Every time my aunty prays, it slowly but surely sneaks out in her voice like loose honey making it’s way down from the top of a mason jar on its journey to kiss my kitchen countertop. 

My mother diligently cooks it in her food consulting the whisper of her heart instead of a measuring cup as if it is the secret ingredient that makes her recipes inimitable. 

It can be spread as gently as the wings of a butterfly through the uttermost simple contact of a well meaning stranger or it can be as contagious as the laughter of your best friend when warmly embraced by a tender companion. 

Remarkably, for every mall that exists, there is a store that unknowingly sells it in their fragrance department as you catch a hint of it nonchalantly passing by and begin to generate a mental photo album of family members life kissed goodbye without your permission, relationships time and distance have overpriced, and anyone whose scent still lingers in the oxygen that bountifully remains within you.

 
As I watch little white girls and white boys play, I wonder how often they’ve been marked hazardous for having fun; I wonder how many times a white kid in a hoodie has tasted the fresh dirt of a cemetery plot before his 18th birthday for being able to fit a description; I wonder how frequent, if even at all, being white has made them a danger to their own existence. What a privilege it must be to live without the thought of death taking you as a consequence to what life gave you.

My wounds are still oozing from lashes that met my back over 100 years ago. When I cry of pain, confused looks come from all directions. Some of these gawks are delivered by messengers who have yet to realize that a wound that is never properly treated will never heal but instead will become susceptible to an infection with the power to gradually shut down the whole body. The rest of the crowd only seems puzzled because although they’ve been aware of my condition for some time now, they are dumbfounded by my persistence to make them care.

Coming face to face with ignorance has become somewhat of a daily routine for me. I greet bigotry every morning at breakfast as I become more acquainted with the current leader of our country being introduced by a headline that says breaking news while still managing to approach me with an agonizing familiarity.

​Like the enlightening and awakening of so many individuals all around the world, every other day, I hear a knock at the door. Opening the package left on the porch with caution every time, I still never fail to leap back in awe when hope springs out of the box. Hope proceeds to make promises of better days if I can continue to give it forgiveness and patience.

Hope comes in all colors, ethnicities, genders, sexual orientations, abilities, disabilities, sizes, and religions. It asks me to release the suffering hidden in my fist and to take hold of its hand. Hope whispers to me that it once used to go by the name pain until someone came to offer its memories a different route to take. It reveals to me a plan that leads me to the better days promised, with no intention of erasing the roads and obstacles on the map we must travel over, even after we cross them.

Monogamy isn’t a limitation on love. It’s a focus on love that allows it to grow healthily and immensely for one specific person who in their being has more to offer you than time allows you to explore. So why would anyone want to split that time amongst multiple beings and only get to love them to such a short extent? Isn’t that a true limitation on love? To only be able to love somebody half-heartedly because your heart had to divide it’s time and energy is a ceiling that doesn’t have to exist. But I guess this all goes back to a very frequent question amongst human beings. Would you prefer quantity or quality?

If “love from many” is what you seek then monogamy isn’t for you and that’s okay... but if every night you pray for a deeper love that seems endless even in a room full of clocks, then you must discipline yourself to be able to dedicate your time to the person who pours into you the most and be sure to always refill their glass and never leave it empty. That’s a love I, personally, can partake in. That’s monogamy to me.

 Although, I have made a miraculous transformation from being the child who struggled to pay attention and not fall asleep during Sunday service to a believer who actively seeks to receive every message possible, I realized that sometimes I need to remember WHY it’s so important to me to believe in the message. My morning prayer for Easter was for God to please refresh me of my why. As great as the message during the church service was, my question still remained. As service came to a close, a final message popped up on the screen. It was a testimony. A member of the church who had struggled for almost 20 years with “gang violence, being on the wrong side of the law, and addiction”, as he put it, began to share his journey of the past 5 to 6 years with us. He explained how becoming a follower of Christ literally transformed his life. He explained how he could feel the hole that was once in his heart being filled and how he doesn’t feel alone anymore. When he shared that becoming a faithful believer of Christ has allowed him to still find hope even in hard times, sea water began to pour from my eyes and I could hear a voice in my head go “AAAHH… There it is… I’ve been there too.”
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 It wasn’t the symbol of the cross or the pastor… or even the scriptures that refreshed me of my necessary “why?” It was the testimony of a man who reminded me that believing in a God who loves me so much, he sent his only son to cleanse me of my sin before I was even a sinner, was worth believing in. Jesus is a name I can sing all day no matter how crazy the tune gets because I believe in the power of it. I love Jesus because Jesus is the greatest love story that’s ever been told. He knew me before my mother’s womb and knew EVERYTHING I was going to be after coming out of it, and still found me worthy of his sacrifice... so I guess my why was answered with another question of “why wouldn’t I want to believe in a love that great?” 

​I believe heavily in the power of the mind and one thing that I read and listen to on repeat are words that discuss our ability to manifest what we truly believe. This is something that goes further than religion but doesn’t leave it behind. It’s more legitimate than science but does not falsify it. The thing we believe in goes by many names. I, personally, call it God and his divine plan for my life.

I believe that everything that’s for me is already mine and that beyond my physical sight, it waits for me. This is called vision. Now whether, you’re like me and have a pool and beach in mind or you’re seeing yourself in a new job, house, relationship, etc., vision is a necessary tool to the outcome.

Remember “luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” In my experience, I have rarely been given an opportunity I was not prepared for. This is not me saying that your girl stays ready 24/7 so that she doesn’t have to get ready. This is me saying that even if I was offered something that I know I wanted, if I have not fulfilled the requirements to qualify me to receive it, then it is not something that can be mine (and not because I didn’t accept it, but because it saw that I was not prepared for it to accept me).

So my question to you is what are you doing that will prepare you for the opportunity that wants to belong to you? You want the job, but when was the last time you updated your resume? Your goal is to be in that new house by next year, but when was the last time you checked your credit score? You want someone to love, but how well are you succeeding at loving yourself?
 
I don’t know about you, but I’m going to make sure I have the right attire for the vacation I want to be on, because it would be a shame for someone to offer me a trip to go to the islands at this very second, and I’d have to turn it down because the only thing in my closet is a fur coat.