Risky Go Night- Night (Another Risky Business Story)

I haven't been able to talk to Risky lately because she has been unrealistically tired. She has been donating a lot of plasma at a variety of different donation centers, which I am not sure is okay. To do so, she has to constantly make sure her iron levels are up, which is very stressful and takes a lot of work. Because of this, whenever I call, she is always asleep. The last time we spoke, I told her that this was just for the short term and to power through. She then told me she is treating this like a real job. 

First off, I just don't see plasma donation as a long-term solution to financial problems. But to hear her say that it is was disheartening because it means she is giving up on her goal of getting into another residency program. I mean, this is her dream and she is already an M.D. Is she going to hang that up to become a full-time plasma pusher??

We are both 41. I guess it is time to get real. We are either going to be on course to retire comfortably in nearly 30 years, so we should be preparing to collect cans, dumpster dive, and donate plasma for the rest of our existences. If the dream stages of our lives are not outright over, the buzzer going off is dangerously close. 

Honestly, if I had any sense I'd be thinking like Risky. I don't like anything having to do with blood, but I could see myself dancing on a street corner for change as long as the weather was good. At least then I could afford snacks. But I'm stubborn. My desire to be a writer is literally like a book I can't put down. If they eventually find me dead from old age in a tent city, please believe I will laying on top of my backpack full of short stories. 

If I can catch Risky while she is awake, I will try to give her a friendly push back in the direction of a residency again. We all have to do things we don't want to do when we are desperate for cash, but the idea that she would give up on her calling to donate plasma is bloody insanity! 

The Gabe Factor

In another post sometime I will tell you how my search for Patty, my 8th grade best friend who used to date Charles Christmas, led me to having a mistaken conversation with Other Patty, another Patty I went to school with that wasn't my Patty. 

The convo was fruitful. She told me what she was up to and she also confirmed that Gabe, this boy we went to school with, somehow got involved with drugs and died. I recently even talked to my aunty and cousin who knew him and his family. His death shocked everyone. 

Honestly, I can't even invision Gabe smoking a cigarette. He was cute. He was funny. He was bright. He could sing. He and some other boys were in a singing group. I remember they sang  "All My Life" by KC and JoJo at a middle school assembly. We were not good friends, but we once did a project together where we had a spirited discussion on when it's appropriate to use an acronym which, oddly enough, is a debate I've had many times over the years. Other Patty said she felt he turned to drugs because his music career didn't work out. 

I'm not sure if this is true, but the thought it might be led me to have a conversation with Lisha about how we don't express to kids the importance of having a reliable and attainable plan B. No one knows better than me how hard it is when your dream life doesn't work out. How can we prepare kids for this without crushing their goals? I say kids because this definitely isn't something you want to start considering at 20 when your back is against the wall. 

Honestly, I'm not sure doing so would even matter. Telling me I should have a solid plan B would not have caused me to stop striving towards being a writer. Like I said, I didn't know Gabe closely, but I'm sure that having a plan B would not have stopped him from singing. The hard truth is that you have to take life when it comes how it comes, prepared or not. That's pretty much a golden rule. There's no acronym for that. 

The Blues

It's very early, but I'm wide awake. I could be using this time to wash or paint my nails, but instead I feel like going outside on the porch to play a harmonica. I'm not sad or depressed, but I do have a bit of the Where is my life going?- I'm tired- I hope I didn't mess things up with a new guy I'm talking to- I'm tired of my vagina- I hope I'm not in perimenopause- Should I give up on my dreams? Blues. I'm trying to remain optimistic, but I am a little exhausted with life. I don't know what is to become of me sometimes. I wasted the first half of my life being a dreamer. Now I'm disappointed and don't know which end is up. I don't feel that my future is bright, and I'm very concerned about where this may leave me as a senior citizen. I hate even the idea of garbage. I'd do a very poor job dumpster diving or collecting cans. I don't see me winning the lottery anytime soon so I need to hustle. But until I figure out a game plan, it's just me and my metaphorical harmonica. 

The Cappin' Captain

I went to school with some real bosses. Pharmacists. Doctors. Lawyers. Business owners. Materially, I do not have as much as many of the people that I graduated with and, admittedly, being what I consider a "have not" played into my not wanting to go to my 10-year reunion with my friend DZ five years ago; played into my insecurity and anxiety. I don't have a $500,000 home or a luxury car. What would I tell people about my life? How could I explain to people that in the 10 years that it took for them to become "rich", I was kind of lost in the world, essentially, with my degree and everything I had ever written? If anyone were to ask me what I was doing at the time professionally, a common question at homecoming, I imagined myself screaming. I imagined myself crying. I imagined myself dropping dead. But one thing that never occurred to me to do was lie.

X lies. X lies big time. X lies to the point that it is almost laughable. If X had seven twins and thirty personalities, X still could not have accomplished everything that X says that X has. And these are not little white lies. These are huge, traceable, and, at times laughable lies. It has gotten to the point that folks are starting to figure this out about X and now have to cross-reference with their circles and contacts if what X is saying is true. Or sorta true. Or complete fiction. 

X is fun. X is funny. X is a good friend to X's friends, but X is also a mystery. A real head-scratcher. For although it has been confirmed that X's resume is about as good as a penny with a hole in it, X still somehow displays the financial fruits of this invisible labor. This, in turn, has turned people who know X into professional hypothesizers. Is X the bastard child of an African prince? Did X win the lottery? Is X an art thief? A Narco? A scammer? I mean, what?! People can't wrap their minds around it! But I can. 

Being completely honest opens you up to judgment and who wants that? Not I said the cat! But lying is exhausting and troublesome. You have to be lightning fast, ready to cover up a previous lie with another one; sidestepping questions and accusations. I am not lightning fast. I am molasses slow. I'd have to come clean after one day of pulling everyone's leg. X has been at it for almost 20 years! Kinfolk always tells me that the grass is not as green as it looks with a lot of our old classmates which is great, because I've never liked grass. DZ would say it is simple as standing in your truth. If I were close enough to X, I would tell X the jig is up and to exit the fairytale into reality. Homecoming is all love, and everyone has their own BS. I'd encourage X to sit next to me on the astroturf and have some spilled tea with me. It doesn't pay to lie, and that's truth. 

The New Year with The Hope Daily Planner

I have talked a great deal about my need to get more organized in my life and my ongoing spiritual journey to get closer to God. I am not going to lie: both have been a struggle. For me, it all boils down to time. The days seem to ALWAYS get away from me, and I never have time to tackle my to-do list or study my Bible. But then I was sent this Daily Hope Planner by Hope Fuel and it is helping me to start the year off right. 

If you are as unorganized as me, you have probably had planners before that you didn't stick to. In the past, I have made a habit out of purchasing the prettiest ones that I can find. Then they just sat on my bookshelf and collected dust because I lacked the motivation to even get started. I have even downloaded apps that go unused because I figure that I can remember what I need to do, but never do. The Daily Hope Planner has been helpful for me because it asked questions that helped me to really sit and think about what it is that I want to accomplish this year and how that is connected to the relationship that I am trying to build with God. 

Because I am often easily discouraged, I like the space that the planner gives me to remind myself what I am thankful for. It also encourages you to start your weeks off with a devotional. My devotionals for the year will be centered around organization and staying the course. This helps me to not only stay focused, but to tie my goals and needs back to God. 

Eager to start your year off on the good foot? Click here for more info on Hope Fuel products. 

Pots

I am 34 and I don't have a pot to piss in. The only thing separating me from a person that is REALLY up shit's creek is that I have a lot of close friends, and I think that at least two of them would let me borrow a pot if I really needed one, under the condition, of course, that I would wash it before I returned it.
If you have never been under INTENSE financial stress, allow me to describe it to you. In short, it is a consistent state of anxiety and fear. You are afraid to the answer the phone. It could be a bill collector. You don't check the mail. It could be full of bills. The same feeling you get in your stomach when you have to call you OB/GYN for your pap test results is the same feeling you have when you have to call the IRS and BEG them to reinstate your payment plan.
Time flies. When I was a 2nd grader, I used to entertain myself by counting on my fingers how old I would be in five years, ten years, etc. I would get excited, thinking of myself at 21. I would be rich and married to one of the members of Immature. Well, me and Romeo never made a love connection and I am now in my mid-30s. And no, I don't play that add-up-the-years game anymore. If I count forward 50 years, I don't see me dancing in an Immature video. I see me in a nursing home that smells of poop. It's the only place that will take me because I didn't have a savings, and it is the only place my poor people insurance will cover. The nurses will smoke cigs and blow the smoke in my face. I will spend days on end in my soiled diapers. And, perhaps worst of all, the only beverage option I will have with my pureed dinner is UNSWEETENED TEA!
I try to complain about this to P, but he is a "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" type of man. He just doesn't get it. I had to throw my last pair of boots away, the ones I had had for 12 years, because I could no longer plug up the holes in them with toilet paper.
My minister did a sermon about how bad times are good. You have to go through things so you will be prepared for what God has in store for you at the end of the rainbow. As hungry as I am for a change in my life, I better be able to taste this rainbow.
Enough belly aching for now. I have to go but my empty wallet next to my Bible and see if God can create a water-to-wine situation.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotifyless Mind

Poverty has taken a lot from me over the past three years. My apartment. My independence. My ability to maintain an above negative balance in my checking account. But at the beginning of the month, poverty took something from me that I need to survive; that is the very power source of my existence. Poverty has finally taken away my Spotify Premium. It has happened people! I can no longer afford the $10 a month.
Last night, I had no other choice but to go to Youtube for my musical needs. It was horrible. I haven't gone on Youtube to listen to music since I was like 25. All my playlists are outdated and come with like a million commercials. The blast from the past of it all was too much. While listening to some early ASAP Rocky, I thought that I could actually hear my old roommate having sex in the next room over.
2019 has to bring me wealth and wealth and more wealth, because there is now officially nothing else my poverty can take from me, unless I finally get the medical okay to cell my organs and eggs. Come New Year's, I will be praying, eating greens, dancing on the arm of the freeway with an empty tin can for tips- anything I need to do to make some money. Because Mama draws a line at trying to live her life without the aid of a commercial-free soundtrack. It really is too much!

Plans

Over the weekend, my mentor asked me what my plans are.
She told me that your 20s are for making mistakes and that by your 30s you should have a plan. Spoiler Alert: I'm 33.
I was mildly annoyed because I got the feeling that she felt that I don't have a plan for my life. Like I'm not awake nights, very aware that I am 7 years from 40, and that I have wasted so much time thinking about going to grad school that I could have had a Ph.D in something by now. I told her that I do have a plan and I do...I think. But in the event that that this "plan" falls through, your guess is as good as mine as to where I am going to end up. My crystal ball is showing me a grocery cart full of my journals and a makeshift bed under a bridge. And I hate the outdoors, so that would really suck!
In my 20s, I read an article that advised young college grads to say that they worked well under pressure in job interviews. The article suggested that potential employers like that. So I began to say that in interviews and, sure enough, I got two internships. I guess I have been saying that lie so long that I actually began to believe it honey, because I don't work at all under pressure. Just typing about the anxiety related to the very sad, possibly impending, horrifying possibility that my plans may fall all the way through is making me want to crawl unto a ball, sucking my thumb.
In my 20s, I thought I was mortified that I wouldn't become a great writer. 30 was the deadline. Now that I am over 30 writing a blog that no one reads, I realize now that I wasn't mortified, I was concerned. What I am feeling today, right now as I type, THIS is mortified!
When I was a little kid, I couldn't tell certain animals apart. I just couldn't see the difference between a monkey, a gorilla, an ape, and an orangutan. As an adult, I seem to have the same issue. I just can't comprehend the difference between a goal, a wish, a dream, and a plan. Life has taught me the correlation between employment and shelter thought, and I think that should show for something.
What is the plan for the rest of my day? I was going to make some tea then take a nap before Judge Judy came on, but I think my plan should probably be planning out the rest of my life. 40 will get here quicker than 30 did, and I would like to spend the big 4-0 in my house with my man, not on the curb with a tin can. The scary thing: the choice is mine based on my plan. Again, MORTIFIED.

The Half- Way Point

Last year was such a crazy year for me that I was OVERJOYED that 2016 showed up to put an end to it. I made a list of goals and I was determined to get everything on the list done. And I mean these were life-changing goals ya'll. Now look: July 2016 is here, the year is more than half-way over, and I still have not done everything that I need to do! Not completing my goals depresses me, but today, I find myself awake and alert and motivated to knock some of the goals off of this list. My birthday is in December, and I refuse to turn 32 with the same old unaccomplished goals on my list from when I was 26. I have made lists. I have made plans. I even fell victim to the vision board craze. Now it seems like the only thing to do that I know will bring results is to buckle down and get these things done. I am pretty protective of my goals, but I will share one with you: TO FINALLY LEARN TO DRIVE! I will keep you posted!

Vision Board Revamp

At the beginning if this year I declared that 2014 was going to be the best year ever for me. I was so motivated that I even made a vision board. Sadly, a lot of things happened this year that I had to handle that took me away from my vision.

So, last weekend, I revamped my board, adding additional things that I want to see happen in my life a long with friendly reminders to myself such as, "Don't share your dreams with everyone." In 2015, I would also like to see my creative work published and I would like to purchase a house or at least get a better apartment. 

I'm excited to see my dreams unfold! Have you already started on next yesr's vision board or are you wrapping up your goals and assignments on the one for this year? Tag me your board on IG @.  hollsthegreat. I'd love to see yours vision:)

Much Needed Job and Goal Inspiration

If you are anything like me, you have hoping and wishing and praying for something or someone to breathe life into your career. The exhaustion of not only looking for work but looking for something that won't make you miserable to go to everyday is overwhelming! So I thought that I would share some tips with you from James Rosseau, a Fortune 100 Exec and Christian hip-hop artist/producer, that inspired me.

1. Embrace your passion. Don’t discount your dreams. Return to that childlike fascination you once had and find a way to spend your work and life passionately.

2. Perform to progress versus perfection. Don’t become paralyzed by perfection or the pursuit of it. Instead, perform to progress toward your goals and dreams, celebrating each small step along the way.

3. Promote with purpose. Let people know who you are in a way that is personal and purposeful -- not a slick self-promoter. People recognize and reward those who stand confidently in their strengths authentically and purposefully.

4. Parlay your platform. Your ‘platform’ is the station in life you’ve achieved thus far. It is the sum total of all your efforts in honing your talents and skills. It may not be where you want to be yet, but it’s yours.

5. Put it into action. Keep your eyes and ear open to see when opportunity knocks. Be alert to it and be aware. Take action on the four steps that lead up to this as earnestly and as often as possible.

6. Practice philanthropy. Give. You can never go wrong giving, even when no one hears about it. So many of us have benefited from the gifts of others, and you’ll never know what your small, or even not-so-small, gift might mean to someone in need, be it a coworker, a friend, or even a boss.

Energy

I have had a lot of energy of late to get things done that I need to get done. On New Years Day, I made a plan for myself to get to where I needed to be by the end of the year. I'm really confident in it, and a couple of things are already coming through that I wanted to happen. Of late, I have been so hyped about this plan that I can't even sleep! I wake up in the middle of the night to fulfill another task before I force myself to sleep. Here is the thing: I am trying not to overdo it because I know how easy it is for me to burn out. Looking back on my 20s, I don't know what happened. There is no reason, other than my own insecurities and self-doubt, for me to not be where I need to be. As I move towards 30, I can feel myself shedding the fear snakeskin a little day by day. I feel a little gangsta actually. I am determined to keep faith that this year will take me where I need to go. I can't go into 30 with nothing accumulated, like now. It just wouldn't be cute...or logical. 

Medill

When I got back from Chicago, I looked up the Medill School of Journalism @ Northwestern, and I have not been able to close the tab! I love this school...I feel like I need to be there.
I have to say, I am not sure at what point in my life things began to feel unattainable for me, like attempting to reach my goals is hopeless, but this is something I really want, really badly. But I just have to be honest, I feel hopeless.

Movin' On Out

Ugghh, the stresses of moving.
For about two weeks, I have literally been wading through all my belongings in my compact room, packing things in between naps and tossing things over my shoulder that I don't know where to put. Seriously, the only thing I can think of more stressful than moving out is moving in.
My fam is leaving our current abode to move into a smaller yet more chic house not too far from this one. But doing so has proven to be a MAJOR headache. For one, everyone is packing at different speeds and seemingly nothing is getting done. Two, it is truly exasperating looking at all of the things that I have accumulated in nearly three years since graduation.
For the most part, mostly everything I brought from college was in a trunk that was literally on its last wheel. I replaced it with an x-large storage tote and was saddened to see all the things I'd stuffed in the trunk: old stories and grad school applications, books that I was supposed to read in school, didn't, but that now look oddly interesting. Man, how time flys.
I don't know about you, but procrastination has been biting me in the rear since I was a toddler. Getting a look at all of the things I was supposed to do made me want to crawl into the storage container myself! There is so much I need to get done but now, so many years later and it being during the holidays and me being on my period, I really don't have the energy to do anything. Yet the New Year is on its way, and although I usually suck at resolutions, I have decided to kick the procrastination demon to the curb. I have got to pack, study for the GRE, study my driving manual, start my grad apps, and do a whole lot more that I can't think of right now. But the point is, I am mentally determined, if not physically so, to get some stuff done. And I shall, I shall...after I finish blogging and lay down for a minute.

Lost in Atlanta

I just wanted to ask a question: what I am doing with my life?
I wanted to ask you all, because I clearly don't know.
What I do know is that at one point I had goals for myself; strong, serious goals for myself. But these goals were too high. You know, the TV-created, pretty goals that are created in the safety and security of collegiate settings? So once I graduated and my bubble was ever so politely busted, I created more suitable, doable goals that would eventually get me where I want to be, but they have slowly but surely become plaque in my memory banks. The real world has bitch slapped me folks, and left me standing in the middle of downtown in an easy fitting yet stylish ensemble, with my hands in the air!
Blame it on the economy. Blame it on the confidence I have within myself. Hell, you can even blame it on the alcohol. But at three months shy of my 25th birthday, I feel totally and utterly defeated. De-feat-ed!
Man, just writing that took a lot out of me. I'm going to bed.