"They Say I Walk Around Like I Got an 'S' on My Chest..."

Two things: 1) I love Nicole. 2) I hate cops.

This doesn't stem from some type of deep-seeded racial sentiment or some psuedo-political agenda about police brutality... I just feel like the police feel that they're above the law (and with the way the justice system seems to work most of the time, it appears that they are) and above respecting people and this is my problem with them...

Nicole has had some issues with cops lately (some of it her own fault) and because of these issues, it's making me hate them even more... the other night, we're coming back from Wal-mart... her family had come into town to help her move into our new townhouse and I wanted to make everybody breakfast in the morning...

We're driving down the street when we see the blue boys behind us... we weren't speeding... hadn't ran any red lights... to be honest, we were black people out at 2 AM in a car and that's really all you need for the police to pull you over... but I digress... so the dude pulls us over... Nicole asks what the problem is while handing over her ID and registration... the officer says "I'll tell you as soon as I see who I'm talking to..."

Evil Thought 1 = "Who does this dude think he is? I should get out this car and..." At this point, I'm already pissed because if this were any other dude, I'd knock his head off his shoulders for being so disrespectful to my woman... but since he's police (who seem to be very apt at shooting black people especially when it doesn't warrant it) what can I do? If I even say something in the wrong tone, he's liable to shoot all of us, say we resisted arrest and then get a medal of honor for taking down three criminals innocent black people who weren't doing anything wrong and just want to go home...

After looking at her ID, he asks her where she lives... Evil Thought 2 = "YOU'RE LOOKING AT THE ID... why does she need to tell you address again? Do you think it's fake or something? I should get out this car and..." Finally he reveals that we missed a stop sign that we indeed DID NOT miss and proceeds to go back to his car... this entire time, I am SEETHING... not just because of how he's handling the situation but because I'm helpless... as her man, I should be able to be Superman... nothing should be able to get to her with me beside her because I should be able to effectively neutralize the situation whether it be some type of out-of-line male, nuclear holocaust or what have you...

Literally 20 minutes later, the dude comes back to the car and (you're gonna love this) when Nicole asks about the ticket, the dude says "It's all at the bottom of the ticket" and just walks off without even saying "drive safely" or "goodnight"... what happened to "Serve and Protect"? I guess the new line is "Shoot and Harrass..." Evil Thought 3 = "Yo, you're being WIIIILD disrespectful right now... we could all kill this dude right now and dump his body in the woods... nobody would know... I should get out this car and..." Nicole looks at it and it's a $180 ticket ($130 of it in court costs) Evil Thought 4 = "Really my dude? You're gonna not only pull us over, be disrespectful but you're also going to give us this ticket on a totally bogus charge? I should get out this car and..."

At this point, I have to make a decision: I can either be the angry black male, solving nothing and effectively getting my already-riled-up girlfriend even MORE riled up ORRRRR I can be the supportive boyfriend who tries to make her laugh, effectively ending her anger and keeping things from getting too hostile... I decided to be the latter... and I tried, I REALLY tried... but the ABM showed up a few times and it got to the point where she had to calm ME down... LOL...

There aren't many things that make me feel emasculated but this is one thing that always will, no matter how hard I try to not let it get to me... I know I don't have many male readers and I'm not sure that my females will really understand it (it's just one of those innate "guy things") and even though Nicole hasn't said anything to me about it, I can't help but feel like I let her down even though I'm not sure what I could have done differently... I'm just confused and frustrated, two things I don't ever care to be more than necessary... I don't have a moral to the story with this post, I'm just ranting... thanks for reading...

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"The Newest Addition to the Family..."

He's only 6 days old (and it'll be another five weeks before we can bring him home) but he is the newest addition to the family... we don't have a name yet but we're definitely taking suggestions... so far we've come up with Orion, Chugs (I refuse to call him Chuggie like Nicole is... LOL), Meko, Champ and Caesar... he's not supposed to get very big which is kinda ideal since we're only getting a townhouse... but once we get our own home, I'm planning to get an American bulldog...

In related news, the people we're getting this puppy from had to be some of the scariest people I've ever met in my life... LOL... like, seriously... first off, the road to get there was like one way and it was DEEEEEEEP in the woods... luckily it was still light out or I woulda been like "fuck that... the Klan probably lives down there..." then the lady that came out looked like a damn linebacker and her arms were all ate with bug bites... it was just strange... it looked like the start of some type of horror/torture film... LOL... but they were nice enough people...

Just wanted to share...

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"Counting Sheep Doesn't Work..."

Sleep is underrated... and I say that because you don't realize how much you need sleep until you don't get enough of it...

I am the world's WORST sleeper... well, I take that back... I'm the world's worst sleeper to be around... Nicole is truly a trooper... every night, this woman sleeps next to me and never complains... not even once...

When it comes to sleeping, Nicole and I are polar opposites... Nicole gets cold easily, so at night, she's already under the blanket two seconds after we lay down... she falls asleep quickly, moving maybe once or twice to get comfortable and then she simply sleeps soundly until it's time to wake up the next day...

As for your favorite blogger, Hard Work? LOL... I get HOT easy as hell... and one thing that I cannot do is sleep while I'm hot because I just wake up every five minutes irritable as fuck... so the room HAS to be at least a little cool... this is already a conflict... (we've actually worked out a happy medium though... we keep the ceiling fan on, she sleeps under the covers and I sleep on top until I get cold enough to slip under the covers...) my next issue is falling asleep quickly... I simply can't... no matter how tired I am, I have to lay in bed for at least 45 minutes before I fall asleep and that's a good night... most nights, it's closer to two hours... I just have too many different things swirling around in my head that it's hard for me to just clear my mind and fall asleep... it sucks... the next issue? I move around... ALOT... lol... it just takes a lot for me to get comfortable... my pillow has to be a certain way... my arm has to be a certain way... my head has to lay a certain way or I'm just not comfortable... so while Nicole is over there just laying, I'm moving all over the place, shifting back and forth, turning from side to side, one leg off the bed, then both off the bed, then both BACK ON the bed... just craziness... the next issue is that I can't ever seem to stay asleep... EVER... most nights, I'll knock out only to wake up an hour and a half later, unable to go back to sleep... so I usually get up and go watch TV until I feel sleepy again, four hours later...

The last, most important and most annoying sleeping habit of mine is this: I SNORE... incredibly loud... I get it from my grandmother and for whatever reason, we are the only two people besides my uncle who snore... my uncle's isn't as wall-shaking as the two of us though... we can truly wake the neighborhood up... LOL...

So even with all these differences, Nicole puts up with it just to lay next to the man she loves... the crazy part is she actually HATES when I don't sleep in the bed with her... I think it's insane because if I was a normal person who had to lay next to me, I'd hate myself... I don't know if that made ANY sense but I think ya'll get what I'm saying...

I'm making this post to shout out everybody who puts up with the annoying habits of their significant other... I know it's not always easy but when you make it seem like it is, it makes the relationship that much stronger...

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"How the She and the I Became Us..."

If you've reached this blog by way of my original blog, then this is probably information you know already (at least most of it) so this might seem like a bit of re-do for some of ya'll... if you've arrived here simply by luck, then I advise you to pull up a seat and read The She and I That is Us...


Nicole and I have dated for a little over four months... I've never been really good at relationships... even though I am the quintessential "good guy" that every woman clamors for (incredibly considerate, well-mannered, in college, won't cheat, won't beat on you, will cook YOU dinner and clean up without much fuss, etc. etc.) I have never had a relationship longer than seven months... most end around the three-month mark which has led to a life of me having random hook-ups, falling for the wrong girl, dealing with heartbreak and chasing exes...

Last year, I hit rock bottom... in life, in love, in EVERYTHING... my entire life was in shambles... my ex woke me up one morning and told me that she was having feelings for her ex to which I replied "what do you want to do...?" This led to me telling her to go back to her ex because the last thing I wanted was for a girl I was planning on committing my life to was having her play The Halfway Game... this is where your body, your mind and part of your heart might be with me but yet, there's a part of you that longs to be with that other nigga... needless to say, she ended up going back with this dude and THAT SHIT HURT, B... I mean, in a way, yes it's my own fault... I basically told her to go back to this dude... in my defense, she was supposed to say "No, fuck that nigga... you're a good dude... I'ma ride for you..." (NOTE: this was in no way, shape or form, a perfect relationship... we were always arguing, so at the time, I guess it would make sense for her to go back to an ex so she wouldn't have to deal with me... didn't stop it from hurting though... LOL)

So we broke up... around this same time, I had to move back home to live with my family... this is when the regret swooped in... I wanted her back... I was ready to forgive her, ready to work on us, ready to BE us again... she wasn't having it... at least not the relationship part... we did some things that we probably shouldn't have and that led to a nigga feeling even more confused but it was all for naught... I did what I could to get over her... but my heart was still in a fucked up place...

Around this time, I met another young lady... and she was EVERYTHING I was looking for... beautiful, smart (babygirl was working on her doctorate!), funny, sex was BANANAS, but she was grounded... she was humble... we clicked on so many things... this is when it became apparent to me that she was the one... she had to be... she was the best woman I'd ever come across... and she actually spent time talking to me... me of all people... I couldn't do anything but thank God for sending me this beautiful woman... we talked about everything from marriage to kids to meeting her mom... she's actually the one who convinced me to go back to East Carolina and was a major force in getting things in order for me... but as is usual with me, things didn't happen like I wanted them to...

We had just spent the entire weekend together... everything went great... I met her sister and her future brother in law as well as some other friends... when I returned back home, all of a sudden she was hard to reach... when we did talk, things just seemed off... not bad just different... days later, she told me she had prayed to God about us and God told her, I wasn't the one...

Say what?!?

Now let me explain... I understand a person's belief in God because I have my own personal beliefs... but for some reason, this just didn't sit right with me... like... it's cool if that's what it is but is that really the explanation you're going to give me? Tell me you're fucking somebody else... tell me I'm just not what you're looking for... tell me that your friends and family didn't like me... tell me I suck in bed... don't tell me that God told you not to be with you though... what can I do with that? I can't argue... I can't plead my case... I can't do anything but accept it (still working on it, might I add... LOL)

Needless to say, after already dealing with my ex leaving me for another dude and now having God tell the woman that I just KNEW I would be going down on one knee for in the near future that I wasn't the one, I was a broken man... I'm talking sledgehammer to a knee cap type broken... it was more than just the usual, I'm-done-with-relationships type shit that we're all known to spew right after a relationship goes awry... it got to the point where I was really on some "fuck-bitches-get-money" type shit and that's not even my steez... I've always been a hopeless romantic... I was always a relationship guy (even though random sex never fazed me... LOL) and here I was heartbroken and not seeing an end to this long chain of bad relationships... girls were throwing themselves at me just wanting to be Mrs. Hard Work but I wasn't even trying to hear that shit...

So I started just meeting chicks... not necessarily having sex with them... just going out on dates, doing whatever to pass the time... during this period of time, I met Nicole... and we hardly had the fairy tale beginning... what was crazy about her is that at the time I met her, she didn't seem overly excited in my goodnaturedness like most women... I'm used to the "You're such a good man... you have your head on straight... you're not like all these other niggas out here looking for sex" response when I'm with a chick... to Nicole, she was kinda indifferent... not like she treated me badly... she just treated me like I was any other nigga and it kinda threw me off... LOL... I mean, I wasn't expecting her to just fawn all over me or anything but she didn't seem like she even cared...

This led to the beginning of our relationship... she treated me indifferently, so in turn, I treated her the exact same way... this proved to be detrimental because at the times where she needed me to be excited about something, I wouldn't be (although in my defense of dealing with the heartbreaks, I wasn't excited about anything)... this led to her thinking I didn't care about her which wasn't true at all... I generally cared about her... not to the point where I felt like we needed to be in a relationship but I definitely wanted her to be in my life...

At this point, I headed back to school... I moved in and was more than ready to meet some new people in an attempt to get past this whole phobia of dating and try it one more time... but not with Nicole... LOL... I mean, yeah, she was cool but there was no way I could be with a chick like her... she was just one of those unappreciative chicks who thought everybody should worship the ground she walked on and I couldn't really fuck with that... not to mention she'd be an hour and some change away and I didn't even have a fucking car... I surely wasn't going to be wasting my refund check money on bus rides back and forth when there were more than enough females in walking distance of my dorm room... sure we could still talk on the phone, text back and forth but a relationship? Nah, not happening...

This all came to a head one night in late January... me and Nicole had been talking for about an hour and for whatever reason, my responses weren't giving her the reassurance she needed that I really liked her as much as she felt was necessary... in my mind, we weren't in a relationship, so I didn't owe her any extra attention... this led to an argument about how I didn't care enough and late into the night, my dorm room was filled with "I DO FUCKING CARE!" and "HOW COULD YOU SAY SOME SHIT LIKE THAT?!?" until around three in the morning... my roommate Darren was yucking it up the whole time because he thought that shit was funny... but I was seriously pissed... if it's one thing I can't stand it's when a person tells me how I feel or what I mean... I KNOW WHAT THE FUCK I MEAN/FEEL BECAUSE I'M THE ONE WHO MEANS/FEELS IT...

Throughout this conversation, I realized something... Nicole's attitude towards me had changed... her indifference towards me had faded and I realized that she did actually care about me... here was a chick who could literally have any guy she wanted but she wanted me... I wasn't used to that... I'm always the one who reveals my feelings first... I'm the one who always has to guess if a chick is really feeling me but here was Nicole telling me that if I wanted her, I had to show it, mean it, convey it... could I do that? Would my heart allow it? I guess we'd see...

Months later, on Easter Sunday, I asked her to be my girlfriend while I was waiting on a bus back to school... we'd just spent the weekend together and for the first time in a long time, a relationship just made complete sense to me... while Nicole had never pressured me in anyway for a relationship, she did require time and attention and I figured if I was willing to give her this time and attention, it only seemed right that we move it in a monogamous direction...

I'd love to say it's been all smiles and giggles since then but it's been anything but... we've officially broken up once, unofficially broken up three other times and damn-near broke up dozens of times... but just the other day, we hit the four-month mark and things are starting to smooth out... we're past the petty arguments and we've gotten to the point where we've decided that we want to be together for the long haul... we've discussed marriage at length and I, for once, feel in my heart that she wants it to work... we're not talking about marriage because she thinks its cute or discussing weddings so she can tell all her friends about it... we genuinely want to be married to each other...

The thing about this that is so funny is that while I haven't asked her (at least not with a 3-carat ring, down on one knee while I profess my love to her) we already have colors (four shades of purple and grey), a date (January 1, 2011) and the number of guests (VERY EXCLUSIVE... less that 75 people)... not a whole lot to go on but it's a start all things considered...

This is what has sparked this blog... you see, growing up with all women (a mother, three sisters, two grandmothers, a bevy of opinionated aunts, etc. etc.) has given me a lot of traits that most men either 1) won't admit to, 2) don't have or 3) haven't been taught... and while I am 1000% all man, I don't have another male I can confide in... there is my crazy little brother Jamal (who's currently overseas in Afghanistan keeping our country safe) and my homie Darren (who's just like Jamal but waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more reserved) but while I feel like I can throw certain things their way and have them give me an honest opinion, I don't feel like I can count on them to tell me to stick with it when it comes to relationships... like those nights when me and Nicole are beefing and I need somebody to tell me to bring me back down to earth and be with that girl I know Darren and Jamal are the types to be like "Man, fuck that shit... women are crazy anyway... just leave her ass..." and while I appreciate that sometimes (LOL... they'll always be my niggas) that's not what I need to hear at that particular moment...

And asking the women in my life is almost assuredly the way to be outvoted (ya'll women ALWAYS stick together... LOL) without anybody seeing my opinion/point-of-view... so I created this as an outlet... I could've easily put this on Where the World Goes When I Close My Eyes but I didn't want to have a blog where I was always airing out my relationship woes amidst all the random foolishness that goes on over there... so that will be the main focus... if you're still with me (and wow, you got some reading stamina if you are... LOL) then I can offer to give you nothing but honest insight... I'm not gonna sugarcoat it, I'm not gonna lie and I'm not gonna be overtly detailed... (i.e. I might say we had sex but I won't go into all the little tidbits... that's a little much... plus, she'd probably kill me... LOL)

I'm not sure how long this blog will last... for all I know, we're gonna break up tomorrow (at least temporarily... LOL) but I'm just doing this as an outlet to get out what I need to get out in the medium that works best for me... if that's not your cup of tea, hey, it is what it is...

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