"American Skin"

This movie!!! This production!! The cast! It was woven together as intricately as the Most High did each creation that brought this production to life. It is layered with a multitude of issues plaguing American society and with clear justication/evidence presented in the monlogues and dialogue. The cast was multicultural in a macro and micro perspective. This film's characters and complexities is a microcosm of America 🇺🇸...the America that many want to sweep under the rug and continue to "do business as usual". And, as those who like to put on airs when the company comes, i.e., when the rest of the world 🌎 is watching, black brown, idegenous, women, the disenfranchised, CONTINUOUSLY find ways to highlight that unwanted child that AMERICA tried to abort without considering a possibility that the ghost would haunt because no amount of bleach can clean its hands. Since America continues to partake in the same habits, in one form of another, it will always be addicted; thereby never renewing its mind and heart, collectively and individually, to change the systems and processes that placed its feet in the stirrups. 

We can continue to break glass ceilings from a minority point of view. We can continue to put women and men of different colors, ethnicities, and religious backgrounds into positions that, ostensibly, can create change. We can. I'm hopeful because that is the type of person I am. With that being stated, the character slain in "American Skin" could have easily been Kamala Harris or Barack Obama's son if he was blessed with one. Their son could have been in a 1995 Honda rolling through suburbia. It could have easily been Justice Sonia Sotamayor's grandson, covered in great body art, riding with his friends in a fine tuned vehicle that doesn't fit Mar-a-Lago. They could have just as easily been placed in the ground or an urn ⚱.  

While I recognize and appreciate the strides that have been made in America, I MUST also remain cognizant that inequities and inequalities exist within the system. 

Kuddos to the cast, filmmakers, and producers for making THIS film and debuting it during THIS appointed time in history. It shall not be forgotten.

Just as the plot thickened and created space for people to, inherently, check themselves, their biases, prejudice, and stereotypes, it is the HOPE that it will for viewers of the film 🎥.  

If it does...if it does...when it does!!! 

Until tomorrow...America...we are no greater than the next...no pedestals...the time is NOW for accountability. 

Blessings in Adversity

 2020!!! 2020!!2020!2020.......

This year brought about countless changes, some good, bad, indifferent and multitude of others on the scales of life. We lost yet we gained. We suffered yet we conquered. We loved and hated. We felt helpless yet we were helpful at times. We were torn down, but we found ways to build. We felt directionless but somehow our internal compass took control. 

People who were passive became proactive. People who were aggressive found a way to channel that thing within them that created a space of tranquility and stillness. People who thought they COULD NEVER realized they COULD. When one's back is against the wall, he or she finds out his or her composition internally. One can come out swinging; one can sit and do nothing; or one can center herself and devise a plan of action prior to moving. We had each of these this year.

2020 has been a year of challenge. One that many of us could not have foreseen in our lifetime. We have read about pandemics and epidemics. We have witnessed racism, bigotry, sexism, classism, and many other isms. But, I do not think many of us could have fathomed anything to the magnitude of what we have and are currently enduring in this time. Leaderless nations. Leaderful communities by the everyday man, woman, and child. 

Death, defeat, degradation, and demise seems to have covered over us like the shadow in an eclipse, but even the eclipsed is outlined with the light. Still we rise. We are here. We are birthing. We are birthing dreams. We are birthing businesses. We are birthing awareness. We are birthing growth. We are birthing life. 

Lest not hang our heads and hearts in the pits of despair and hopelessness. Lets straighten our necks, stand up tall, vision forged ahead, and walk one step at a time into a new life, a new world. Creation. 

In the midst...in the midst...we will rise like the Phoenix out of the ashes!