Monday, May 7, 2012
Grand Kids...I can name them all.
A few years ago on mother’s day in church pastor asked all mothers, grandmother and great grandmother to stand up, then he asked all mother only to sit.
I kept on standing and he said, “Angela, are you a grand mother?” I said, yes I am, then he said how many grand kids do you have, I said seven, he said name them.
I did name them but it took me a minute to make sure I did not leave anyone out. I did not expect him to call on me to name my grand kids so I was not prepared. Now I have nine and I must say I can name then all in lest than fifteen seconds.
I love all my grandkids; they are an extension of me. I always try to remember their birthdays and send them a present, not because I have to but just to let them know that I remember and love them.
This week I have two birthdays, my third and fourth grand children, Xavier and Imani, both on May 10th; I remember getting the phone call on the same day.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU BOTH.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Do you know the State you live in?
When I came to this country I was twenty two years old. I had left my beautiful Jamaica behind me. Every now and then someone would ask me something specific about my Island paradise and I did not know. I had never visited all the wonderful places and sites that visitors would come to my country to see, therefore I did not know my own country.
I promise myself that, that would not happened again, but due to my business NY life I have not had the time to keep that promise, however, starting this spring I will be on a mission to visit as much sites in New York as I can before leaving this beautiful state. The first place I am going to see is this subway station.
It was built in 1906 and was later abandon in 1945 because no too many people used it and also because of the curve in the station platform there is a gap between the train and platform which makes it a little dangerous.
In 1995 the city planned to turn it into a museum but that plan never gets off the ground. So if you are visiting New York and have the time, take the #6 train to the last stop and stay on and while it makes that loop to go back uptown you will see what only a few people in NY knows about, a piece of NY history that is buried underground, as it is not opened to the public.
Why Color............?
Why Color……….
Who invented hair color and why? As a black woman who is very proud of whom I am, I find myself doing the color thing. At first I said I don’t like to see the black with the little white peeking about here and there, so I color or rinse to hide my them. So I call the grey my highlights.
However I have developed a scalp condition and my hair is getting very thin in the middle of my head. Is this because of all the chemicals I’ve being using over the years? One does not know. I have been to several doctors and still I don’t have a cause or a cure for my problem.
Just this past weekend I went to get my color and “boy!” I’m red, I can never seems to get the right shade of brown I would like since I don’t like jet black, Also, my head itch so bad that at 4am in the morning I was in the bathroom washing it. Now, one would think that I would rather have my night’s rest without the itching than to have my hair color, but like any other addiction I always go back for more.
As soon as a month or so has past my grey start showing themselves, I find all kind of excuse why my head itch so bad the last time (this is not the first time this has happened). Maybe it was the brand or the length of time the chemical stayed in my head. Whatever the cause I always find myself back in the salon to get my color.
For now, I am still trying to decide if I will continue to color, or not? I have seen some really beautiful women with their “salt n pepper” hair that looks just fab.
Who invented hair color and why? As a black woman who is very proud of whom I am, I find myself doing the color thing. At first I said I don’t like to see the black with the little white peeking about here and there, so I color or rinse to hide my them. So I call the grey my highlights.
However I have developed a scalp condition and my hair is getting very thin in the middle of my head. Is this because of all the chemicals I’ve being using over the years? One does not know. I have been to several doctors and still I don’t have a cause or a cure for my problem.
Just this past weekend I went to get my color and “boy!” I’m red, I can never seems to get the right shade of brown I would like since I don’t like jet black, Also, my head itch so bad that at 4am in the morning I was in the bathroom washing it. Now, one would think that I would rather have my night’s rest without the itching than to have my hair color, but like any other addiction I always go back for more.
As soon as a month or so has past my grey start showing themselves, I find all kind of excuse why my head itch so bad the last time (this is not the first time this has happened). Maybe it was the brand or the length of time the chemical stayed in my head. Whatever the cause I always find myself back in the salon to get my color.
For now, I am still trying to decide if I will continue to color, or not? I have seen some really beautiful women with their “salt n pepper” hair that looks just fab.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Mothers and Fathers
Mothers and Fathers
Not because you give birth does not make you a mother and not because you are unable to care for you your child does not make you a bad mother.
Not only because you are a sperm donor, that makes you a father. And just because you are a sperm donor you are a father.
I grew up with my paternal grandmother, aunts and uncles with instruction from my father that if my mother shows up she could visit but she was not allowed to leave with me.
As I get older, I began to wonder why my mother never visit or write when she was living a stone throw away from me.
I started hearing stories of how she visited when I was a wee babe but as per my dad she was not allow to leave with me. However, I was still hurt that she was not in my life. For whatever reason my dad took me to his mom, my mom was angry and decided that she was going to stay out of my life.
Did that make her a bad mother? No, not in itself. When I was fifteen years I was introduced to her and instead of trying to connect with me she tried to destroy the relationship I had with my father. Did this make her a bad mother? As I grew older, it was clear to me that my mother did not love me as she did the others; she had no empathy for me. When I was in my late thirties I went to her to chat, mother to daughter and she started talking about my sisters. I was so hurt I screamed at her, I try to show her how I felt how she made me feel and asked her why she could not accept me just for me. She told me that she had asked God to forgive her and there was nothing she could do for me. That made a bad mother to me! I was hurting at that moment and she did not even try to help.
At this point in my life I did not want anything much from her, just for her to treat me as her child and she could not.
She became a foster mother and was very good at caring for those children, she even asked me for help sometimes (to wash their hair and such).
I have seen many men who took care of children that they did not fathered, and many abandon their own children.
Mothers and fathers are people who are care givers not only to their own flesh and blood children but to all children who are in need.
If you adopt a child and you love them, you are a parent, (mother/father), if you show love to your neighbor’s children you are a mother/father. I have three children, my youngest is twenty eight years old, and still today their schoolmates still calls me mom whenever they meet me in the street.
We could all be mothers and fathers, it’s in us but like a seed that is planted, it we don’t water it, it will not grow. It is up to us to take the gift that the Lord gave us and nurture.
Circumstances may come up and interferes with the natural order of life, but we have to decide who we are and what we want for ourselves and our children.
Not because you give birth does not make you a mother and not because you are unable to care for you your child does not make you a bad mother.
Not only because you are a sperm donor, that makes you a father. And just because you are a sperm donor you are a father.
I grew up with my paternal grandmother, aunts and uncles with instruction from my father that if my mother shows up she could visit but she was not allowed to leave with me.
As I get older, I began to wonder why my mother never visit or write when she was living a stone throw away from me.
I started hearing stories of how she visited when I was a wee babe but as per my dad she was not allow to leave with me. However, I was still hurt that she was not in my life. For whatever reason my dad took me to his mom, my mom was angry and decided that she was going to stay out of my life.
Did that make her a bad mother? No, not in itself. When I was fifteen years I was introduced to her and instead of trying to connect with me she tried to destroy the relationship I had with my father. Did this make her a bad mother? As I grew older, it was clear to me that my mother did not love me as she did the others; she had no empathy for me. When I was in my late thirties I went to her to chat, mother to daughter and she started talking about my sisters. I was so hurt I screamed at her, I try to show her how I felt how she made me feel and asked her why she could not accept me just for me. She told me that she had asked God to forgive her and there was nothing she could do for me. That made a bad mother to me! I was hurting at that moment and she did not even try to help.
At this point in my life I did not want anything much from her, just for her to treat me as her child and she could not.
She became a foster mother and was very good at caring for those children, she even asked me for help sometimes (to wash their hair and such).
I have seen many men who took care of children that they did not fathered, and many abandon their own children.
Mothers and fathers are people who are care givers not only to their own flesh and blood children but to all children who are in need.
If you adopt a child and you love them, you are a parent, (mother/father), if you show love to your neighbor’s children you are a mother/father. I have three children, my youngest is twenty eight years old, and still today their schoolmates still calls me mom whenever they meet me in the street.
We could all be mothers and fathers, it’s in us but like a seed that is planted, it we don’t water it, it will not grow. It is up to us to take the gift that the Lord gave us and nurture.
Circumstances may come up and interferes with the natural order of life, but we have to decide who we are and what we want for ourselves and our children.
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Looking back at 2011.
2011 was a year with many blessings, some challenges and some pain.
My preemie granddaughter went home after three months in the hospital. I sold my house and bought my retirement home.
We had an earthquake in August and a blizzard in October.
The president had promised to bring home the troops and by the end of December he was making good on that promise. All out troops was out of Iraq.
However, my worst pain was to hear that someone that I love very much thinks that I don't or should I say didn't love them. I have done all I can, went to war and fight their battle, extend myself financially whenever I can and to hear those words, it was hard. However such is life.
I hope that 2012 will be as good a year for me and for YOU.
I have learned that one cannot have good without bad, sweet without bitter and happiness without sorry. We must take the good with the bad.
Moving ahead to see what is in store for this new year.
My preemie granddaughter went home after three months in the hospital. I sold my house and bought my retirement home.
We had an earthquake in August and a blizzard in October.
The president had promised to bring home the troops and by the end of December he was making good on that promise. All out troops was out of Iraq.
However, my worst pain was to hear that someone that I love very much thinks that I don't or should I say didn't love them. I have done all I can, went to war and fight their battle, extend myself financially whenever I can and to hear those words, it was hard. However such is life.
I hope that 2012 will be as good a year for me and for YOU.
I have learned that one cannot have good without bad, sweet without bitter and happiness without sorry. We must take the good with the bad.
Moving ahead to see what is in store for this new year.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Moving on
Yesterday I cried………….
This is the title of a self-help book I had attempted to read some years ago but got so lost I just put it on my bookshelf to read later.
I was talking to my younger daughter last evening and she was telling me some of what is going on in her father’s (my ex-husband) life. At the end of the conversation I said to her, the next time you talk to your father tell him that he is better off without her (his wife who had just walked out on him).
I said she was of no help to him even when he was sick and needed her, she was missing in action. Therefore move on with life knowing that now he has to fend for himself and not waiting for her to cook his meal or to do whatever a wife does.
My daughter said to me, “I did not expect to hear that from you”, meaning she thought I would be glad for the situation he was in. I told her even though I was hurt and disappointed at the way things turned out for us and all the pain he had put me through, I wish him no harm.
I would never reconcile with him again, he is my past but he is still a person and I have to live with me. I cannot spend the rest of my life being so angry at those who have done me wrong. I will not get pulled back in their mess or let it bough me down.
YESTERDAY I CRIED…….BUT TODAY I AM LAUGHING, not at those who has done me wrong, but for the joy that I have found in letting go of all that stuff.
This is the title of a self-help book I had attempted to read some years ago but got so lost I just put it on my bookshelf to read later.
I was talking to my younger daughter last evening and she was telling me some of what is going on in her father’s (my ex-husband) life. At the end of the conversation I said to her, the next time you talk to your father tell him that he is better off without her (his wife who had just walked out on him).
I said she was of no help to him even when he was sick and needed her, she was missing in action. Therefore move on with life knowing that now he has to fend for himself and not waiting for her to cook his meal or to do whatever a wife does.
My daughter said to me, “I did not expect to hear that from you”, meaning she thought I would be glad for the situation he was in. I told her even though I was hurt and disappointed at the way things turned out for us and all the pain he had put me through, I wish him no harm.
I would never reconcile with him again, he is my past but he is still a person and I have to live with me. I cannot spend the rest of my life being so angry at those who have done me wrong. I will not get pulled back in their mess or let it bough me down.
YESTERDAY I CRIED…….BUT TODAY I AM LAUGHING, not at those who has done me wrong, but for the joy that I have found in letting go of all that stuff.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
"thank you" and "You're welcome"
I grew up in the country in Jamaica and was not accustom to certain things as those who grow up in the big city.
“You’re welcome”, is one of those phase that I never heard until I went to boarding school at the age of fifteen. My principal was a very big English woman (Mrs. Robinson). She was very stern, and rightly so, she had to care for over one hundred and fifty girls from fifteen to eighteen years old, who lives on campus, some of whom has never left home before.
From the first day of orientation she let you know what was expected of you, and saying you are welcome was one of those things. You just don’t ignore a person when the say “thank you”.
But what does it means to say to someone “you’re welcome”? This is what I have come up with; Saying you’re welcome means, I am glad I was able to help, it was no problem, it pleases me to be able to help you, I was happy to be of service, and I am here whenever you needs me.
Today it is one of the phase that I use quite often and with pleasure. One of my many duties is to collect payment from customers and sometimes I have to extend to them a little time for them to make payment and they are always appreciative and say “thank you” (not all customers are like that, some take it for granted that I have no choice but to give them the time). So when I say you’re welcome, I mean, I am glad I was able to give them the time they need and that our company will still continue to service their business
although they are a little behind on making payment.
A lot of times I don’t have to make a second phone call, they call and keep me up to date on when payment is coming, to which I say, thank you for letting me know and they say’ you’re welcome.
It is just courtesy.
“You’re welcome”, is one of those phase that I never heard until I went to boarding school at the age of fifteen. My principal was a very big English woman (Mrs. Robinson). She was very stern, and rightly so, she had to care for over one hundred and fifty girls from fifteen to eighteen years old, who lives on campus, some of whom has never left home before.
From the first day of orientation she let you know what was expected of you, and saying you are welcome was one of those things. You just don’t ignore a person when the say “thank you”.
But what does it means to say to someone “you’re welcome”? This is what I have come up with; Saying you’re welcome means, I am glad I was able to help, it was no problem, it pleases me to be able to help you, I was happy to be of service, and I am here whenever you needs me.
Today it is one of the phase that I use quite often and with pleasure. One of my many duties is to collect payment from customers and sometimes I have to extend to them a little time for them to make payment and they are always appreciative and say “thank you” (not all customers are like that, some take it for granted that I have no choice but to give them the time). So when I say you’re welcome, I mean, I am glad I was able to give them the time they need and that our company will still continue to service their business
although they are a little behind on making payment.
A lot of times I don’t have to make a second phone call, they call and keep me up to date on when payment is coming, to which I say, thank you for letting me know and they say’ you’re welcome.
It is just courtesy.
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