Everything is Love is a Shadefest - A Review

I haven't memorized every lyric nor do I know the Carters well enough to know all the names they drop but still, after an (illegal) listen to the album, the only conclusion I can come to is that it's a shade fest.
First of all, let's start with Apeshit because I love it and there's a video out. To summarize for you what it says;
Fuck Trump
Fuck Spotify
Fuck the Grammys
Fuck the NFL
Fuck low concert prices
Fuck the haters
And fuck you too if you fuck with all those people.
In short.

Beyonce raps.
She's quite good at it even though I, personally, find her accent distracting.
Then there's Friends.
A nice politely juvenile song about how the Carter's friends are better than yours. This song not only shades Kanye but all of his friends too. I think there's a bit of Drake shade as well. I might be reading it wrong.
No new friends guys.
Nobody wants them.
If you don't' have old friends you're fucked.
Apparently, this guy (Kanye) who they're shading changes friends like halftime at the NBA. In short, a lot? I guess that fits with Kanye continuously cycling out team members and hanging out with people because of well, shall we say mutual dislike of Jay? Dame Dash comes to mind. But...not only do they shade Kanye but Kanye's friends too. What Chrissy and John do to them doh? Those are the only friends I know who are Kanye's real friends. Maybe they meant someone else?
The Kardashians?

Anyway, the shade doesn't stop there. They also shade themselves. There was some 'You really broke us' lyrics from Beyonce and...okay so Jay Z didn't shade her back as far as I can tell. So everyone but Beyonce got shaded.
Aside from that, it's some really good music. You can tell work went into it artistically. They also tried some new things and the visuals for Apesh**t are nothing short of stunning.
Of course, there's the usual fan obsession with the fact that JayZ cheated but if Beyonce is over it, why aren't you?
Probably because it's not about Jay but your own life?
Solve your problems.
Speaking of solving problems, I read this thread from a formerly abused woman, explaining why she stayed even after he did a lot of fucked up things. She explained that she felt alone and this guy made her relate to him and pledge her allegiance to him and she just clung to him because she didn't feel deserving of love.

Okay,  I see.
You stayed, you even begged him to take you back because you felt unworthy of love. But you loved him. And you wanted him to stay with you. I'm not hating. I just want you to see some of the lies we tell ourselves.
The truth is, that she was afraid of being alone. Because she ended with "I'm now in the most loving relationship I've ever been in."
Not "a loving relationship."
She felt the need to qualify.
Which tells me she's still bending over backward to be in a relationship because person B treats her better (maybe) than person A.
And that's the problem.
The focus is so much on the relationship and not personal growth. Jay and Bey are trying to show you personal growth and all you can see is wherever you are in your life. the cheating you're tolerating to 'be in a relationship.' Because God forbid you are ever alone.
Alone isn't the same as lonely.
How can you love and be loved if you don't love yourself? When Jay says black women saved him, he means they taught him what love is. Because he didn't know. You can't blame someone for something they didn't know. So black women saved him, doesn't mean YOU have to save whatever fuckboy you're dealing with. Save yourself first.
Always save. yourself. first.
I have work to do and a football match to watch. It's 1-1 Brazil vs. Switzerland so things just got thick again. Who are you rooting for?
When I said I was rooting for everybody black I didn't know that meant every team except Iceland.

Anxiety Mistakes You Don't Want to Make

Good morning.
I have an assignment deadline to complete soon so naturally, I'm writing a blog post.
Hey, one cannot just have breakfast without distraction.
And I have been remiss in my posting. I apologize. Blame it on the reason I'm writing this post.
Let me recap.

Once a year or so, I get this run of bad luck where everything, and I mean everything seems to go wrong. I seem to be slap in the middle of that time right now and I can tell you, it's not a fun place to be. Right now, the light bulb in my office and my living room aren't working. These are the two rooms I use most in my house. My electrician niece has decided she hates me so she keeps blowing me off. I can't just get some stranger off the street to come and fix it. And of course, church mice are doing better than me right now financially. Oh and my fridge suddenly stopped keeping things cold, the repair people took a week to even answer my calls, another week to find the problem and then, a few more days before they fixed it. If I had money for groceries this might have been a huge hassle but since I'm hand to mouthing it, I make sure to only buy enough food for the day. It's been crazy.
I stopped using tap water to cook though and I haven't been sick since so there's that.
It's small every day irritabilities made bigger by the fact that they keep coming.
Oh and I also got told, right in front of my salad, that the reason I don't get lucrative contracts on upwork is because of my location and race.
I mean, I knew racism was real but it really hit me hard that one. I had thought I finally had a place where I could be judged solely on my work but no...here we are. It made me tremendously sad to know that much as I was hurt and it was shocking, there are people who live with that sort of second classery in every area of their lives.

The reply came in response to a question I posted on the community forum about why, if my feedback was all four and five stars, could I not get the really high paying clients to respond to me. I was hoping for stuff like:
"Well, there is a certain way they expect you to write your proposal."
Or,
"Do you upload a recent resume with every proposal?"
You know, stuff I could do something about...
The point is, all these things might be my present reality but I know that I can change that reality with the power of positive thinking.

Wait! Wait!

Don't go away, I'm not about to go all motivational speaker on your ass. Except for how...I am.
My problem is anxiety. When things start spinning out of my control, I get anxious. Then I think about how out of control everything is and get more anxious. I wake up already thinking about
"What do I have to do today?"
"Oh my God, I haven't paid my rent yet, gotta get this work done."
"What date is it? Shit, the month is half over and I haven't...."
And on, and on and on...
That's before I even brush my teeth.
It's even worse when my son is home and has problems of his own I need to solve.
Yes! I know he should solve his own problems, I'm a work in progress.
Anyway so instead of starting the day with positive affirmations, a feeling of gratitude and belief that I already have everything I want and all I have to do is wait for it to manifest...
There I am, running around like a chicken with its head cut off, not really getting anything done.

Even so, without that calming centering I need so much yet apparently can't find the time to do, the universe or karma or God has my back. I watched Infinity War last night. Yeah, like, for the first time. And after I watched it I thought to myself, "I gotta write a postapocalyptic post-Thanos fic featuring Sam and Dean where they are terrified one of them is gonna disappear."
By the way that ending was so much bullshit...
Anyway, so I'm thinking that, and getting back to work and one of my former clients (who thinks my work is INCREDIBLE by the way) messages me that she wants me to write another short story for her - the one I'm supposed to be doing now. And I say okay and she sends me her requirements and I say I'm thinking postapocalyptic story and she's like "Yeah! me too, that's what I was thinking too!"
So the universe enabled me to write the fic I wanted to write anyway, and get paid for it.
The power of positive thinking isn't about meditating things into being. It's more about focus and intent and belief.
Anxiety gets in the way of that.
And how do I manage my anxiety? By getting stuff done. If my anxiety sees movement on things that are making me anxious (such as getting contracts) it calms down. That's why I'm able to write this morning (afternoon) because I'm less anxious.
Okay so I really need to go write a story.
Are you excited for the world cup?
I'm rooting for everybody black.

Happy Pride Month!

"I am a dirty computer.
I am not ready to be cleaned."
In fact, I am reveling in all this dirt; discovering new textures and tastes...the thing about being in your forties that they don't tell you is; you can set yourself free if you want. Free of the assumptions that society puts on you, the ones that you put on yourself without even realizing, the ones that insistence has made you accept...
All of these can be thrown out as you embark on a real journey of self-discovery, fuelled by Janelle Monae's music of course. Don't believe me? Just watch Jada Pinkett Smith's Red Table Talk

So, of course, I support everyone else's journey to find themselves and be proud of who they are. This month, it's the LGBTQIA community celebrating the choice to stand up and be counted. To say, "Here I am. Take me as I am or leave me alone. What you won't do, is change me."
Isn't it a glorious thing to be? Proud of who you are?
The narrative these days emphasizes so much all the things we have to be ashamed of. Our electoral choices (booo!), the way too much weight we carry around (bleh) the mental health challenges we grapple with daily (Kanye, here's looking at you kid) our struggle writing (whose?) that we sometimes forget how truly awesome we are.
Yes, even you.
Yes, you.
Yeah, I'm serious.

Don't feel bad if you're not quite there yet. It truly is about the journey, not the destination. Why just yesterday I discovered something so interesting about myself that I had no idea was even in me. It was so exciting to know this new thing about myself. It was like falling in love all over again. Yes, me with my big age, still discovering new things about myself.
Too often, we look to other people to tell us who to be; who we are allowed to be, how we're allowed to express who we are. We live in prisons largely of our own making when the truth is, living for other people never made anyone happy.

What is happy you ask?
Gabrielle Union was on Jada's red table talk last Monday and she said that her life coach asked her the same question. The only answers she could give at the time were food related. And goddamnit, food is allowed to make you happy but many times we turn to food for comfort. So technically it's not making us happy. It's just helping us forget that we're unhappy.
Although, gah, homemade french fries are the shit. You cannot be unhappy and eat homemade french fries at the same time.
What makes you happy?
I'll tell you what makes me happy. Creating stuff. Be it a blog post, a story, a graphic, my child...I am a sucker for creation. Watching true love makes me happy. That's why I love Supernatural so much. It's great to see people who truly love each other interact. And the bonus with Sam and Dean is that they are soulmates and the actors who play them are soulmates. It just makes me feel soft and content to know that true love exists.
I have a thing to say about soulmates. I think many people confuse being soulmates for being romantically in love and that's not true. Being soulmates is a thing where one soul recognizes and connects with another. Both souls have to be open to it, to let each other into the very core of who each other is.
My son is my soul mate. I see him. He sees me. He knows who I am beneath all the masks, even the ones I am unaware of. And I know who he is. This isn't a mind-reading thing. It's not something that can really be explained. But you'll know it when you find it.

In honor of pride month, I'm gonna be highlighting some books I have written and read that depict LGBTQIA people just living and loving like the rest of humanity. I think we get so caught up in categorizing that we forget that we're all the same. Who makes your privates stand up and pay attention is your business. Do you even know for sure who rocks your boat?
Are you sure?
I'm in the questioning phase of my life so all bets are now off. For Ben and Anders the question wasn't who rocks their boat, it was, am I gonna be brave enough to acknowledge it? For Miles, there was no question. Small town living made it impossible for him to do anything but hide.
Are you wondering who the fuck those are? Well, Ben and Anders are our heroes In Search of Paradise, and Miles is the best friend in the Child of Destiny series. And that's all I'm saying about that.

Cheers.

graphic lyrics from Janelle Monae's dirty computer album.

Sixes of One By Annemarie Musawale

ixes of One By Annemarie Musawale: Sixes of One is a Flash Fiction by Annemarie Musawale and has been published on woxpert.com- online platform to read books for free. It is written in `English` language.

Hi. I have stories on this site that you can read for free. Sixes of One is one of them. Go read, enjoy, share with your friends. Happy Madaraka Day! Or happy Friday for the rest of the planet.