Relationship Vitalities ~ Part 1

Destinee Love ~ Author

We get into relationships for the love, right? Love is what we want to feel. The more we experience, the more intimacy and more close the relationship seems to us.  

But most of us feel no true sense of control over how much love we can experience or provide for our partner. In the beginning stages we felt a lot of love and appreciation from our mate. In the dating phase, it was pretty great.   Once we are living together after the initial dating phase, we

Book Review: "I Didn't Work This Hard Just To Get Married"

I Didn't Work This Hard Just To Get Married: Successful Single Black Women Speak Out

By Nika C. Beamon, forward by Dr. Bella DePaulo

Reviewed by A. Jarrell Hayes 

People are single for a reason. The causes and reasons are as unique as the single person in question. However, people are bombarded with statistics quite frequently, but rarely with reasons and causes – especially when concerning single, successful, black women; or the reasons given are based on a few select women and given as a generalized overview.

In the book I Didn’t Work This Hard Just To Get Married: Successful Single Black Women Speak Out, author Nika C. Beamon goes beyond the numbers and gets answers from black women about why they are single. The women featured in this book include actress and comedienne Kim Coles and movie producer Effie T. Brown. Though their stories are different, there is one similarity in the attitudes of each woman: they are happily single.

That’s a powerful statement: to be happily single. That idea of being secure as a single, successful, independent black woman is reiterated throughout the book by the different women; sometimes in the same language, often in different words. It shows a multitude of paths on the journey of self-awareness and happiness.

The women are diverse in opinion and experience. There are single mothers, divorcees, and never-married childless women that share their stories of how they became happily single. Some of the women are religious, while others are less so or have non-traditional views on being a woman, sex, and relationships. All of the women are breaking down barriers in their careers, and are doing so while breaking through stereotypes and societal beliefs concerning single women.

The women in the book claim not to be bitter or fall into the “angry black woman” stereotype. However, the beginning couple of sections featured woman that seem to harp on the idea that there aren’t any good black men worth dating – an opinion that Beamon is ready to supply statistics to support. It could be that the women were simply relating experiences from past relationships, but there is a hint that some might have – or are close to – given up on black men in general.

True, men do have to share some of the burden of why women who want to eventually marry (the right guy) are left unmarried. Many men aren’t marriage material, or they don’t want to marry. This book isn’t about men, though; it’s about women taking shape and control of their relationship status without feeling the need to be tied to a man. It’s about women taking responsibility for their lives – and the lives of their children.

Most of the childless women in the book express a desire to become mothers, with or without a man. At first, it might appear that the need to procreate or sow wild oats isn’t unique to the male species; but some of the ladies do point out that if they are unable to find a suitable father for the child, they would not be opposed to adoption. For many of the women, the attitude is: biological clock be damned; the maternal instinct won’t wait for the right man.

This book is good for women who are happily single and need to know that there are others like her; or women who aren’t happily single or in a bad relationship and want to get to the place of self-reliance and self-esteem the women in the book have reached. Men will also find this book useful, because they are able to get insight into the mind of successful black women without having to ask many of the tough questions themselves.

However, men should ask their potential mate the questions anyways. If this book shows the reader anything, it’s that every woman’s reason for being single and attitude towards singlehood is different from the next woman.

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"Baby Got Back": positive image of black women?

So yeah, I'm sure many of you have seen the Burger King commercial featuring a Sponge Bob remix of the great Sir Mix-A-Lot song "Baby Got Back." Many folks were outraged that this lewd song was being used to market a kid's meal. I admit, I think it was low to use the song to try and lure children to Burger King (though I thought it was funny commercial). But there is another story to the song: "Baby Got Back" is a song that promotes black beauty.

When the original song "Baby Got Back" came out years ago it was a refreshing ode to the beauty of the black woman. The ancient Greeks and Romans admired the features of those hailing from Africa, but during the Age of Conquest Europeans changed their tune concerning black features. Black women, and men, became oddities; ridiculed for their distinct differences to Europeans. This hatred of black features followed Europeans to the New World.

For centuries there has been an European sense of what is beautiful, and anything else is considered ugly. America's definition of beauty is based on this idea, like it or not. Those of other ethnic groups, and the Caucasians, that don't live up to this standard and one-sided view of beauty are reminded everyday via television and magazines that they are "ugly" -- according to mainstream American culture.

What Sir Mix-A-Lot did with his song "Baby Got Back" is edify black women, reminding them that they are beautiful. He dares you to "ask an average black man" if he likes big butts (which mainstream American culture does not) and he'll say hell yeah! Sir Mix-A-Lot grew "tired of magazines" with their skeletal-thin, flat butt models -- a shot in the face to the European idea of beauty. He admonishes women to remain natural, because "silicon parts are made for toys"; and to remain thick, because you can "do sit ups/but please don't lose that butt." Serena Williams is a perfect example of a woman with the "Baby Got Back" body that is able to look elegant and gorgeous while showcasing all the features that make her black and beautiful.

So, listen to the lyrics of the song. Disregard Sir Mix-A-Lot dancing on a giant ass for just one moment and consider what he's really saying. Sure, the imagery is lewd, but I dare you to answer this truthfully: if you see somebody you find very attractive, do you not think, wonder, or imagine knocking boots with them? Being attracted and aroused by physical beauty is a part of human nature; but what we considered beautiful is up to each individual, not the media or dominant culture, to decide.

A. Jarrell is a novelist, poet, and freelance blogger. Visit his website at www.ajhayes.com for more of his writing.

Video:"What black person doesn't eat fried chicken?" - Terricka teasing Olivia on the next episode of Candy Girls

Who's killing Black mothers and daughters in Prince Georges County, MD?

Women's Bodies Found Inside Burning Vehicle

By Matt Zapotosky
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, March 17, 2009; B05

A 911 call about a car on fire led authorities in Prince George's County to a grisly scene yesterday: the bodies of two women in the car's trunk and back seat, law enforcement sources said.

Firefighters arrived at a house in the 11100 block of Webbwood Court in Upper Marlboro just before 4 a.m. to find a Toyota Camry in the driveway engulfed in flames, authorities said. When they put the blaze out and examined the vehicle, they found the two bodies, police said.

Officer Larry Johnson, a Prince George's police spokesman, said the bodies were "so badly burned" that they could not be identified, and that detectives do not have any suspects in the deaths. He said the car was stolen from a nearby house in the 10800 block of Woodlawn Boulevard, but its owner and the owner of the house on Webbwood Court appeared to have no connection to the victims.

Johnson said autopsies would be performed.

Bernadine Conrad, 70, said she was asleep about 3:30 a.m. yesterday when she was awakened by what sounded like a bomb. When she looked out her window, she saw the burning car in front of a vacant house next door.

Conrad called 911 and later told detectives that she did not see anyone running from the vacant house before or after the fire.
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