I didn’t think moving to New York would be easy. However, I didn’t expect to feel like life is punishing me at every step, and that some unseen omnipotent power is having a great laugh fucking with me.
The Girl Next Door is Black
The Life & Opinions of a Late GenX-er/Early Millennial
Life
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#AirbnbWhileBlack aka Racism Lurks Everywhere
You may be familiar with #AirbnbWhileBlack, the hashtag that quickly gained traction on Twitter, and attracted coverage from several media outlets. NPR even hosted a Twitter chat on the subject. Tweet after tweet, Airbinb users contributed personal accounts of rental requests being rejected due to discrimination by the host.
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Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes: The Girl Next Door is Black, on the Move
You’d think after all the times I’ve moved as a kid and an adult, that it’d get easier, less stressful, but noooooo. As per usual, life has other plans and laugh’s at yours.
Life: “Mwah haha. I spit on your plans! I will do as I see fit. Ya dig?”
In case you missed the announcement on Facebook, I officially moved to…
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What Good is Being Alive if You’re Unhappy?
What does being alive mean to a person suffering through depression? Another endless day to trudge through? More pretending like things are okay, putting on a happy face, so you don’t have to explain yourself to others, see their pity, or worry about bringing them down with your gloomy mood? Wondering if there will ever be an end to this misery, because it seems like you’ll always feel this way? Trying not to collapse when someone asks, “How are you”?
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I Could Have Used More Laughs and Fewer Tears, but 2015 Was Actually Pretty Okay
Happy New Year!
2015, like every other year, had it’s ups and downs. However, it’s important not to let the year’s lows overshadow the highs.
When I considered writing an end of the year retrospective, my face scrunched up in disgust as I reflected on 2015. Not my favorite year by a longshot. So much of it felt like a continuous struggle – like I’m in the middle of a significant lesson which I’ve tired of learning.
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3 Important Life Lessons I Learned From An Unlikely Friendship
One of my closest friends is a white woman 30 years my senior – a Baby Boomer. We shared a cubicle wall back in the ’00s when we worked in IT at a large insurance company. I hated that job so much that some mornings I’d sit in my car and cry before leaving for the office.
It was the type of job where I had a micro-managing relic of a supervisor whom on a daily basis would periodically stroll by unsubtly peeking at our screens to make sure we weren’t surfing the internet.
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San Francisco, I Think I’m Over You
I’m kind of back to not liking living in San Francisco.
Part of my disenchantment is probably my fault. I arrived here with big dreams I’ve yet to see realized. For one, I thought I’d fall into a good group of friends. Instead, someone I considered a good friend ghosted on me. Though I have made a few good friends whom I am grateful for, they’re from disparate circles. My social life is unrecognizable to me.
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Why Her, Why Now?
Her death didn’t come as a complete surprise. A cancer diagnosis six years ago was only the first of three. Three times my poor friend had to endure intensely draining – in all senses of the word – cycles of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation. I saw her when she lost her hair and covered her head with baseball caps, generally opting out of wigs.
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Why “Black Twitter” is Important
I’ve been in San Francisco for two and a half years and I feel I am withdrawing. I don’t think I fit in here. I spend a lot more time alone than I did in my former life in Los Angeles.
This past year has been particularly isolating as America’s longstanding simmering racial tensions bubbled up to the surface with a vengeance, ignited by Michael Brown’s murder last summer. After which, conflicting emotions of hopeless grief and building fury alternately gnawed at me.
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Don’t Call Me “Girl”
“Girls! Girls!” a large, middle-aged man in a bright yellow safety vest hollered at me and my new friend from across the parking lot as we walked away from my rental car.
I turned slowly around, cocked an eyebrow and didn’t begin moving in his direction until my companion did.
“Yes?” I asked with a touch of attitude as we neared him. He’d yelled out to us like we’d done something wrong.
“Where are you girls going?”
So far I liked nothing about this encounter.
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I Don’t Really Care About Buying a House
As my 40th year grows nearer, my dad insists that I need to consider buying property. To him – and many other Americans – owning a home is one of the cornerstones of success. I remember when my parents bought their first home. It was a source of pride for the whole family – a huge achievement. Owning a home was a visual representation of having “made it.”
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Roaring ’20s-Style Bachelorette Weekend in Palm Springs
Though my flight from San Francisco was only a little over an hour to Palm Springs, turbulence plagued the last 15 minutes. As I gripped both arm rests, wondering if this might be where it all ends, I scolded myself for not having made friends with the guy next to me. He might be the last person I see. I should at least know his name. I silently protested: “I’m not ready to go yet. It’s not time!” I heard a small child cry: “Mooom, I don’t like this!” Kid, we are on the same page.
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Another Black Life As a Hashtag
I felt the sting of threatening tears as I read tweet after tweet, largely authored by black faces. Individual, collective virtual protests over the acquittal of the police officer who killed Rekia Boyd. Rekia, a 22-year old, black Chicago resident was unarmed when off-duty officer, Dante Servin, shot her in the back of the head, killing her.
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Why Are You So Quiet?
My best friend in high school ended our friendship in a letter. She was a year older and in her first year of college in a different city. In the letter she listed a number of issues she had with me. Of all the words she wrote me in that two-paged front-and-back handwritten missive, I vividly remember reading: “And you’re too quiet sometimes! It’s like: talk!” The words struck me with as much force as if she’d come back to town just to punch me in my stomach.
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That Time I Almost Accidentally Joined a Cult
All the chatter about the HBO documentary on the Church of Scientology, Going Clear, got me thinking about my own experiences with a similar church I’ll call the Church of OddPhilosophies. Because I would never say anything bad about the Church of Scientology.
I was once on the run from the Church of OddPhilosophies.
Ok, so things weren’t as dramatic as that, but there did exist a time when I had to avoid the COO.
Picture it: the early ’00s, Los Angeles, California. A city of towering palm trees, near constant sunshine, and an overabundance of injectable-filled faces. A twenty-something woman full of youthful energy and naiveté dreams of a brilliant acting career.
