“sometimes you’re just too intense in your quest to invent/ the perfect man please understand my rhyme is your repent”

(sigh). it would seem that we’re increasingly willing to accept that being an individual means being alone. how do we reconcile carving a niche in the world with wanting to share a piece of that world with someone else? it’s one thing to pursue the famous (really another manifestation of the long-distance relationship), but when both parties are famous and release tracks like the one off the top, there’s always the potential that one will cut the other one out and replace her vocals with Mya’s-ouch. for all your boxing day reads, here’s the last of Sister Souljah’s love advice from No Disrespect for 50% off of free-ninety-nine:

“But if I learned one thing it was: Never mess with an entertainer. They were in love with only their careers. They were also loved, lusted after, and literally hunted by hundreds of women. What these women were willing to do to accommodate these entertainers distorted their self-perception. They started believing that they were larger than life. Then they developed obstacle courses and hoops that you would have to jump over and through to prove that you were different than the other two hundred women who had called and hunted them this week.” (309)

“I didn’t agree with a woman seeing more than one man at a time the way the girl in the film did. He argued that some sisters would say I was crazy. How could I believe in polygamy and not believe that sisters had the same rights to have more than one man at a time? I argued that the only reason sisters should consider sharing our men was the shortage of black men. There was no shortage of black women. We needed to share in order to keep our families intact, to keep our children connected to a male presence, a father figure. We needed social order and balance, not disintegration and chaos. Sharing men was not about having sex with as many people as you could. It was about finding an alternative lifestyle-a lifestyle that was open, honest, and less painful.” (323)

again, remember the Big Love point? this book of non-fiction is over a decade old, and her current empire of non-fiction revolves around a 14-year old Muslim protagonist who murders to support his family, enacts revenge on his first asian wife’s father when he kidnaps her, and marries a second asian wife along the way. so, if it looks like a duck and it walks like a duck....

“So you’re asking a dysfunctional man who cannot properly manage and conduct one successful relationship with one woman, to conduct two relationships with two women? It’s impossible.” (346)

 see now, this is a valid point.

“Men who vanish from time to time are probably guilty of doing something wrong. Don’t make excuses for them. They will make plenty of excuses for themselves. If you can’t independently verify their alibis, if you have the feeling inside that they are lying, go with your gut intuition.” (353)

but let’s not let our lives revolve around these doods, right? 

take it away, Devin.