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I am sitting here thinking what is to become of my life as I move from one transitional stage to another. All through my life, women have played a big part in the decisions I have made.

It is also pretty ironic that in all the different jobs I have held in this journey I will like to call LIFE, save for two jobs all my bosses or immediate supervisors have been women, and each one fulfilled their own purposes in my life most of it positive and in a weird twisted way the experience has made me who I am today, it also made this book possible.

I listened this weekend as one person talked about the decision her son made to live with the mother of his child even though he was not in love with her and he was not happy. I lived to see that same guy turn around and marry the same woman, I watched him on his wedding day as he did everything his wife said, she was in control he was smiling all the way though the event on that day, as I was told that day his wife controlled everything she said who was invited what was to be worn and I could go on, all he had to do was show up, you fill in the blanks.

Reflecting on my own first failed marriage, I knew how he felt as I too thought I was doing the right thing, after all, she said she was pregnant. “Do the right thing” I thought it meant getting married. Boy was I wrong............................... 

As I struggled with the words of this book I struggled with taking myself out of the equation and to allow the women who I have met during the course of my life to express themselves. Why do they do the things that they do? Why do they say the things that they say? What makes them love, lie, deceive, cheat, give, take, strike out the way they do? What makes them this great puzzle that make some people say "women you cannot live with them you cannot live without them." What makes them get up on a morning and despite all their troubles as a mother, wife, girlfriend, lover, sister, aunt, grandmother or great grandmother go on to fulfill another day and say yes I will do it again tomorrow?

I do not have the answers, they do. There are too many books written by "scholars" and medical practitioners who say they have studied the woman and this is their conclusion. I am saying no let the woman speak because they all walk different roads at different times so  their lives do vary from one point to another and in this book we will attempt to explore it with their words, like only they can provide, their words of wisdom. Some of it we may agree with some we may not, but all in all I will leave it as their words told by them and only transcribed by me.

Enjoy.

 

I remember my process of going through, I am still going through, but with wisdom and the Lord on my side, it became easier. As I sang along with Christina Aguilera, the words of her song began to penetrate my soul, my being; the beauty that was dormant for a long time came alive.

You see, being black, full-figured with huge breasts, with a flat butt (yes!), and being told day in and day out by a mother who degraded and abused you in every way possible that you would never amount to anything, that no man will want you ‘cause you’re lazy, fat, ugly etc.; a mother who would beat you and at the age of puberty strip you naked, put you outside and call all the boys in the neighborhood to see you; a mother who would beat you so badly that your ear lobe ripped and still send you to school with a blood stained school shirt; a mother who would leave you at the babysitter who’s son and his best friend would rape a three year old and the mother non the wiser, wouldn’t take a hint as to why you hate the place so much; a mother whom you have stood by and supported in times of emotional and financial need yet  would put you and your infant son out on the street for ‘touching’ her food stuff. You see, being black, full-figured …. Is not what they say it is, but what you think of your self!

But guess what I am beautiful! Yes, I am - inside and out!  You see God made me in his image and likeness; there was no mistake, none. While growing as a child, as a teen, as a young adult, I made choices, based on how I felt about myself. And trust me, they were really bad choices. But, most importantly, I learned from them. Deep down inside, I knew that the beauty the world projected and accepted could not be it! No! They forgot me, “the full-figured woman with big breasts and no butt.”  I am beautiful - my smile, yes! That’s beautiful, my sense of humor, that’s beautiful; my winning personality, that’s beautiful; my intelligence, that’s beautiful; my creativity, that’s beautiful; my ability to reproduce beauty, that’s awesome! I opened myself at the river and poured out everything ugly that was said, thought or given as ‘gifts’. I watched it as it floated down stream and away from me and promised never to accept from or perpetuate those gifts to any one. Then I looked in the crystal clear water and saw a reflection I almost didn’t recognized - ME! Beautiful me! I saw God in myself and I loved her.

One person who have influenced my life, always said that every problem has a solution; it may not be now, a month from now, a year from now; but work towards the solution - in that way you surround yourself with positive thinking and that problem becomes easier to see through.

To those who may read this piece, the message is that “it is within you, and only you can wake it up, only you can want it badly enough to say “new page, new me! I am beautiful!” Believe it!”

To all those women out there, you are beautiful and that inner voice is agreeing with me.  Accept yourself as you are.  Then and only then, can others accept you! 

You’re beautiful.

 

Published on Saturday, Nov 20, 2004 Toronto Star, Canada.

According to Agence France Presse, a 73-year-old prostitute won the right to continue working from her camper van in two northern Italian communities after a lower court overturned a police warrant to move her on. The woman took legal action against the police who in January this year ordered her to move on from two suburbs of Udine, in the northern region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. The local police headquarters said her professional activities were "in appropriate" to the areas frequented by minors and issued an order after a police patrol found her entertaining a client in her camper. No word was mentioned about her client in the story as that part was not important all that was important was the fact that she was 73 years old and she was a prostitute exercising her rights to earn a living.

The woman's lawyer successfully argued that the order had caused her economic hardship and had no basis in law, as prostitution isn’t illegal. At least in that part of the world.

Magistrates at the Regional Administrative Tribunal recognized the police warrant had caused "serious and irreparable" damage to the woman's income and so the case was thrown out.

At the end of the article the writer went further to make a point and what a shallow point it was to say and I quote "For you whippersnappers who shudder at the thought of having sex with a 73 year old, please remember Sophia Loren, below, is only three years younger" and they went on to publish a picture of Sophia Loren in a low cut red dress with her proud breast showing what it means to age gracefully.

We often stop to wonder just how powerful the woman is as she uses all her resources of which the man could do little to resist. The man often shuns the woman, but could he do without her? No he cannot he may leave the one he is with but then he quickly moves on to another whether it is for sex or physical companionship he cannot do without her. It is said that some men could do without a woman and turn to masturbation but even in that realm, most men will think of a woman in order to achieve any form of self-gratification.