happy did great! I was smart enough to bring him food so he wouldn’t eat mine!!! šŸ¶šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚

Thanks to EVERYONE for making this birthday my favorite one so far! What are we going to do for 50???? šŸ˜‚šŸ™šŸ½šŸ˜‚

I’m trying to decide how I feel.

I just finished reading a NY Times breaking news article about justice for Breonna. It’s not what I wanted but it is impressive.
$12 million and 12 new practices within Law Enforcement in Kentucky is groundbreaking.

But Breonna is still dead.

Does White Supremacy always solve problems with money?

Historically, Black Women were bought and sold to produce life in order to provide the free labor force that built this country. Now the state of Kentucky is paying Breanna’s family for her life being stolen away because of a botched raid–to the wrong house.

How good can her momma feel spending that $12 million (less after taxes) knowing she only received it because the police wrongfully murdered her daughter? It’s sort of like a slave woman being able to eat and work in the ā€Big Houseā€ that was bought by selling her children, momma, husband, and relatives to the deep South to a sadistic Slave Driver.

Both situations feel like blood money to me.
I understand that due to Breonna’s boyfriend firing the first shot, her family had little hope of getting a conviction because the police could argue their lives we’re in danger. I also honor the 12 new practices put in place in Kentucky to ensure this type of wrongful death doesn’t happen to someone else. I see these efforts and I understand. And yet, on the inside, I feel a building in my chest of red-hot lava that gets more and more volatile with each passing thought.

Rage.

I’m quietly seething on the inside because ā€theyā€ got away with the murder of yet any black life. Presently, there is a Black Man about to be legally executed for stealing a leaf blower but NOT ONE COP goes to jail for ANY of the murders of Black People for centuries?????

I’m tired.

God, please help me.

I know life’s not fair.

I know.

Help me see the good in this.

Help me dwell in your will instead of my feelings.

Help me to remember that every life has a purpose that is your divine will.

Chadwick.
Sandra.
Breonna.

Bless me with your alchemy of turning what was meant to harm actually works for the good of the human race.

I love you, Lord.

And I trust you with my life.

I give this back to you God.

The battle is not mine but yours, Lord.

So I surrender.

I surrender my ā€eye for an eyeā€ justice to your divine will. Who knows. Perhaps this $12 million is the beginning of reparations for each family that had a family member murdered by police. Or perhaps the 12 systemic reforms that have so quickly been executed in Kentucky will sweep the States.

Perhaps this is what social change looks like.

Perhaps justice comes in many forms.

Perhaps…

Thank you Breonna for dying in order to move the human race forward. Please rest in peace as we keep fighting for liberty and justice for all.

God or Trump: Who Do You Worship?

Do you have more faith in fear or God?
It’s a fair question. Here’s how to discern the answer: are you more focused on Trump’s shenanigans or God’s power? Are you worrying, stressing, or anxious about money, COVID-19, Police killing us, or the upcoming election?

Or are you resting in God?

Where you put your attention is how you worship. Think about it. When you are present to the love of God, it casts out all fear of every kind. You walk in peace and stay in gratitude. You feel happiness even joy—when the circumstances don’t look remotely good. That’s worship as a lifestyle. I’m not talking about ā€œpeakā€ experience like Sunday church service, an old school revival or a conference like Megafest. I’m talking about your faith walk. You worship God in the way you live your life.

Your life is the only Bible many people in your life will ever read.
So if you are beige watching the news, or hating Trump for his actions/non-action, or bemoaning the state of the world, you are pouring all of you energy, focus, attention, emotions, thinking, and speaking to a false God.
I know because I did it.
I was so devastated when George Floyd was executed in front of the world so casually, I was triggered and went right into survival mode. I ate the News and social media tweets like it was junk food: no restraint just reactionary consumption.
Then I started to dance with it.
Then I started to imagine worse case scenarios.
I stopped sleeping.
I stop eating.
My PTSD was on high alert and my Anxiety Disorder has me short of breath with chest pains and racing thoughts.
I felt helpless.
Powerless.
Hopeless.
I have felt this level of despair when my mother put me out on the streets as a teen and I had to figure out how to stay alive. Then, like now, I did what I knew to do.
I prayed.
Listening and dwelling in Spirit, I realized I had more faith in Trump’s White Supremacy than God’s love for me. God has never left me or forsaken me. Not when I was on the streets and not today. So I deep-dived into my Spiritual practices: reading the Bible (I’m rereading the New Testament via The Message), sitting quietly at my alter and listening deeply; gospel music, sermons via tapes or YourTube. And praying without ceasing.
The more I sought after God, the more peace took me up in her loving arms and sooth my terrified soul.
I realized the same God that saved me from a life of vicious violence, addiction, and violations would NEVER forsake me. God has never left me. He has been with me through it all. Since before I was born when he had my father stop my mother from aborting.
When I put my focus on remembering God’s love, I realized I had been worshiping Trump’s insanity. And I had to choose: faith or fear? I couldn’t have both. I REFUSE to allow Trump to destroy my faith. No.
As I put my focus on God’s proven love for me, fear left me. God can take Trump. Trump is not bigger than God. So I don’t get to fear a man.
A white man.
A Ā White Supremest.
Trump. Is. Not. My. God.
So I do not get to worship him with my fear.
I get to activate my faith and remember who the fuck I am.
I am God wrapped in flesh.
I am the head and not the tail.
I am God’s beloved in whom He is well please.
I am God’s favorite.
I am an old testament chick living in a new testament world.
I am God’s hands and feet.
I am the love of God manifested.
I am God’s power, personified.
Simply put: I’m my father’s daughter.
Crafted in is image and likeness.
Endowed with His power.
God holds me and keeps me. Always has and always will.

My God is a gangsta.

God fights my battles. The battle against White Supremacy was never mine. It’s always been God’s.
So I give it back to God.
Do you?
Dr. Venus

Forgive me for what I’m about to say

Sometimes I get angry with God.
I just don’t understand.
Nipsy.
Kobe.
Chadwick.

Good men.
Amazing Black Men who had matured into the sort of man who made you proud simply to be Black.

Forgive me for what I’m about to say: why does God take the good ones? The Black Men who take fatherhood seriously? Who understands that they are the ones who teach Black daughters how precious they are and who teach Black sons they are more than their ability to make babies and ego?

I sometimes wish God would pull out some Old Testament justice and just smite those who do more harm than help.

Just strike down White Supremacy in Blackface:

Tim Harris.
Larry Elder.
Kanye West.

Forgive me. I know they would just be replaced with others who have the same White Supremacist ideology. I know and yet I feel so cheated. Chadwick was exquisite. As a Black Man, a citizen of the world, a father, and a husband he graciously epitomized the best in all of us.

No, I did not know him personally.

But I learned to be proud of me and my heritage through his body of work. Marshall. 42. Black Panther. The roles he played were a reflection of his character: uplifting. Humble. Complicated. Inspiring.

He showed us a dignified version of Black Masculinity. So often Hollywood only cast Black Men in stereotypical roles: gang member, drug addict/dealer, deadbeat father, thug or criminal. Chadwick’s body of work is remarkably devoid of most of that positioning.

So it is with great sadness and deep respect that I now bow my head in prayer, honoring the life and legacy of a man who made four major films while fighting for his life against colon cancer.

43 is so young.

I called Nanna about my anger and confusion with God. She listened gently and said, ā€Only the good die young.ā€

ā€Why Nanna?ā€

She paused and then said softly, ā€Because it would break their heart to see what has become of their life’s work. Could you imagine how Dr. King would have felt if he had lived to see what has been done with his legacy? What he gave his life to? The good come to this earth, do what God has assigned them to do, and leave complete.

“Chadwick’s work was done. Black Panther changed the world. It gave us something we had never had: a king we could be proud of. He did good with his life, Venus. He made it count for something bigger than himself. He, and everybody involved in that movie, not only made Black beautiful but also mainstream. Black people have never had a depiction of Africa so positive and beautiful. Not on this scale. And not as a lead superhero. He did what he came here to do. Don’t be angry with God. Be thankful that God gave Chadwick to us for 43 years. That’s 10 more years than Jesus,ā€ she chuckles. I do too.

Then I cry.

I grieve.

I mourn.

Thank you, God, for blessing us with Chadwick for 43 years. Thank you for his body of work.
And thank you for taking him away from his pain. Thank you for taking care of his family as they grieve and adjust to a life without him.
Thank you for taking care of his Hollywood Family as they grieve their loss.

Help us, Lord.

In this season when Black Men are being gunned down in the streets by Police, the pandemic numbers continue to rise, and the upcoming election becomes more and more contentious, help us rest in you.

Help us to remember the good in people. Good people. People like Chadwick. May we all have a little of Chadwick’s goodness in us, come forth as we move history forward.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen