5 Qualities Women Like in a Man (Plus 21 More!)

In my upcoming book on Love and Relationships is a chapter on attraction (“What Women Want in Men”/”What Men Want in Women”), and today’s blog post is based on my notes for that chapter. But first, a little background:

Lately, I have been following a couple of movements in what is called the “Manosphere”. This is a community, online and in real life, of men who talk about things concerning men: divorce, dating, marriage, work, finances, children, power dynamics, even politics and sports. Until lately, most of the conversation on love and relationships has been controlled by women and men catering to women. It seems that everyone from Oprah to Derrick Jaxn to Dr. Boyce Watkins to Steve Harvey has catered to a mostly female audience. This led to a lot of male-bashing and blaming men for nearly all the problems in relationships; especially Black men. And it didn’t stop there. Music bashed men. Movies bashed men. Sit coms bashed men. Everywhere we looked, men were portrayed as violent, whorish, fumbling and idiotic, foolish and the butt of jokes. Terms like “toxic masculinity” and “patriarchal” are thrown around teaching our sons and daughters that there is something wrong with the male gender–as if there were no such thing as “toxic femininity” or an equally oppressive “matriarchy” in existence. We have words like “chauvinism” and “misogynistic” to describe anti-female men, but nothing to describe anti-masculine women. Feminism as a movement is popular to speak up for the rights of women, but what about a movement to speak up for the rights and concerns of men? The man has, for all intents and purposes, become the bad guy, and the favorite whipping boy of the Left. And in the wake of the fight for equal opportunity and protection of women, men and our voices and issues have been left on the side of the road to die an unseen, neglected, even mocked, death.

The Manosphere has heard our gripes, and has arrived to answer the call.

Now I am not going to cosign everything I’ve heard and read from the Manosphere. There is, as with all things, a percentage of BS in this movement. But much of it–most of it–is a breath of fresh air and a relief to hear. This is actually a subject that has been endeared to me since I was a young man. My father’s side of the family is heavily male, so I have grown up surrounded by masculine men and been indoctrinated in the ways of men. In turn, I mentored by younger brother, my sons, my many nephews and younger cousins, my martial arts students, my brothers from the mosque, my friends, my employees, my mentees, and even neighbors or strangers I may encounter along the way. This message–how to be a masculine man–is an ongoing, never-ending message I preach wherever I go. Take a look back on this blog, I’ve preached it from the very beginning. It is a dying art in the West, and we men must grab the baton and pass it to the next generation. When I encountered the Manosphere and realized where the brotherhood was taking it, I smiled and got excited because it is sorely needed–now more than ever before. Consider this book and blog my contributions to that movement.

I will agree, however, that at the root of most problems in a relationship is a lack of masculinity. And the solution to almost all problems in the world–whether we are talking relationships, politics, community, you name it–is to return to the core of masculinity. But we will discuss that another time, for I digress.

In the discussion of attraction and dating, many men may try and blame their failure to secure a quality mate on the arrogance and overconfidence of women. Popular Youtuber Kevin Samuels talks about women wanting a “High Value Man” without being a “High Value Woman”, and he has a great point. We must be what we attract. I can not be an overweight woman expecting to gain the attraction of fit, athletic men. Yet comb any dating site profiles, you will see an abundance of overweight women demanding that only fit athletic men need apply. These are the same ladies who will rant on social media about how men ain’t shit or there is a shortage of “good men”–yet they’ve overlooked many men who are attracted in them while aiming much higher for men who aren’t interested in them. And I’m not letting the brothers off the hook neither. We can’t be overweight couch potatoes or men who are barely scraping by financially, while demanding only sexy, fit women with fewer than 1.5 kids, and a body count of fewer than 5 men apply. Probably the simplest and best advice I can offer for anyone “looking” is this three step process:

1. Make a list of all the qualities you want in a mate. Be specific.
2. Make a list of all the qualities you believe that man/woman might want in a mate. Be specific.
3. Look at yourself, and become that–or wake the hell up.

Today, let’s just speak to the fellas. Guys, we always say that women shouldn’t tell us men how to be men or how to choose the women we like. Likewise, we can’t tell women what they should be attracted to. It is important then, to both listen to the women when they tell us what they like–as well as look at what they say they are attracted to. The two (what they say they want vs what they actually gravitate towards) are rarely the same thing. So this list, like it or not, it based on my conversations with women and my observations of what they want. I am only going to discuss 5 of the items, and either we will cover the other 21 items later or you may have to wait till the book comes out,

1. Money. Like it or not, as men, we must have money. Only corrupted and flawed women will prefer a man without it. So it a lady tells you that she doesn’t need her man to have money–or if she turns down financially stronger men to be with broke men–run the other direction. She is either lying or there is something wrong with this woman. The female species are hypergamous by nature, they always want the strongest male in the animal kingdom because he is better able to take care of her and her family. And the man who has more resources will most likely pass on his super genetics and economic wisdom to his children. What woman doesn’t want that? And get that “gold digger” crap out your vocabulary; few women really are gold diggers. Accusing women of gold digging when you don’t have gold to take is broke-MF lingo. So here’s the skinny: We men should be mining to extract the most out of the economies we live in, and grinding to get the most out of our respective markets and industries in which we work. As a man who is not the primary caregiver to our children (and moreso if you don’t have minor children), we should be working a minimum of 60 hours a week unless we have achieved the financial level we have been striving for–or we have passive income that doesn’t require us to work. Never be satisfied with being mediocre. Women are not drawn to mediocre men, unless there is something wrong with her. Every one of us have the ability to increase our net worth, especially those of us who live in the West. All we have to do is strive to get it. And if what we want are beautiful, quality women–it’s going to take money. So get a second income, whether it be extra overtime, a second job, a rental property, book royalties, app-based driving–just go get it. We have no excuses.
2. Good health. Bet you didn’t expect this one. Few lists include our health, but it is a big one especially if you are an over-40 single. Stop drinking, stop smoking, put down the second helpings, start working out. No woman who is a quality woman wants to meet a man and end up taking care of him within a few years. Poor health affects everything from our disposition to our complexion to our gait to our performance in the bedroom. When we are unhealthy, most often we look unhealthy. If you are 45 but look 65, that won’t get you the attention of many women. We must be fit and well-nourished. Good health gives us life and makes us more attractive. Good health makes us confident, it keeps us happy. Well maintained skin and hair (for those of us who have it). Strong healthy teeth and fresh breath. A strong, confident posture and walk draws attraction; not an overweight guy who can barely climb a flight of stairs or bend over to pick up a dropped item. If you are over 35 and your health isn’t your priority, I can look at your blood work results and tell your future and love life for the next 10 years. Get it together if you are serious about finding a mate.
3. Your Crew. Another surprise. As human beings we are by nature social animals. We hang out in packs. Rarely will you find us preferring to ride alone. Although there are many who are loners and they are fine with you being one–most women will look at who you roll with to determine your value as a man. There is a saying: If you hang with 4 rich guys, you will be the 5th. If you hang with 4 broke guys, you will be the 5th. Hang with 4 gay guys, you will be the 5th. And so on. If you want to be a higher version of yourself, a Higher Man, you will have to live your life deliberately and purposefully. This includes choosing your friends wisely. As children we befriended other kids because they were in close proximity to them. We had no choice really. But as adults, we are no longer products of our environment because we can choose what environments to be in. Look around you. Who do you talk to on a daily basis? Who do you gain ideas from? Who do you debate with? Who do you strategize with? Why are you friends with the guys you are friends with? What purpose do these friendships serve in your life? Do they make your life better? Do you improve life for them? Why are you friends? What binds you? What purpose are you all around each other for? Surely, it must be for more than shits, giggles, and beer & football. Women will look at two things–the quality of the men you spend your time with, and the relationship you have with them. What type of men are in your network, and what purpose they serve in your life. This ain’t high school; our friendships have to be more than social circles. They can enhance our lives or they can just be for entertainment and kicking it. Do you have grown man friendships? Or power networks? Whether these ladies realize it or not, they actually judge and categorize you by the type of circles you run in. Look at the fellas you hang with. How do you think these ladies see you based on your friendships?
4. Your Purpose for Her. Here is something you probably won’t hear often. I had a couple of exes who use to complain that I “tried to change” them, as if that were a bad thing. Let me ask you a question. If you were a woman, would you want a man who is superior to your station in life–not just professionally, but maybe in terms of wisdom, preparation for retirement, or lifestyle? Or would you prefer a man who was inferior to you? Would you want a man who can teach you something, or help you improve your life? Would you want a man who was an upgrade to you, or a downgrade? You know what the bullshit answer is? “I want a man who is equal to me.” If you are a typical feminist female, or lefty male–I can almost guarantee you said this. You want a man who brings nothing extra to the table, he has the same level of wisdom you have, same money, same drive, same amount of experiences. With him in your life, he is nothing but a companion… your life is neither worse nor better because he is there; you want nothing from him but dick and conversation. Hogwash. Well if that’s what you want, you aren’t trying to level up, then no wonder you are single. I’ll tell you exactly why. No woman wants an inferior man but inferior women. It is not in the nature of humanity to only want to eat the minimum for the day and just get by. You could live and just get by in today’s society sleeping under bridges and working at fast food restaurants. As human beings, we are the only creatures who have the ability to find and obtain more than what we need to survive on. We have the ability to store extra for a rainy day. We have the ability to forecast in the future and see the storms or droughts coming. We have the ability to move to a better climate and provide a better future for our children. We have the ability to give our kids a better life than we had, even a better life than our neighbors have. No other living creatures can do those things, they are victims of their environments. WHY on Earth would you want to be in a relationship with a man who cannot improve your quality of life or the quality of life for your children? Excuse the bluntness, but it would be stupid of you not to. Next to oxygen and water, dick is the most plentiful commodity on the planet–and of all the dicks you are searching for, you want one that comes with nothing else but two balls and a smile. Well if you are one of the many women who actually DO want a man who brings more wisdom, planning, resources, and discipline–wouldn’t you want to learn what he had to teach you so that you could actually benefit from his knowledge? Here’s a hint: You cannot upgrade your life and get bigger and better things, and find more happiness unless you learn new things and change for the better. This is why high caliber men “change” women–they are teaching them. If you are a man who doesn’t come with more wisdom, more resources, more knowledge, and better preparation, then you aren’t a “superior” man… You are either an inferior man, or one of those “equal” models so popular with the feminists. If you want a higher caliber woman, and you want to be seen as valuable to the ladies, you must have the ability to improve her quality of life–and the unselfishness and desire to do so.
5. Man of Order. High caliber women like order, not chaos. I might go out on a limb and say that all women prefer order. But the problem is that in the last 40-50 years, especially in the Black community, manhood and masculinity has been in a decline, so many women have grown up in single parent households full of chaos and struggle. The result is that many women have grown up seeing their mothers repeatedly disappointed and failed by men, so they adopt this flawed attitude that “I don’t need a man/I can do this without a man”. Essentially, they see men as unreliable, undisciplined, unfaithful. The response to this is to believe that men cannot be counted on and do not have their lives in order, so we are temporary pleasures for them. We give them love, we give them babies, we help with the bills–but that’s where the line is drawn. They see the single parent/single income struggles they live as normal. Anything better than that is for the rich and famous, back in grandma’s day, or patriarchal. This is what the ladies say, but what they really want is a stress-free, worry-free life, without all the surprises and headaches the struggle brings. Problem is, so many men have brought them nothing but drama, so they often see the moment we leave them as a weight off their shoulders, and a peaceful life. When a man comes to the relationship without the chaos, we might be met with resistance but eventually she will come to appreciate it. But here’s the thing: You can not bring order and peace to her life unless you have order and peace in her life. So a man who lives a disciplined, healthy lifestyle will be seen as high value. You must have control of your finances, your health, your vices, even your time management and stress levels. These things affect your ability to think, and have full power over the direction of your life. Know where you want to be in 5 years, and how you are going to get there. Have the strength to stick to the plan and reject distractions. Be deliberate in all your actions. Be loyal to the people who matter in your life. Have a fierce dedication to your goals and be obsessive about your already well-defined, carefully-chosen priorities. This includes your commitment to her. If you are so absentminded you can neglect a lunch appointment with her, she will feel neglected and undervalued about the bigger things. If you are frazzled over the most minor obstacles life throws at you, she won’t feel confident that you can handle real disasters. If you constantly lose keys, wallets, or frequently overdraw your checking accounts–she won’t have faith that you can guide her effectively in a household. Be a man of discipline, a man of order, and a man of principle. If you have these qualities, a woman will trust you with her life and follow you to the ends of the Earth.

Naturally, there isn’t enough room on this blog or time during my vacation for me to detail all 26 qualities a man should have. So subscribe to follow AskAkamo, and look out for the book! Hopefully, we’ve given you plenty to think about and ponder over. Here is one more piece of advice fellas: Nothing on this list involves your genetics and things you cannot change. Everything can be gained or improved. There are several posts on this blog concerning manhood and masculinity; read them. Then do all you can to make the changes. We all can’t be 6 feet tall and handsome. But we all can live up to a woman’s ideal mate just by upgrading ourselves. Please like, share, and comment. And thank you for visiting my blog!

The Fallacy of Being “In Love”

We all will feel it’s warmth, and we all will feel its sting–most of us, at least. It gets us all: the rich, the poor, the young, the old, the famous, the meek, the drop-dead gorgeous, the homely. As Rumi calls it, “the agony and the ecstasy”… Each of us will enjoy the ecstatic feeling and each of us will suffer the pain of its ruin:

You know what I’m talking about. Quite often you don’t see it yourself, but you almost always see it in others. Your otherwise emotionally and/or rational sibling, friend, maybe even a parent calls you one day to tell you they have found someone. This person isn’t like the others, they are authentic. They are exciting, they are funny, they are serious. There is often some dreamy way they met, some exciting story about how it happened and they love to tell it. They believe they are soul mates, and things often accelerate from zero to a hundred in the blink of an eye. Maybe one moves in with the other. There is crazy talk–marriage within weeks. Having babies. Us-against-the-world. And you love this person, so you tell them to take things slow, but they don’t listen. It doesn’t matter that the new lover’s divorce isn’t finalized yet, or that their work history isn’t stable. They might even accuse you of being jealous or not supporting them. Soon, work is no longer important. Children, bills, responsibilities may be neglected. They are living only for the new lover, and pleasing that person–even if means disappointing or alienating one’s own family members–is the only thing that matters. They are no longer rational, intelligent beings: They have fallen in love.

We all fancy ourselves rational, sensible creatures. We are meticulous about our careers, we are attentive parents to our children, we are intelligent. Yet when we fall in love, the gloves come off and nothing else interests us. And we are so optimistic and sure that this time–unlike all the others–this will work. Never mind that there will be problems; we believe that love rules over all other things and reigns supreme, but again and again we discover that it does not. Even when people are in their 50s, 60s, and 70s, they will fall prey to the fallacy of love. We will put all our eggs in that basket yet again, and yet again be fooled and disappointed. We will once again have to hear our loved ones tell us how they saw it coming. We will replay the relationship over in our heads trying to figure out what went wrong. Maybe in retrospect we will finally see the signs others saw that we didn’t notice (or refused to acknowledge). We may tell ourselves, “never again”, and swear off love forever. After all, who wants to be in love again and experience this stuff?

We do.

We all love that feeling. It’s the greatest feeling ever, actually. You know I’m telling it. What we don’t like is the agony of having had and lost. And as the poets say, sometimes it’s better to never have had, than to have had and then lost. It begs the question: How can we find and keep love, and never lose it?

This is a subject we will be discussing in some upcoming articles. I’m actually researching it because I am by far no expert. I believe I am coming close to the answer–as a result of my own mistakes, my observations, and research. If this interests you, please subscribe to this blog and stay tuned for more!

For now, though, I would like to challenge the notion that what we have been experiencing is, in fact, “love”.

There are few things in life that we really fall in love upon first sight: Our newborn baby, a little brother or little sister, a puppy, very little more. For everything else, love is a feeling that is build with time and experience. For example, a lifelong best friend or a beloved mentor. These things don’t happen overnight. Much of what people call being “in love” is more infatuation than love. The intensity of the emotion felt for a sibling or child is nowhere equal to that which we might feel for a complete stranger whom we had known only a few weeks–regardless how many hours we’ve spent on the phone. True, it isn’t the same type of love–but it is love no doubt. With a sibling or best friend, you have invested time, emotion, pains and experiences to arrive at the level of affection you have for them. With the lover you’ve met online or through a mutual friend, it was mostly physical attraction, a few hours or phone conversations and hundreds of texts messages–the two are not equal. For our purposes, we will cease calling it “love/in-love”, and refer to it as the “in-love experience”.

The In-Love Experience

The In-Love Experience is, at it’s core, an obsession. It is something we feel, not really in our actual hearts (who came up with that myth, anyway?), but in our minds. It exists mostly in our imaginations. We imagine love stories with the two of us as the hero/heroine. We create a fantastical future. Our minds exaggerate who this is and how great they are. We have deluded ourselves. Even when things go wrong and we say believe our ex-mates fooled us, in hindsight we actually fooled ourselves. We saw the signs, as did everyone around us, we just didn’t accept that we saw what we saw. Or we thought we could overcome or resolve it. We can almost always look back and see where we went wrong. How many times have you said to yourself, “I KNEW I should have let them go when ___!” Let’s be real, family, we participated in the illusion and added fuel to the fire of self-deception. It’s our fault… and it isn’t our fault.

Since we were children, we have been bombarded with stories about other fools who had the In-Love Experience: Snow White, who met a Prince in the woods and exchanged a few sentences. Cinderella, who attended a ball and danced with a Prince who can’t even remember what she looked like (without the shoe, he had no idea who she was). Olive Oil, who can’t decide who she loves until the two men fight and one wins. Elmer Fudd, who sees a rabbit in drag and thinks he’s in love. Face it, you were conditioned to believe that love-at-first-sight exists. We have been looking forward to and fantasizing about having our own In-Love Experience since we were small children. Almost every movie we have seen, every cartoon, every superhero, every story tells us that there is a love interest out there. And when we meet that love interest, we will know immediately and if it’s reciprocated, we will fall even harder. Well into adulthood, we confuse every mutually exclusive puppy love crush we have with love. We meet someone we believe is the most handsome, most beautiful, most compatible, most charming boy/girl/woman/man/other we’ve ever met, and suddenly we are willing to drop everything to be with them. Many of this go through this five or more times in our lifetimes (and this is the most stable of us), while many of us go through this every year. As a matter of fact, the more attractive we are, the less stable we will be. Why? Because the most attractive of us have the most options, are the most difficult to please, and have the most attractive princes/princesses falling for us as well. And each time we experience it, we believe that finally, this is the one I was waiting for. This is my last Mr./Ms. Right, and we will last forever. Catch us a few years later, and it will be “Mister WHO?”

And when we are in the midst of our In-Love experience, no one can tell us otherwise. We overlook their flaws. We think every joke they tell is the funniest. We are not stupid. We know there will be issues that may arise, but we believe love will conquer all. Suddenly, we get irritated that others are not as excited as we are. We can’t focus at work, because we are daydreaming about our lover. We text all day, we comb through their social media accounts. Every interaction they have with members of the opposite sex seems suspicious. The few minutes they take to respond to our messages seem like an eternity, and again, our imaginations run rampant: If we aren’t imagining some beautiful fantasy with them, we are imagining that they will betray us. Soon, our insecurity gets the best of us–or our preoccupation with them lead to problems in the real world. We’ve been slacking at work. We have neglected other responsibilities. We’ve lost interest in ourselves and become (here’s that word again) obsessed with our lover. We are not in love, we are obsessed.

Sooner or later, we discover that the feeling we have been experiencing was a fleeting one. It was built on very little real pillars: it was nearly overnight and based on very few actual bonds. At some point, we must come down out of the clouds and rejoin our friends and family in the real world. The songs we sing tell us “love don’t pay the bills”; we know this well, but for some reason we forgot. Once we return from orbit, we start to notice the things our family noticed. We begin to see things we didn’t like, the deal-breakers, that we were once willing to overlook. His smoking habits, his bad breath, her irresponsibility with money, their instability or their short temper. The sex isn’t as good, she doesn’t look as nice without her makeup, his stomach is a little bigger than you realized. Maybe there is jealousy, maybe the affection isn’t as frequent as it used to be, perhaps you realize that your values or life goals don’t align. The In-Love Experience is over, the obsession has ended, and you realize you are no longer “in love”.

Soon, it becomes easier for family members to talk you out of this relationship. You now listen to their gripes and fears. They start to make sense. Perhaps you start talking to that guy at work who suddenly seems more charming and attentive than your lover. You begin to think you can do better than her/him. It’s no longer fun. You no longer overlook the slow responses to your text messages. You wonder who that girl is who likes all of his posts and comments. You wonder if her cousin is really her “cousin”. Your mate is no longer living up to the fantasy you had for them. You tell yourself, perhaps you don’t love them anymore. Think of love as the logs in a fireplace, and the In-Love Experience as the kindling. We must light the kindling to get the fire going, but sometimes it goes out and doesn’t spark the actual fire. Sometimes we must light the kindling over and over before the logs catch aflame. Once the kindling has heated the logs, you will have a long lasting fire that will keep you warm all night. Much too often, however, we think of love as the kindling that catches alight easily, but just as easily goes out. It takes more than a match to get the logs going, but if the kindling is managed properly–you’ve got quite a fire. Too many of us believe that there is no fire if the kindling goes out and move on to the next fireplace, when all it needed was some coaxing from the cold fire-starter. Simply put, many of us have and lose love because we gave up too soon, and we don’t put enough work into it.

This happened because you confused the In-Love Experience with love. As the saying goes, love is energy and energy doesn’t disappear–it moves and it transforms. Meaning, if you loved this person, you always will. So either you never really loved them–or you don’t know how to hold on to the person you love, or vice versa. If your relationship is built on concrete pillars–time, invested emotions, history, children, commitment, knowledge of your mate–the relationship survives through time and trauma. If it is built on the imagination and obsession, it will fail. Each of us has needs and desires. Very few of us have exactly the same requirements. Some want constant reassurance, some want frequent physical acts of affection, others want to simply spend time in your presence. If you get what you desire and need, and your mate gets what they desire and need, you will stand the test of time. You will survive the eroding effects of the dissipation of the fire of obsession. Sure, most of us will experience the In-Love Experience–almost all of us. However, what we build during that phase and the commitment we make while we go through it will determine if we develop and keep love. We must transition from the In-Love Experience to “love”. Love takes work, it takes time, it is not as exciting at the ILE, but it is long-lasting and permanent.

Let’s explore this process and discover how it works in the near future.

Thank you for visiting my blog.

Black Problems

Wrote this piece while watching a lady in a laundromat do her daughter’s hair. I know that struggle; I became a single Dad when my daughter was 9 months old and I didn’t know anything about taking care of Black hair. My best friend came to California to hang with me for the summer two weeks after my ex left. My sister visited pretty frequently that summer from the Bay area. Then my mother arrived three months later and stayed with me for almost a year. None of us knew a thing about braiding or cornrowing. Fortunately, my next-door-neighbors were Sudanese and both daughters taught me to braid, and I ended up dating a beautician… Well, I thought about how Black girls had to balance beauty with self-esteem in a world where it seemed no one–not even Black men–loved them and who they are, or how they looked. Here was my beautiful Black daughter, in a family of non-Black women. I swore she would never have straightened hair (although her hair is somewhat straight)–I even carefully chose mates who wouldn’t leave her feeling left out or feeling like her Dad didn’t value women who looked like her. This is the dilemma of raising a Black girl in a White, male-oriented world. Teach her not to love herself as God made her, and you run the risk of teaching her not to love herself. I get that. To some, it’s just hair. To those who know better-she is the young, female version of Sampson. You teach her so much more by the seeds you allow to sprout from her scalp. I whipped out a pen, grabbed a flyer off the wall, and wrote this piece. Hope somebody out there can feel me.

Thanks for visiting my blog.

 

with a fine-toothed comb

she sorted out kinks

curls

and imperfections:

lint, grease, and debris

remnants of four-hundred years of ugliness

hoping to straighten out her blackness as well as her naps

wants nothing but the best for her baby

painful process with the power

to pursue a pampered life

mother’s prerogative to pass on

a pretentious policy for a positive future

pressing in

beauty, success and acceptance

all contained in what she perceives:

presentable hair.

as if relaxing away her pretty locks with a perm

could also relax away the tense life of being a Black woman

“life ain’t no crystal box of crayons, honey—”

mother’s desire to elevate her daughter’s beauty and status

by eradicating her African roots

the ignorant notion

of solving and sorting out Black problems

with a damned comb.

🙂

©2004

The Queen and the Princess…

Monster

intricate roadmaps of scars

churn, swirl and twist, like

the vicious veins that torture unforgivingly

agonizing reminders of the monster I’ve become

so I hide behind prosthetic mounds of womanhood

ashamed to bare my pain

to those I hold dear

fear that it may frighten their innocent minds

or kill his desire

so I

carry these secrets to the grave

My Lord, couldn’t You save me

why have You forsaken me

refused to hear my cries:

disfigured

unbecoming

heart-swallowing

something’s missing

like Leroux’s angel of music

hideosity hides beauty

my bosom no longer blossoms

oh, what a bare-breasted beast,

half-woman i’ve become

carrying the shame of such unsightly monstrosity

wish i could tell him how much it hurt

*it won’t hurt if you touch me*

but i will hide her till the Angel comes for my soul

one day the sun will rise for me:

the pain

the shame

subsides

and–

maybe she will once again

feel

whole.

 

beauty despite what’s missing

My Mom: Drama Queen… With the Concrete Memory

I know probably half the people reading this post have a Drama Queen in their family. And half of those “Queens” are you own mothers. We love them dearly, but they get on our nerves, and for those whose mothers travel across the globe once a year to pester us and invade our new lives… We oftentimes can’t wait to put them back on a plane. Our kids hate to see them go, but they just don’t understand, do they? Don’t know them like we know them, huh?

Girl if you only knew. Those kids perhaps know your mothers better than you do, and I surely hope you don’t poison your children’s minds by talking about how nosey and needy Grandma is, or how dramatic she is, or how demanding she can be. Thing is, children appreciate our mothers, sometimes more than we do. My kids? They absolutely *adore* my mother. They start counting down the months before her visits and they terribly lament her departure once she’s gone.

But not as badly as you will; once she’s really gone.

Kids appreciate your mother more than you do because they don’t know the drama. And it’s a good thing. Mothers go through so much, and sometimes they don’t tell us how much they’d endured for you–while other times they browbeat you with it so that you never forget (or is it, so you’ll understand?) We are the Kings and Queens of our households–the bosses, the Dictators, even–for so long, we forget what it’s like to have a mother around, giving us a piece of her mind, telling us what to do, and chastising us the way we chastise our own children. She’s there to remind you of all the things you’d wish she’d forget, to tell you about things you don’t want to hear about for the millionth time. It’s in this Western culture that once we are grown, we almost forget the past, and start new lives. Our forefathers did it when coming here for the first generation. You left “home” behind and became an American. You forget that old Italian culture you left behind, you allow your children to call each other by name instead of titles like “Kuya/Ate”, you cook pot roast and steam your vegetables instead of making those Keftedakia and Greek salads your grandmother taught you. You wear your shoes in the house. You stop buying Kosher food. Your children carry your husband’s bland, American last name. You pronounce your English perfectly. Your kids speak only one language. You waste your food when you’re no longer hungry, instead of using last night’s leftovers to make baon, or Fried Noodles. Yeah, you forgot–but Mom didn’t, and it drives you nuts.

Something unique about life in the West:  Each generation generally lives better than the last. Especially for those of us born elsewhere on the planet. Our parents sacrifice heavily for us to have a “better” life. They barely got us to adulthood having the essentials, unlike many others who inherit what was left behind by a previous generation. When we had problems doing homework–we turned to another kid because some of our mothers barely spoke English. Mom doesn’t understand this culture and she surely doesn’t understand profession–why is she trying to give me advice? Mom, marriage isn’t like it was when you were younger. I know what I’m doing…

There will come a day that you will sound like your mother. You won’t understand the next generation. But you will know life a little more than your by then-grown children will. Like you, they won’t listen either. I hope you won’t ever have this experience:  You stop, you reflect, and you realize that Mom was right. This is what she meant. But unlike right now, you will not be able to pick up the phone and call her to say, “Mom, you’re right. I love you.”

Instead, you will have to wait until the kids are sleep, then close your eyes, and visit her in your dreams to say it.

I have some advice for you. ALL of our mothers are Drama Queens. They ALL went through some great sacrifice to get us where we are today. They were not guaranteed to have done the best job, they may have made a shitload of mistakes. They still might be making mistakes. But she is your mother, and she has cross Hell and highwater to provide for you, to teach you, and everything she has ever done–from missing meals so the kids have enough to eat, to working extra shifts to afford to buy you presents, to marrying another man while she still loved your father just so you’d have a complete, nuclear home to return to from school, to badgering you about why you aren’t married or why she doesn’t think you’re treating your husband or wife well enough–it was ALL done because she wanted the best for you.

Don’t piss that away, just because you are too damned stubborn to shut the hell up and take a little advice and listen to wisdom. If you really appreciated the woman she’s become–like your kids do–you’d honor and hang on to every word she spoke. There will be a day, when she won’t be able to say anything else to you, and all you will have are memories, and regret.

Today’s religious lesson, whether you are Christian, Jewish, Muslim or other:  God tells us to honor our mother and father. He did not put conditions on which mother and father to honor. He didn’t say “honor parents if they were good parents”. Your parents could have been deadbeats, drug addicts, ex-cons, depressed, poor, too busy working to notice, whatever–But we are to honor them the way you’d honor a celebrity who came to your home. Imagine if Oprah came to your house, how would you prepare for that visit? What if a U.S. President gave you advice you didn’t think you needed? Or your favorite actor or singer? Would you argue with them? Some of us would treat a celebrity we have never met with more fanfare than we treat our own parents. That isn’t “honor” at all.

I would name names, because the loved ones I wrote this for read this blog and they probably recommend this to their friends. But you know who you are. Don’t do anything you will one day regret. Don’t wait till your mother is gone before you cherish her.

Thanks for visiting my blog.