Not Day 1.1

So,
This is what my plan was:
1) to choose 4 sets of stable friends I trusted, tell them my goal of leaving and stay on their couches for three months a piece.

2) to continue working and save the money to buy decent merchandise to sale for the road so that I could make extra change whenever I featured.

3) to plan my European Tour

4) to get the hell out of America at the age of thirty and explore, tour, do some rock star shit and come back.

Simple enough eh?

My friends thought so! I had chosen 4 sets of friends who I knew to be stable, and very chill. The first set was Doug and Hezzie. They are a practically married couple who is not married and they have a gorgeous young girl name Billie (but I call her Billis). Doug Hezzie and Billis offered me their home for the first three months. But of course, the more I told people my plans, the more offers I got to stay at many homes, so it took a while for me to even get to Doug and Hezzie due to house sitting offers. I spent the first three months of this last year chillaxed out in so many different houses and apartments. Some of my friends even paid me to stay at their place while they left. I'd told Doug and Hezzie that I would be at their place by my 29th birthday in August and didnt move in until October due to so many offers. So needless to say, the adventure to my adventure was a little off on the timing. But Hezzie and Doug were so sweet and welcoming just the same and Billis was fun to hug and kiss and dance with.

When I ran my 4 step program by the womyn in my family I did it with the same bright smile on my face and light in my eyes that I told my friends with. I thought they would be more excited than me about my adventurous plan. Long story hella short they were NOT havin it. I remember I was in my cousin's kitchen during her daughters birthday and she, my aunt Happy, and my sister totally protested against this journey. "I don't think you should do it. I think it's a horrible idea" my cousin said. Shocked, I asked her why. "Because it won't work! Your friends will change, they aren't gonna keep you on their couches - Joyce think about it, you are stable right now. You have a job, a nice place, nice things - why would you leave something stable for something unstable - I would never do what you are doin." "Of course you wouldn't" I responded "you had a child at my age - if I had a child I would never do this either." "No, no!" She persisted "IF I WERE YOU, if I were 29 without a child, with your life I would never do this." I realized something and  smiled when I said it "that's not true. You have no idea what it's like to be me."

I went home and called my logic. My logic is my cousin Stevie. Stevie is my second cousin. He is about 6'6 and he used to play for the Oregon Trailblazers. He is very handsome, as sweet as sugar and as honest as they come. He is the only person I will listen to without question. I trust his judgement because he has set such a good example of what a person should be with his own lifestyle. He has 4 daughters, and has been with his wife since I was 3. She is the ONLY womyn I have seen him with and they still look at each other like they wanna eat each other up one spoonful at a time. "Fussy" (that's what Stevie nicknamed me at the age of 3 and been callin me ever since) "I think this is a great idea. Even if it doesn't work at least you tried - but I think it's gonna work because you are steppin out on faith. In my life experience, my God has responded well to faith. Also, if you were a male in this family, no one would dare question your itchin foot" (an itchin foot means urge to roam and wonder). "you know Fussy, let the conversation you had with the womyn in your family be a lesson: you cant share your dreams and goals with everyone. Some folks are dream stealers. They'll destroy the hope you had in a dream before the fire is strong - and it doesnt mean that they are trying to do it. They don't have to be mean to be negative. Most people can't dream for themselves and be happy and hopeful about conquering their dreams so what do you expect them to say to you about yours? Especially the womyn you grew up with! Had you told them you were getting married to a man they had yet to meet but were thrilled about, they would've applauded you because that is typical of the womyn in this family. They can grasp the bland outcome. But now that you tell them that you are married to an idea, a dream that you or them have yet to meet, they cant show happiness - but they will say in the same breath that they serve a God that can make the impossible possible! I believe God has always had great things in store for you Fussy. Everything is gonna be fine. You're young, strong and wise. That's more than enough to fill in the blanks in any plan. Go for it."

NOT Day 1

Lord,

There is so much goin through my mind right now, it's a trip. So, I'll start you at a fair beginning and fill in questions if you ever have them.

About a year ago I fell in lust and almost got arrested for it. (It's a long story that you can hear on snapjudgment.org. Type my name in the search engine and click on the story called "Junk In The Trunk".)  Anywho, the entire experience shook me to my core. I'd never come so close to losing everything I worked so hard for and I'd never felt so embarrassed and naive. If I'd gotten arrested - just arrested, not proven guilty or anything I'd have lost my job working with children, I'd have lost my home because I would have had no job to pay my rent - I would have lost everything and I risked everything for the idea of falling in love and living another American predictable disaster - not that marriage is a predictable disaster - it's just the kind of marriage I had envisioned for myself would have been a predictable disaster because I was willing to sacrifice too much and expected too little from whoever was willing to step up and pretend to be the best pretender at the time <-- (thats another long story). So, I was a mess and didnt know it. What I did know was that I'd just escaped a mess by the skin of my teeth!

I remember lying on my bed, feeling the adrenaline and crying right after I'd been excused from the crime scene. After thinking of how much I could have lost, it made me examine what I had. After much examination I realized that I didnt have much. I had just turned 28 years young and felt 15 when it came to relationships and abut 30 when it came to life. I was single - well, divorced for almost 5 years with no kids and sharing a house with my mother. I remember lying on that bed with tears rolling down the sides of my eyes and thinking "I just wanna go". I just wanted to get up and go where no one knew me and I knew no one. Of course I gathered that this feeling might be considered a "normal" mild case of depression provoked from just escaping jail. Yet, as time passed the feeling of wanting to leave stayed the same. After even more time passed the feeling began to grow stronger.

So after a few months of "feeling" I made a decision to "do". I gave my mother 6 months notice that I would be moving out of our home to stay on the couches of friends in order to save enough money to tour Europe. I, after all am a well known Bay Area poet, a smart womyn (or so I think) with lots and lots of friends and resources to catch me if I stumble (or so I thought). 

A year has passed and I will be leaving for Nairobi, Kenya in less than a month (fingers crossed). This blog was created by me to share with you what I have learned in the journey towards my journey and what I will learn when I get there.

A few warnings: Yes, my grammar sucks. Yes, my punctuation is way wrong. Yes, I curse like a sailor. Fuck yeah I consider myself a damn good writer!