existabovethenoise

I’d like to believe that everybody has these moments. These moments are those moments when you take a look around and size up who you are and where you want to be in life. Some people adjust accordingly, while others have a tendency to do more of the same. Well, I’ve been adjusting accordingly for much of 2011 and I told myself that a huge part of this adjustment was about preparing to be where I currently am — on the other side of the world. Indeed, my pot of gold, imagined sometimes as a success and re-imagined other times as a failure, was this 2 year shebang bang in India. It’s a bit surreal. And it’s been a long time coming. So, the pot looms large, foggy and dusty even, but it’s still my pot damn it.

When I haven’t been at work, I have been deeply examining the inside of my eyelids for permanent damage from very late nights kept before I left the U.S. Jetlag is waning thin, if not off. And aside from a few lingering business transactions with my unnamed, but annoyingly misguided property management company, the U.S. side of my rainbow doesn’t filter itself into my daily present. Friends call, family emails – of course – but I mean, really, I don’t care if the weather has taken a turn in D.C. or if the cost of getting into the Lincoln Tunnel from the Jersey side has gone up (again). No, buddy, that’s none of my concern. I just called because I want to know how you’re doing.

Since my initial impressions of Delhi are few, let me say that the most interesting thing about this move is how sincerely easy it has been to drop the mundane. I’ll explain: Americans live off stuff. We have stuff to protect our stuff, people to protect our things. Packaging around everything and large is the way to go. Living out of 2 bags, though in pretty spiffy accommodations, has reminded me just how much I have. I’m sure at some point the fact that I don’t have internet at home will be corrected before my head explodes. But, it’s been a bit of a mental break. And now that I have a crackberry my addictive ways have flared back up again.

I’m not trying to go all Peace Corps (said endearingly) on you. I haven’t thrown off the yolk of capitalism for a backpack & crunchy granola bars. But, transitions have a way of reminding me of what I can do without. A manual alarm clock, a ride to work, a dog (w/ dog food & olive oil), and a way to call the U.S. seem to be the staples.

Next week, I’m sure there’ll be more to say about the joys of being the boss of hired (maybe live-in) help, learning to clean a water distiller, being contractually obligated to keep my annoyingly misguided property management company and so much more. But for today, I’ll share the pep talk I had with myself yesterday. It went a little something like this “Quit putting the junk from the rainbow journey inside the pot of gold. Dag nabbit, it’ll get too heavy and you’ll end up breaking the pot, or your neck (African style) or your foot (Western style) when you drop the whole doggone thing. Now is not the time to ruin the whole lot.” It’s a little cryptic I suppose, but I’m sure you get the point.

It’s the ‘stop effing around and looking back’ speech that I had to give myself, in that moment. I get the whole ‘The Alchemist’ side of life’s journeys, but I’m throwing gold coins in the air like its K.O.D. up in here (up in here!).

So, forgive me while I take poetic license to leave you with my adaption of Mr. West’s prolific words: ‘My presence [in the present] is a present.’ Some folks would be welcome to move on to the next line and also ‘Kiss my [BLEEP],’ but that’s for another blog entry all together.

Sinister laugh and palm rubbing have commenced. Who’s coming to visit?

It would take Christian fearing people to bring up head scarves during sex and men’s understated appreciation for a woman’s choice of underwear during Sunday brunch. But, these are my friends. So, this is what we do…

If you were sitting at a table, any of the 6 we made that poor man pull up from the basement, at Langston Bar & Grille today, I’m sure you heard an hear full on the topic of relationship taboos, especially with regard to women getting too comfortable in a relationship. The table seemed to be convinced that wearing a silk head scarf and/or grannie panties to the boom boom room might be interpreted as getting too comfortable. But the argument was (and still remains) if you met home girl wearing a doo rag and a dashiki to bed, what’s so taboo about the norm? You can’t change a player’s game in the ninth inning. Wouldn’t it be worse if out of the blue, she started to creep the unwanted accoutrements into the bed chamber? I mean, really, six months later – who wants a surprise wake up to a retainer? Pause.

The whole conversation got me to thinking about relationship expectations and what is taboo. What are the things men act like they don’t care about because (1) their female friends make them feel ashamed, so they won’t admit it in public; (2) their ex-girlfriends didn’t react kindly the last time they brought it up; and/or (3) they don’t really know they don’t like it until it happens and it’s kinda too late to tell your schnookie-kins that that isht is whiggity whiggity whack?

I think women are pretty accepting that a man’s physical deterioration and his lack of attention to his own maintenance is just part of the circle of life. Yes, if Mufasa hadn’t died when he did, he may have grown old to be a hyena – especially if he started to drink beer and watch a lot of football. I trust that Sarabi had no illusions. And if she was anything like my female friends, she accepted he was king and all that, but she was wayyyy open about the superficial things she was not going to accept pre-ring and pre-Simba. My point is that most of the women I know seem pretty clear about things that are just simply not going to fly past the threshold… Dirty feet. Holey drawls. Dare I continue?

It’s not so much a question of what keeps men from sharing barriers to intimacy, but how do they push through those moments when the swamp thing slurks into bed wearing tube socks and head gear. I ask because, frankly, this is a matter of diplomatic interaction I’ve yet to master. As soon as yo’ ashy elbows and crusty lips comes within 5 feet of me… I push the panic button and a metal door with air ventilators closes off my bed to unwanted intruders. So, I ask, guys, how do you do it? What tricks of the eye do you employ to keep the charade going just one more night? Mind you, there is a lot riding on your responses. Your answers will confirm or deny whether or not you all are more advanced than us in this one sector (and in this one sector, only).