In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. – Martin Luther King Jr. One of my main growing edges as a person is being a recovering people pleaser. Blame it on being an only child, a lonely extrovert without lots of peers to play with, […]
Category: Relationships
Loving Ourselves: The Case for Radical Empathy
It’s been a rough past few weeks, hasn’t it? Between the SCOTUS rulings, Zimmerman trial, another recent discovery of a serial killer who has targeted Black women, and the general tomfoolery of white supremacy experienced on a daily basis, it seems like we can’t catch a break. Certainly, it’s never easy to be a person […]
Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe
Father’s Day has come and gone again. As someone who did not grow up with a father or father figures, this day has not traditionally been on my radar at all. These days, though, it’s hard to forget Father’s Day, besides all the incessant commercials urging you to buy the fathers in your life any […]
Getting Crunk at Charis: Sweetwater and Supporting Feminist Bookstores!
Come one, come all! Join us in Atlanta at Charis Books and More on Friday, June 28th, 2013 at 7:30pm EST for CF Robin Boylorn’s book talk for Sweetwater: Black Women and Narratives of Resilience. The CFC is so proud of our girl Robin! Earlier this year, she published her first book with Peter […]
the light of us: a mother’s day mix
call it our craziness even, call it anything. it is the life thing in us that will not let us die. Poet Lucille Clifton’s language for lineage was cherished. “roots,” a poem from her 1974 collection An Ordinary Woman named it light and I choose to liken it to mothering. it is the light in us it […]
Not that Kind of Dr.
She has a substance abuse issue, she has anxiety disorder, she had an abortion during the semester (did not tell parents), she experienced sexual abuse by older female family members, she experienced being homeless (on her on) before coming to college, she is escaping a dangerous neighborhood and has lost several friends to gun violence, […]
Single, Saved, and Sexin: The Redux
One of the most controversial posts we’ve ever had here at the blog was called Single, Saved, and Sexin’: The Gospel of Getting Your Freak On. In that piece, over two years ago, I argued: Sex is a form of creative power. And it is in the literal fact of its creative aspects that we […]
Pineapples
They say eating pineapples makes your juices taste good. Lately, I find myself ordering lots of fruit salads, tryin’ to guarantee that my juices keep her coming back for more. She doesn’t know this of course. I mean, I know she loves me and I know she loves my goodies but still … I’m trying […]
Love Lessons: Musiq Soulchild & Tressie Cottom
When I sat down to write the song that came to mind was Musiq Soulchild’s Love. I thought about this perfect ballad because it allows for a much larger vision of love that includes all manner of relationships including the one we have with ourselves. Soulchild sings… Love So many people use your name in […]
(On Making Sure) Love Never Fails: Some Reflections on Feminism, Faith, and Holograms
I have made no secret with y’all that I’m a church girl and that the church remains profoundly important to me, even though I have walked out of it in anger, been disturbed and therefore refuse to be contained by much of its stifling theology, and generally am completely over the shenanigans of church folks, […]