She Got A Temper Though #HelpMe

You don’t have it? Okay, well take this sheet of paper and write it down here. Okay. …and so I began writing, in the neatest handwriting, on unlined paper. Just like Daddie.

I’m so over this whole entire thing. What more can I tell you about this man? I have filled out soooo many pieces of paper. But, I am who I am…sometimes, a writer…so let me get this done and we will be done with it. As I’m writing…

You’re 37? I will be eventually. You’re not married? No. You don’t have kids? No. So you’re not married and you don’t have kids… *was that a question?* No. Why aren’t you married? Because nobody asked me. What’s wrong with you? *these mf’in questions are what’s wrong with me* You mean or something? No, I’m not a mean person. You sure? *well, now that you mention it, I might be mistaken*

At this point, I have only written two sentences. They’re hella neat though. I look across from my mother who is exactly no help at all with this ridiculous line of questioning. Mom, this is over, you do it. I’m not writing this.

But maybe I should have kept writing because I think that made him feel like he could continue. You must be mean or something. I look over at my mother, the woman whose womb I occupied for 9 months…the easiest of the 7 births she endured. Help. Me. Mama…HELP. ME. HELP. ME.  Well, she’s not mean, but she got a temper though. She does have a nice personality. *mom, what in the ENTIRE F are you saying right now*

Seriously? I don’t like her.

He looks back to me like he’s got confirmation of something he knew. Anyone who’s been victim of my temper has earned it. This is the only part of the conversation my mother confirmed. She’s worthless. Okay, so let’s say you’re going out on a date. He wants to go to Outback, but you want to go Chili’s *I actually never want to go to either of these places, but hell, it’s not like my mother is going to help me out* …are you one of those types that gets mad when you can’t go to the place you want to go? I don’t get mad about things I don’t spend my money on. This is a non-issue. Well, you know some women are like that. See, me, I can find something to eat anywhere, but sometimes you want what you want.

Well, isn’t that lovely for you. Do you want to know what I want right now?

Sometimes I feel like my mother doesn’t love me. She does, but you are sitting across from me. You know me. You know my life. AND you obviously know my temper. And you’re just gonna let this ride? Under these circumstances? I don’t even want to be in this place. But, here I am, the oldest born 3^rd, so I have to be in this place.

This place = Funeral home.

Writing = My Father’s Obituary.

Guy = Funeral Director.

My Mother = Doesn’t Want Me To Be Great.

Yep. Daddie ain’t here no more. When I told Ernie the news he gave me two immediate pieces of advice. Don’t order any drinks (from the restaurant airport I was at…he actually said give it back but well, me) and write. I took none of his advice. When I write things, they become real…and this is something that could have remained fake news and alternative facts a few decades longer. And I ain’t wasting no alcohol, ever. But it was what I needed to hear. So much so, I would not let him call me. Text only. Because if you say something like that to me, I might come undone. And the way my life is now set up, there is no time for that.

I told him because of all the people in the world, he knew exactly what I was going through. Not because his daddie had passed. But his person had passed, just months ago. For some of us in the world, there is a person that connects us to it. Just one. They are your link to Earth. The only person in the world, with the sound of their eyes…the only person that can collect you, snatch your edges, give you the go ahead to pop off (Daddie was very, extremely, selective about this one…but sometimes I got a chance at greatness), encourage your dreams...

My father is the reason I am good – if you believe me to be good. The reason I am a writer –if you believe me to be so.  The reason I am a good friend – if you believe me to be your friend. The reason I am smart – if you believe UCLA and UCA were right about those pieces of paper they gave me…which hang on my parent’s wall today. And most importantly, the reason, the actual, specific, Earthly reason I love – if you believe that I love and or love you, in whatever ways love is meant. My father, my Daddie is my person. And he’s not here anymore. And that’s worse, much worse than the terrible awful. I am the child of a great man. I am the child of the greatest man.

The next day, because the gravity of this hasn’t quite set in, because grief…I think? My mom and I are at lunch. It starts to come back to me.

Mom, that was kinda weird yesterday? What was weird? The funeral home guy. Those questions. You think he was trying to hit on me or something? What’s wrong with that? *besides the freaking obvious?* MOM! Dad’s there…Like Daddie is literally there!!!! I can’t…I Can’t Do This With You! I think if you lived here in Texas he would have asked you out. Mom, that’s insane. There’s no way I would do that. Like ever. Why not? He has a job.

Does anyone need a mother? I have one. She’s not all there, but she’ll be super supportive of your quest for a partner in life. Because, Outback and Chili’s.

I think about that day at the Funeral Home (and the next one with my mother) because it’s the epitome of my relationship with my parents. If the roles were reversed, and we were making arrangements for my mother (not something I really want to think about, but…) there is no way that conversation would have gone that far. Daddie actually would have been pretty pissed. Which makes it funny. It’s almost comical just thinking about it because I know what my Daddie would have said and done. Because I got the chance to experience it, just weeks prior.

We were at my younger sister’s graduation party (Welcome to the Master’s Wheaty!) and someone asked when I was having a child. My other younger sister has just recently had a beautiful baby girl. Before I could come up with my see what had happened was… my father, my Daddie gave the most chilling, the most supportive, the most direct facial expression that the conversation literally ended. He said, without saying, that having a child is not the definition of her life. Should she have a child, it will be the most perfect child that ever lived. And if she chooses to not have children, she will still be perfect. Just like she is, right now. He cut his eyes so quickly and sharply, I felt like I needed to confirm that I wasn’t pregnant… This is the first time in my life that I didn’t have to explain myself. And the last time that he could protect me from it.

 

It is said, that Sigmund Freud once said, that there is possibly no greater need in childhood than a father’s protection. I would have to agree with him. I would venture to speculate that this need remains well into adulthood.

Especially if your mother is anything like mine. HELP. ME. N!**@!!!  

A Blog For My Father #andasongtoo

Daddy. Papa. Father. The Paterfamilias. Pops. Daddie.

A man known by many names. A name that some of us all know instantly the meaning. We know exactly who that man is, when his name is called, by his people…his little people. He is mine, and I am his, it doesn’t matter what I did (let’s face it, you know me), or where we are. He always sees me just as I am. And on this day, I am running towards him…

But before that day (well, chronologically after, but before in the recollection of the memories…you know my mental life) I was running to a song. A song I learned about in my Introduction To Jazz Class  at UCLA. Taught by someone else’s paterfamilias.

I was in Osh Kosh, Wisconsin, meeting my twin sister from a different Mommie and Mister. See, we have the same birth day, but the years got a little off. Anyway, I was in Wisconsin, all the way from Arkansas, on a recruitment trip for our graduate school and residential life program. We were deeply engaged in some professionally social conversation when I heard the first instrument. Literally the first note. Now, I can’t tell you what note that actually was, because well, Physiological Sciences degree, but my heart knows it.

I stopped mid conversation, literally, in the middle of speaking, and told them I had to go. Actually, I’m not sure I even said anything. I was like Shug that fateful Sunday. I was doing something, and then I wasn’t. Because what I was doing didn’t matter like what I needed to be doing…in the place I needed to be. Just like the Lord was speaking to her, that song was speaking to me. I had to find where the music was coming from. Nothing else mattered #SeekingTheMaster #GodsTrynToTellYouSomething. Nobody else mattered. Not in that moment. I had to hear it. The song. #iHearYaLord

A Song For My Father. (you should stop reading, click the link, start the song then finish reading…because this song is everything…and your father probably knows it…and I’m already in debt for that UCLA class…so, for free, right?) Thank you, Horace Silver. Somebody needs to play that at SF Jazz. They would get a lifetime membership from me. Meanwhile, you should join.

Anyway, back to the story. I stopped speaking, literally in the middle of speaking to prospective students and employees, and sprinted toward the music #TheMakingsOfARunner #WhenIYetDidNotKnowTheLordsPlanForMyLifeAndFeet. I stood awkwardly close to the band, eyes half closed, heart completely open, smiling, and listening for every melody, arms folded in pure delight. Praying that each one would be right where it was supposed to be. Housed in a memory from years ago, in an overcrowded auditorium, listening to an overqualified man, breathe life, musically, into me.

After the song, I realized that most important thing I wasn’t talking about. Love. What makes our heart’s beat. Things that fill us up, when the world puts us on E. I spent the next fifteen minutes explaining Jazz to everyone that would listen.

Running. Back to that memory. Daddie is a bus driver by trade. So he spent his days shuttling children to/from school, and field trips in between. If you lived in the Bay Area, one of those trips was inevitably to Great America, because well…the school year ends. So, I knew my Daddie would potentially be there, but not really. I didn’t know that I would actually see him. I mean, Great America. Ain’t nobody got time to be there with Daddie when there is literally every single child stimuli turned on HIGH, and hello! I’m a child and I’m so here for this. Lights, Rides, Shiny Things, Sugary Things, Other Kids… I’m so here for this.

But not really. Because I have a Daddie, and he’s the best one in the world. I know that other people think that, but well, delusion. I kid (not really)… Many of us are children of great men, so I know there are some awesome Daddies out there. But mine.

I saw him out of the corner of my eye. And before my mental facial recognition program could ding, I was in mid-sprint towards him. Screaming his name. Daddie! Daddie! Hi Daddie! Waving frantically like he didn’t know who I was, because well, it was possible that 6 other people in the world could have been doing exactly what I was doing because, you know, sisters…

I hugged him like we had not done this, oh say, 5 hours ago, in the morning, in our home. Like I had been taken, and he went through hell, high water, and Paris to find me. Like it was the last dance we would ever have after having lived a long life #iKnewForSureIwasLoved . Like his desperate search for me, after hours and hours, had finally ended #IGetLostYo. I held on to him. We talked about all the fun I was having, which didn’t really seem all that important anymore, and I sat there. On his lap. I didn’t have a single worry. Eventually one of my friends caught up with me, because…sprinting creates distance. I knew it was time to go. He had to go hang with his bus driver friends, and I had to go be his daughter, but somewhere else.

I hugged him real tight. I told him with authority that I loved him, and held out my hand. My Daddie kissed my forehead, authored his own loving words, and put a $5 in my empty palm. My friend standing next to me looked at this ritual of sorts, and attempted to mimic our actions. And in her tattered hand, he placed a dollar bill.

That’s Daddie for you.

And a facebook friend noted so importantly that for all of that, we have yet to memorialize fatherhood in song the ways in which we do motherhood, right? I get it. Umbilical cords, stretch marks, and well, baby’s big heads through a really small passage is worth noting. But, is that more important than our moment at Great America? Perhaps for some. Not for me.

What my Daddie was to me in that moment (and others like it) keeps me alive like my mother did those nine months bouncing around in her womb. My attachment to his leg that day was the exact same. He was transferring sustenance – sacred survival sustenance to me. And he had Daddie enough in him to give a little to my friend.

Actually, maybe I am a little glad that there aren’t many songs about Daddiehood and all that it is. For some, the feeling is foreign. For others like me, it’s too complicated to compose.

Horace did a good job though. I like the way he remembers fathers.

Happy Father’s Day to the amazing men out there, and to those gone before this day doing their work from Heaven. The men who save, the men who sustain. The men who are the source #NotTheMatrix #WelliGuessThatKindaWorksToo #YouKnowWhatIMeantTho. The men who can turn a child’s gaze from every toy on the aisle, ride in the park, dessert on the counter and every other sparkling kiddie thing – just by being. And that wanting, to be exactly like him.

Thank you for being Daddie. It keeps me being (whatever it is I am) all these miles away.

Pops! #ThatSecondLastName Oleksy-Jones

So, I struggle with sexuality. Well, not mine so much. Spoiler...I’m heterosexual. The only struggle with that is finding the person who wants to be heterosexual with me. Actually, I don’t really struggle the other side of that sexuality spectrum anymore.

.

Enter, Pops. MO.m's "hubby" in my professional life. My student affairs paterfamilias. SNJ. That second last name I never told you about. MO.m would be where my introversion, my reflection, my calm comes from. The parts of me people do not often see. Pops is genetically (really, not really) responsible for the GirlieGurl many of you have come to know and love! The laughter, the excitement, the willing to try anything at least one, the hosting dinner parties and events...All of that extroversion is Pops. Totally Pops.

There is no real appropriate place to start when it comes to us. I know, though, that he would begin the story in 2000. UCLA RA Training. Me and my AT&T Nokia phone. Damn shame... I’ve never been smarter than these damn phones.

He was my first hall director. My first supervisor at UCLA. The first UCA alum in my life... And my first openly gay friend. Crazy that I actually know my "first" gay friend, right? Right. #AnotherCherryPopped.

Anyway, UCLA. SNJ. ORL. Delta Terrace. Talk about amazing times. Rewriting my incident reports because I couldn’t control the angry black RA inside of me. Some of the best meals (I cooked for him) in his apartment. Amazing holidays celebrated in the 4th floor of the staff building. Driving his car like it was my own. Being called out in Covel Commons with Shellie. I can still hear him calling us Peacock (my wild and colorful braids) and Du Rag (Shellie always had her hair wrapped up). I wouldn’t trade a second of it.

Well, accept the one second that I would.

People on our staff team didn’t take too fondly to his leadership. I struggled a little with his sexual identity, but not so much that I could not work with him. I couldn’t see how they had an issue with him when I would get ALL the extra work! And I did the extra work without complaint. But, I suppose that made me his favorite because they complained about it to our Area Director.

Our Area Director had a “top secret but not really because I’m an informant” meeting with us. (Damn right I told SNJ about it...hello! He feeds me!). Specific people had their serious issues with commander in Delta Terrace and felt all too comfortable to speak up. I’ve never taken too kindly to this format. If you don’t have the testes or uterus to tell the person, please have several seats. In a confrontation strategy coaching counseling session. For beginners.

Then someone did it. Someone brought up my and his relationship. She’s his favorite... He doesn’t hold her accountable like he does us... She gets to do whatever she wants... *under their breath* Doesn’t she drive his car?

I had a conflict of conscious in that moment. We’re in a room talking about a man who isn’t here to defend himself. They obviously know nothing about our relationship. Which isn’t a relationship. Why are they looking at me? He is a gay man and I’m the daughter of a preacher, and a Christian. And people know that about us. What am I supposed to do?

I thought about it for a while. Then I realized exactly who he was. He was my supervisor, a good (albeit crazy) man, a Cowboy’s Fan #WeDemBoys, a generous person, a gay man...and my friend. And dammit, NOBODY says nothing bad about my friends!!

I began to speak. And with every word, every You're hella moded statement and …as a matter of fact accusatory finger point, everyone else begin to have a crisis of conscience. Mine was gone. Me and the other RAs were never the same after that day. And he and I changed a little too. Only it was me who did the changing. He was the same ole guy. Pops.

Before I made it to Westwood, I would have told you that homosexuality is wrong and I’m not sure I could be friends with someone who lives that life or identifies that way. I could not see how it could be. Not with the way my Bible reads, and how my Daddie preaches. And it’s not even about condemnation; it’s just looking at it from a "what’s right and what’s wrong" perspective, based upon what I believe.

While in Westwood, I made my peace with it all. I was not his favorite. I was just his. To love, to care for, to care about, to teach, to befriend, to develop, to watch Alias & Cowboy games with, and to nag. When I was hungry, he bought groceries and I made us dinner. When I needed to get to the Rose Bowl for the game, he made me take the car to get an oil change days before, then drop him off hours early and bring back lunch – for everyone. When I needed a place to live over the summer, he took me in – no questions asked and no rent required. And when I need someone to look out for me because I was (am) so naive, he anticipates all my needs.

Pops and MO.m took me wine tasting in Napa. You should see them together. How much they care for each other. All of the memories they collected over the years. The shared hopes for our individual futures. There with me, in Napa, drinking wine. There, with me, teaching me about wine. And I wasted every dime they spent on me. We went to some of the best wineries in Napa, because we’re bougie, and sampled California's greatest bottled creations. I had my thizz face on the entire time. Hated it! Even the champagne. I didn’t realize just how much I missed our family time...our together time. Going out to dinner at fancy places I could not afford on financial aid, holidays in the penthouse with that sinful mac & cheese...and good heavens Sweet Tea!

I see now, just how limited my understanding of love was... I love people better because of him. Anyone who has ever received any measure of love from me knows something about Pops. There are days when I am certain, especially at work, that I won’t make it. But Pops is hella strict, and he just won’t allow it. Even those times I fall from grace...as all aspiring earthy angels do. He is always there, waiting for my wings, so that he can catch me, dust me off, and give me enough air to fly again. And his being gay may have something to do with it. Or nah. Point is, it doesn’t matter anymore. It doesn’t make me any less Christian. It doesn’t hinder my walk or relationship with God. My faith is the stronger for it. I believe a little more because of him.