I remember a time when I craved him. When I couldn't wait to see his face and hear his voice. A time when I longed to be in his space and couldn't resist his touch. A time when his breath on my skin was like the night's air. When emotions were so intense, they could only be released by, biting his bottom lip and nibbling his ear. I remember a time when his words were my melodies and his eyes the gospel. When I made love to him to express what words couldn't. It's vague, but I remember. I remember when passion wasn't an afterthought.

I recently told some girlfriends I felt like I was devoid of emotions. But the more I thought about it, I began to realize that I'm not devoid of emotions. I just lack romantic passion. And I miss it. Over the past few years I have gotten pretty damn good at faking passion, in both relationships and lovemaking. Most times he (whoever the guy was at the time) didn't know the difference and to be honest, I think I tricked myself a couple of times too. But let me tell you the real thing with me is some truly intense shit that will leave us both dumbfounded and breathless. It is that serious. It was the type of passion that would often cause my ex to look at me (as if he just met me) and say, "You.Really.Do.Love.Me." And I miss it.

I miss being open and free with my feelings. I miss screaming I love you and having it whispered back in my ear during sex. I miss what its like when sex is actually lovemaking. I just miss the passion.

I am rarely disappointed. At least not by the things people do. Not because everyone I know is a great person who always makes wise, considerate decisions, but because I pay attention to the person. And from that I determine my level of expectation for that person. If he is habitually late, I never expect him to be on time. I am delighted if he is, but not disappointed when he shows up an hour and a half late. If she is consistently inconsistent, I mentally prepare for her to change her mind, plans and point of view multiple times. I am delighted if she stays on track, but never disappoint at that number of times she goes off. Thus we have my relatively low number of disappointments. Well, after this weekend I can add one more to the disappointment column.

Someone who I considered to be ‘like’ family had major surgery(heart) this past Friday. Now for me ‘like’ family means family, DNA is just a technicality. But that is a whole other post. Anyway, LF(‘Like’ Family) and I have been ‘like’ family for damn near 20 years. So even though it was late Thursday night and she was damn near 800 miles away on vaykay, she said she needed and wanted me there, so I found a way. I mean shit, its family what can you do? So I took off work, rented a car first thing Friday morning and hit I-75N for an eight hour road trip (normally 11). All of this despite the fact that LF recently broke my heart (when your girlfriends break your heart it stings, more than when a man does it) But hell, its family what can you do?

(I was going to give the extended version of this story, but fuck it. I am going to just bottom line it. Cause I don’t wanna relive this shit again.)

Bottom Line:
LF’s surgery is a complete success. She survives and everyone is happy. WoooHooo! Yippeee! She gets discharged. We leave the hospital and head back to her “mother-in-law’s” house. Now my plan was to see the kids, hang out for about 20-30mins, see if anyone needed anything (since they had all been there for damn near a week stressed out and all) and keep it moving. Well after about 15 minutes LF’s mother (a woman who I had called Ma for damn near 20 years) pulls me to the side and proceeds to tell me how inappropriate it was for me to be there. She went on to say that LF just needed to be with her family and her children. And how I shouldn’t have come. I informed her that, I asked LF if she wanted or needed me to be there, prior to coming. When she yeah, she did need me that was all I needed to hear. (I mean fuck, its family what can you do?) Her response was simply, ‘Y’all are missing the big picture, her kids should be upstairs with her not downstairs.’ (they had gone to the basement on their own accord to watch a movie. Besides that last thing a person who has just had heart surgery needs is, four kids jumping around them, but I digress). Now anyone who knows me; knows I am not good at holding my tongue and I very rarely bit my lip. But out of respect, I managed to just say ‘You know what? I am leaving.’ and not any of the other many, many things that were running across my mind at that point. I then picked up my shit and left.

That night (and quite honestly right at this moment) I felt an array of emotions. I was angry, bewildered, confused, pissed, hurt. But the one that stuck out the most was disappointment. Sometimes shit has to happen for you to see if your expectations are hitting the mark. In this case I was way off, but trust it’s been adjusted.

I spent this past weekend in my hometown, Baltimore. Well while I was there I went to the Sugar Water Festival, a concert that included Floetry, Jill Scott, Queen Latifah and Erykah Badu. I am a fan of all of these ladies for one reason or another so the concert was a real treat to me and the fact that we had great seats didn’t hurt any. Anyway, this was my first time seeing Erykah Badu live, and let me just tell ya'll, the chick is bad. In all her hoodness and love for real life street thugs she is B. A. D. Bad!

With that said, there are certain things in life that you can hear over and over again, but they really don’t take on much meaning. That is until they are delivered at the right time, in the right setting, by the right person and when these three come together the result is usually what we all know as an ‘A-ha’ moment. The type of moments that force you to sit back, shake your head and say aloud to yourself, ‘Well, I’ll be damned.’ Followed by, How in the hell did I miss that?’ Listening to Ms. Baduizm live singing Bag Lady at the Mereweather Post Pavilion created my most recent ‘A-ha’ moment. As I listened to the lyrics and for first time got the message, I thought about my own personal baggage and realized, ‘These damn things are heavy and I am tired of carrying them.’

My baggage, although not as major as some others is crucial to me and, I am sure is some way or another, is getting in my way. So I wanna take this time to put some of these bags down with the hopes of never picking them up again.

Bag #1-My first broken heart. I was 18 and in that faith-filled flawless kind of love, until I caught him on his way to the hotel with some girl. I was completely blindsided. And that was the part that stung the most.

Bag #2-My biological maternal grandmother. Have never laid eyes on her or heard her voice. She knows I am alive and chooses not to speak or see my father or I.

Bag #3-Missing my uncle’s (fathers only brother) funeral. I always question my decision on this one. I was still in college and on the national board an organization. His funeral was the same day as the conference I’d planned and chaired for over a year. I knew I couldn’t handle it. Besides, I justified it by remember something he said to me the last time I saw him. He said, ‘Cremate my ass cause I don’t want a bunch of motherfucker’s standing over me staring and shit.'

Bag #4-My mother’s first statement to me when she got off the plane in Atlanta for my college graduation. Before saying, congratulations or I am proud of you or I love you or I miss you or anything she said and I quote, ‘Dang, Queen you done gained a lot of weight, haven’t you?’ That set the tone for my entire graduation weekend.

Bag #5-Having an abortion several years ago. I still stand by my decision and believe it was the best choice at the time. However, sometimes you just can’t help but to wonder.

I must admit, this isn’t my complete set of luggage but they seem to be the ones that I travel with the most and they have hurt my back and spirit for far to long. So I put them down in hopes that I

1. Can one day again have that faith-filled kind of love
2. Strive to be the best mother and not get so caught up in my own BS that I forget my life isn’t about me
3. Accept that my uncle is ok with it and realize that if anybody knew my heart he did
4. Stop recalling my mother’s statement at random times in my life for no apparent reason
5. Always rely more on self control, than birth control

And on that note I am going to make it my business from here on out to, in the words of Ms. Badu, pack light.