YOU KNOW THE SAYING....

"The more things change, the more they...???"

It seems, in Life, there are always checks and balances---ups and downs, the step forward, the ten behind. Just when you think there's progress, here comes something to remind you of that timeless adage. While I'd like to consider myself an eternal optimist, lately I find myself on shaky ground.

Recently, a friend of mine put forth a challenge.

"Show me more really good fiction and I will lay down my history hat, he says. "Until then, I'm sticking to the History/Political/Memoir aisle."

Easy enough, I think, immediately recalling the names of authors I know that I think he'd enjoy. But to supply him with specific titles, I figure, best to take a trip to the bookstore. (Yes, I can talk myself into Bookstore Bankruptcy any day of the week). So when a girlfriend calls to invite my daughter and I to the local mall for a little shopping at their favorite girlie store (Claire's) I figure, no time like the present, and invite her to join in on the challenge. Now, my girlfriend and I are very, very discriminating readers. My suggestions to her are usually right on the mark and because she's working on her PhD in literature, we often read books together that will enable us to engage in critical analysis. In fact, we both just completed Rapture by Susan Minot, quite an interesting read both structurally and thematically. But anyhow, we enter into a chain bookstore, W, and find not one, not two, but three tables filled with books by black authors quite aptly identified as "African American Interest."

Okay.

What is hard to describe is the overwhelming melancholy that wrapped itself around me, threatening to choke the living breath out of my body. A dangerous and quite volatile mix of sadness, anger, grief, frustration wrapped tight like an eggroll, lodged in the back of my throat. Here, in this year of 2004, were three tables worth of Blaxploitation books written by, for, and about Black people. Here in the year 2004 were three tables filled with books of which, by our informal analysis, sixty percent had covers that were beyond demeaning and downright ridiculous. Cheap camera art, hand-drawn illustrations, stock photo -- you name it. I had to check to make sure I hadn't somehow drifted into the porn section. One "novel" was over 600 pages long and because I don't believe in bashing another writer, suffice it to say it was the novelist's second "book." Turning open to the first chapters caused even more dismay: no idea about how to create dialogue, how to open the story in an engaging, encapsulating manner. No idea of pacing, no idea of the basic "show-don't-tell." From book to book to book, everyone owns a Lexxus, Mercedes or BMW. Everyone has a high profile job with a $50,000 wardrobe. Everyone lives on the best side of town and basically "living the life." No one has any ancestral lineage, no hardships to overcome, no internal conflict and for these and many other reasons, I ask, where is the story?

To the best of my recollection it seems that somewhere betwixt and between the time that Terry McMillan published Waiting to Exhale and penned the script for the film, someone in a very high place decided, "Gee, maybe Black people do read," and from that point on, flames hit the tar and it's been downhill ever since. I have tremendous respect for Terry McMillan, an intelligent woman with a love and passion for writing and she is not the problem. The problem is two-fold: the authors who have nothing else to do but try to copy her stories ten times over and the publishers/agents who seek them out.

What's happening in the publishing industry is the same sad state of affairs as the music industry. Marketing to the base and seeking out the least common denominator. Make no mistake about it, the bulk of the books on those three tables were not self-published. They were put out by major book publishers with major money to spend. And that's the saddest part. The pimping. The other sad thing is, here amongst these books, the Blaxploitation stuff, were Alice Walker, Edward P. Jones, Diane McKinney-Whetstone and perhaps worst of all, dare I say??? -- yes, Toni Morrison. To even think that these four writers had there beautifully designed words on the same table, in the same room, in the same building as these other writers was absolutely insulting and says nothing of the store manager, regional director and other powers-that-be at the store.

A different store owner excited to hear about my book, recently lamented that the only way she can keep her doors open is to keep those kinds of books front and center--those are the books the bulk of her customers (in her semi-rural area) are looking for.

And so I left that day thinking, what is happening here? Spike Lee said recently, after the release of Soul Plane, that he is getting really, really tired. It seems an uphill battle in which he is the lone soldier. Vanessa Williams cried out in a recent interview asking, "Where are the roles?" Angela Bassett? Haven't seen her in eons. Not to mention the fact that I keep my radio locked to one of three stations: WSMJ 104.3 (Jazz), WEAA 88.9 (NPR), and WPFW 89.3 (Pacifica Radio) lest I suffer a major internal hemorrhage from the dirth of quality programming elsewhere and until I get my satellite radio up and running, this is it. Here, in 2004, we have Pimping 101 in just about every branch of the creative arts: literature, film, and music. And what is the future of writers like myself, who are not 100% literary but definately not chick-lit, romance, or anything of the like?

It makes me believe, once again, as Alice Walker often suggests, that one must cultivate other areas of the life. Spend time with friends, have sex, have fun, party, travel, learn a language, read up on other religions. Go shoot a whole roll of film on nothing but butterflies and trees. Do something else besides write and for God's sake, come to the table with an ability to talk about something else besides writing. Don't hang your hat on this whole thing, find an issue you're passionate about and wrap your arms and soul around it. Become an activist for a good cause because the winds are constantly shifting and they that are the least are the ones who need us most.

What's happening? or better yet, what happened? and where is it all leading? I don't know. I don't know and I don't know. Spouse says it's all just a phase. It'll pass. I don't know. But I do say that I'm going to keep writing and keep living and keep trying to leave this place better than I found it.

Peace.

ANGEL

UNLEASHING

Once pathology disappears, everybody becomes a creator. Let it be understood as deeply as possible: only ill people are destructive. The people who are healthy are creative. Creativity is a fragrance of real health. When a person is really healthy and whole, creativity comes naturally to [her]; the urge to create arises. --- OSHO author of Creativity: Unleashing the Forces Within and The Book of Secrets

More important to me now is living my life creatively. Not one book, not one poem, not one play but a full spectrum life that is receptive and grateful to the Most Creative, the Original Creator. As I fully embrace the way of the Tao, and a seek out a more universal consciousness, I realize that it is so NOT about me; not about awards and plaques that grace a wall and raving reviews by ordinary human being reviewers. Not even about million dollar book advances and that elusive spot on Oprah. More and more it's about using the good to create more good. For me, it's about an everyday creative consciousness that looks toward renewable energy sources, saving our bays and streams from pollutants, devising creative options for learning that embrace different learning styles, trying new approaches in medicine, looking for cures rather than patching. It's about bridging the gaps in and across the diaspora, discussions that lead to planning, implementing and executing. For me, it's about bringing all that I do in my writing life into my real, everyday life. My same open approach to my charachters is an approach I need more of in my everyday, day-to-day. For me it's about living as close to nature as possible, doing everything I can to support my mental and physical health even when that means attending a different kind of church with different kinds of people, saying and doing different kinds of things. It means shedding old skin, old habits and embracing what is fresh, what feels good and right not just for myself but for the environment and those I share this Earth with.

I know I'm not on this journey alone and I know I'm not moving into this new space alone. I know there are others in other places thinking and feeling the same. I was reading a new "green" magazine I stumbled upon and smiled at San Francisco's move toward Universal Healthcare for every citizen under the age of 25 and their recent approval of a $100 million revenue bond to pay for the installation of solar and wind power technologies on city-owned properties: california solar center . I smiled at Sacramento's zoning code that requires parking lots have 50 percent tree shade coverage and Chicago's government requirement that 20 percent of its electrical needs be provided by renewable resources--enough to power 80,000 homes. Is it the complete answer? No. Do we have so much further to go? Of course. But getting there begins with being and thinking creatively. It's about imagining, day-dreaming, proposing, sketching, revising -- all those things we writers do everyday.

For me it's about moving into this new space with grace. Where will the road lead? Where will my spirit dwell and when will I get there? Will it be abroad in a totally new country? Will it be my love, San Francisco? Will it be back to New York, upstate? I don't know. I really don't. Right now I know I'm being readied and that's all a girl like me can ask for.

Namaste.
---A.

MANIFESTATIONS

When we define "manifestation" as "appearing physically," we are only taking into account physical forms, objects.

But successful manifestation is only complete if it results in a change
in consciousness. That change of consciousness, in turn, is the
realization that the essence of what we sought in a physical form is actually inside of us.

"Having" doesn't mean possessing a physical object. It means no
longer experiencing the need.

---Spiritual Warrior, The Art of Spiritual Living by John-Roger

I go to the ocean for one reason: it is there that I meet my Greater Self, the Me that is wiser, confident, and self-assured. The Me that understands and flows with Spirit. The Me that knows how to handle her business, how to make the plan and execute the plan. The Me that moves the ball down center court, full force. The Me that cradles me, cheek to breast, pressing away warm tears of confusion, anger, frustration, and doubt. The Me that never worries, but knows that every need is already fulfilled before the desire is even manifested.

I've been away because the energy around my space is/was moving faster than I can/could keep up; because my mind is moving at warp speed and because things are happening that are making me tremendously happy, immensely proud, sorta nervous, kinda anxious and butterfly-stomachy.

Updates in short form:

a) My book, "...And Then There Were Butterflies," is officially published. My author copies arrived late last week after arriving home from the ocean and of course, the first autographed copy to Spouse. Official release party/launch: September 24, 2004. Info on that and the signings forthcoming. It should be available on Amazon in a few weeks. I'll upload an image of the cover on the main page as soon as Soon comes around here.

b) This site will be re-designed. Nothing major but I will be creating a different blog elsewhere, a place where I can safely ramble again about my personal stuff; things that are important to me but not necessary for book reviewers and people I don't know to know about. Those in the know, will know.

c) I made the decision to return to school part-time. Not for creative writing. Writing is something I feel resides deep within; something I was born with, something I dwell with; something that will only get better with time. Something that will come forth from the heart, from Spirit, not of my own making. And there is something about this American way that bothers me anyhow, that says you don't "know" a thing unless you have a degree to hang on your wall and prove you've been taught AND this American way of thinking that writing is just about writing and nothing more. We Americans have a sickening way of defining ourselves by what we do rather than by who we are on the inside, but that's argument for another day. So inspired by a book I found at the ocean, and of course the warrior-woman writer -- Arundhati Roy -- that I've decided it's language(s) this time and the goal is proficiency in at least four. I'm already semi-fluent in French. I need to get started on Spanish. The next will be Japanese and I'm tossing between Arabic and Italian. I realize that the time will come when I will not be full-time living inside these United States; when I will be traveling to other countries to speak out against crimes against women and children, helping to build clinics with full scale operations, training nurses in early recognition and preventative medicine, helping to establish literacy centers---and I need to be able to communicate with people one on one. Only history can remind us of the atrocities that occur when two people stand face to face speaking two different languages. And the other thing is, I am no longer satisfied with looking another Latina sister or brother in the face, standing toe to toe right here in the struggle, and not knowing how to say, "Sister, are you okay? How can I help you?" So, I'll keep you posted on that.

d) Firing off a letter to my state senator and congressman, Elijah Cummings. After watching the DNC last month I've decided that activists act. It's time to start doing my part. And doing my part starts with making my voice heard.

e) The children are on their way back to school. The summer has been exhaustingly busy but it's been a real joy not to HAVE to rush to get anywhere, to spend lazy days on the beach, afternoons riding bikes, and evenings with one on each side, homemade chocolate chip cookies in hand, watching re-runs of Tom & Jerry.

f) The novel. Lost pace in July since we were readying ourselves for vacation but not fretting. I'm confident I'll regain my speed once September arrives.

g) I'm heading up to New York in October for the OWWA conference. Black Women Writers Dissecting Globalization. Check it out when you get a minute: http://www.owwa.org . There's another conference in Cambridge, Mass. I'll let you know about that one.

h) Tai Chi incorporated into the personal wellness program and doing well. If you want basic, inexpensive intro to it, check out the OneSpirit Book Club, http://www.onespirit.com and look for David Carradine's CD. Currently reading The Power of Intention by Dr. Wayne Dyer. This could very well be the book I ask to be buried with, that's how good it is.

Namaste.

ANGEL