How Can I Help?

Yesterday I left from an interview feeling hopeless. Powerless. Dismayed.

I was speaking with two guys, both 26, who started an organization called Changing the Community. They met as kids playing football for rival teams, went to college, got degrees and decided they'd come back to their hometown to help young athletes behind them learn life skills, in addition to the fundamentals of the game. They mentor kids across the city and put on a summer life skills camp with no outside funding. In a district where 25% of black males graduate high school, they believe their program can make the difference.
"We gotta stop fooling ourselves about what our kids want," one said to me. "They don't want education, they want football. We give them what they want then sneak in what they need."

They want on to say they relate to the kids better than teachers or anyone else because they ARE those kids. They came from broken homes, went to the same schools and are more "black" than other black professionals (read: Oreos) who they said kids won't listen to.

So I thought to myself, "Damn, where does that leave me?" I want to help. But I'm not them....My parents have been married 26 years, I always got good grades and then I went to college like we're told we're "supposed" to do. I always saw value in education. I never was interested in ....you know, what the kids are out here doing now.

So what do I have to offer them? If I can't relate to them, why would they listen to me - or people like me? I had a looong convo last night trying to sort out my confusion about this, because it's clear black people only come in two extremes. Women are hoodrats/baby mamas and men are thugs/drug dealers...or you're uppity and bourgeiose. We don't see anything in the middle. Either you're "real" or you're whack. (As awful as last week's episode of The Game was, think about it - no one wanted to listen to Dr. Melanie Barnett, but they wanted autographs from the video girl).
What about those in the middle? How can I tell a kid education is important when they see lots of "educated" people being laid off every day? Or those who graduated with a piece of paper and no paycheck? Or the Amber Roses who go from stripper to model/socialite? Or the Jay-Z's who sold drugs, rapped, married Beyonce and kicked it with Warren Buffet?

You can say it starts with the parents...but let's face it, it ain't happening. So how can someone from the outside combat the things kids are seeing and believing? I can't say I've been where you are and you don't have to do that. That's not my reality....so again, I sit here feeling powerless. What do we have to offer?

The Underdog of All Sports

I'm coming to realize just how underappreciated the sport of boxing really is. Sure, it makes for a great movie once every 3 years or so. But it gets not even an iota of the shine of sports like basketball and football. You pick up the paper, you see youth lacrosse and high school swimming stories. But how many boxing stories?

"I've had 1,000 kids come through this door in the last year. But when they see how real it is, some of them say, whoa, this aint for me," coach Parker, a local boxing coach, told me. He went on to say that you can't play boxing like you play basketball, so if a kid sticks with his program, he knows this child is different.

I think he's right. Many boxers have backgrounds that are just as riveting as the few who happen to get a movie made of their life. Many of the kids in his program have hellacious lives and whacked-up families. Boxing, as barbaric as it might seem, is their outlet. It's a gladiator sport that's about preparing yourself for different scenarios, coach Parker said, which he feels is the key to life as well.

"There are only 8 punches in boxing; after that it's all about who's in better shape and who's smarter. You both know the 8 moves, so really it's about being prepared for the scenarios you'll see out there in the ring," coach Parker told me.

The sport is a lifeline for a lot of "at-risk" youth...but what can it really lead to? For all the people who are out here boxing (heavyweight, welterweight, every kinda weight class) why come you only know, like, 5 names? We know that a very small number of kids make it to the NBA or NFL,, but those are team sports.....but imagine how many fewer will make it to be Ali, Tyson, Mayweather, Holyfield, Sugar Ray Leonard....

The Pay Wall

I'm conflicted. As someone who makes a living in the media industry, I need people to pay for the content I produce. As a consumer, I appreciate that the Internet offers multiple sources to get news - for free.

From personal experience, I used to subscribe to daily newsletters from Variety, an entertainment trade publication. A few months ago they began putting their content behind a paywall. I always found them to be a pretty useful site, but since I also get similar information from The Hollywood Reporter and Television Week, I decided it was no longer worth it to me to subsribe to their newsletters, no matter how enticing the headlines looked that came in my inbox.

I hear now that the New York Times is moving toward a paywall mode. Thanks to the advent of blogs, it could be possible to get a regurgitated, shorter version of the most important stories of the day, but I think the Times' content just might be good enough to pay for. I value the diversity of the stories they tell, their multimedia pieces and the fact that they are probably thee most reputable source on news and information.

On the other hand, imagine how slighted I felt when I went to the newsstand and purchased Essence magazine's "first ever brand new special hot hair issue," only to receive an e-mail a couple of days ago with a photo gallery of ALL the hairstyles I just paid to see. That, my friends, is NOT valuable to your consumer. If you're going to ask a person to pay, it has to be something they can't get anywhere else. You can't just take what you printed and dump it online and call it multimedia.

At my organization and others around the country, I know there are discussions about how - not if- we begin to ask people to pay for the content we've heretofore been giving away for free.  And this has me conflicted. I want as many people to read my work as possible. But if I write the same story that channel 10 runs tonight at 6, why should someone pay to read what they can watch for free? Or if it's the same story your friends have re-tweeted all day. I can assure you, nine times out of 10, my story is better, more researched and accurate, etc. But the mere fact that I'm asking people to pay for is throwing up a roadblock, I think. Especially because my role is to write content for young professionals. Do me a favor, tell me the number of people you know ages 20 to 30 with a newspaper subscription, online or in print?

Exactly. So, I, like many other media professionals, am kinda confused.

A Tale of Two Cities

I have a confession: I used to hate Detroit. I have concrete reasons, too.

Spending four years at an out-of-state school affirmed my "I want to live/work anywhere but home" campaign. But I realize it was because in that new place I found a collection of individuals I could relate to. It's 100 percent true that you must surround yourself with like-mided people. This never happened for me in the 17 years before my departure, plain and simple.

However, now I have moved to a new city. One 300 miles from home - but one with so many parallels it's like their biographies have the same author.

Both are deemed  ghosts of their former selves. Past Promised Lands where folks who feasted have been reduced to impoverished skeletons. Those with sense fled in droves, you hear. Crime and welfare are up among the few unfortunate enough to remain. The school systems failed as well, full of "city" kids who are black and brown.

Detroit, home of Motown, was fueled by the Big Three auto manufacturers. Here, you could leave high school and land a job at a plant that would feed your family and afford you the "finer things." Because of their layoffs, you have people with years of experience - yet no education - suddenly jobless and having to "downsize" their whole lives.
Rochester, a city on the cutting edge of technology, was consumed by, well, advancements in techonology. Think Kodak, Xerox, Bausch + Lomb..... Former blue collar execs have the same EBT cards in their wallets as everyone else now.

But underneath the depression/recession, both places are secretly being re-created as small towns (trust me, even in Detroit playing six degrees of separation is EASY) where you can wake up one day and decide to make your dreams come true.
Places where a creative subculture is vibrant.
Places where young professionals are taking ownership of their surroundings.
Places organizations are starting to invest in with the hopes of rebuilding the entire metro area from the inside out. Starting with the "center city," or downtown, folk are making lofts and condos from once-abandoned buildings to attract a talent pool for the companies they want to lure into relocating nearby.

These are cities people return to after trying to make it somewhere else because they see the opportunity - to start a business, make a name for yourself in politics or non-profits, own an affordable home and live your passions while getting support from a community of forward thinking individuals striving to do the same.

Yes, people are finding the ingenuity that sometimes is born of desolation.  They're saying hey, let the media tell the story they want to tell. Screw the statistics. In the meantime we're going to keep climbing up!

Am I being idealistic?


There are people who believe in Detroit. People who love Rochester and are rolling up their sleeves to prove that a rose can grow from concrete.

Breakfast is Whatev U Eat in the Morn

Dear Breakfast,


Hey there. I know I should eat you in the morning, but if I get up too late to cook what am I supposed to do? I don't like eggs, sausage or pancakes. I don't want anything fried. Tim Horton's, McDonalds, Burger King - all my "fast food" options - they have no offerings. Hecky naw I don't want oatmeal from Ronald McDonald! What's there left to eat for a girl like me who really doesn't like "breakfast food"?

Signed,

At Work Hungry....Stomach is Growling. Louder Than the Sounds of Typing.

Confessions of a Magazine Addict

I love magazines. I don't want to read the content on my phone or on a tablet or anywhere else. I like to turn the pages and look at the pictures and read them with a nice cup of coffee on my day off. They make long waits bearable and my time on the treadmill seem shorter.  I love that they have a moderately long shelf life, so I can learn something relevant from this month's issue or one from two years ago. I wil pick up O Magazine or VIBE or anything that looks interesting - doesn't matter.

I love that O magazine includes literature and works of fiction. I love that Essence also includes pictures of real women and their every-day style. And VIBE's 20 Questions used to be a very funny feature.


But I've come to grips that they are awful for one's self image. They're pretty much full of tips to erase and conceal all your inadequacies. I guess there's no money in saying, Hey Reader, you're great the way you are. Nope, instead they're full of clothes you should wear right now, makeup you need to buy right now, trendy hairstyles to try today, skinny models and celebs you should love and products you apparently can't live with out, (few of which are actually affordable). They are pretty much one big advertising ploy, and at the same time they contradict themselves and tell you 5 ways to save money and 6 tips to cut your spending.  

And yes, they seem to find ways every month to recycle and re-sell the same bit:

"How to protect your hair," "How to make him want you," "Sizzlin fashions of the season," "How to get the life you deserve today." And this is across demographics, am I right?

So, yeah, I notice flaws. But I can't tear myself away. *sigh* that's what you call an addict

Why Chinese Mothers are Superior

These are words from a Chinese mother in this fascinatng, albeit long, story in the Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704111504576059713528698754.html?mod=WSJ_hp_mostpop_read

Apparently, her theory is Chinese parents berate their kids and force them to do things they don't want to do over and over until they're good at it, whereas Western parents are too busy worried about their kids' self-esteem and therefore churn out failures and losers. I'm not kidding. She says Asian parents assume their kids are strong and can stand the brutal treatment, but Westerners assume thier kids are fragile and tiptoe around speaking harshly or bluntly. Here's a sample-

"What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you're good at it. To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences. This often requires fortitude on the part of the parents because the child will resist; things are always hardest at the beginning, which is where Western parents tend to give up. But if done properly, the Chinese strategy produces a virtuous circle. Tenacious practice, practice, practice is crucial for excellence; rote repetition is underrated in America. Once a child starts to excel at something—whether it's math, piano, pitching or ballet—he or she gets praise, admiration and satisfaction. This builds confidence and makes the once not-fun activity fun. This in turn makes it easier for the parent to get the child to work even more."

Read and discuss.

Why Black Movies Aren't Made

This one is for all of you who say: "I don't mind Tyler Perry but I just wish we had more of a choice of movies targeted at black people."

Ava DuVernay, a black filmmaker and publicist, was the subject of an NYT article that I found very interesting. She launched a festival network for black themed films across the country, the African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement (AFFRM). She didn't see another way for her film, "I Will Follow, to be distributed, so she did it herself.

The article in the Times went on to include some brutal reasons why "black-theme movies" aren't made:

"Those who make specifically black-theme movies, she (DuVernay) said, should realize that “no one is ever going to care about their film except the people it’s made for, which is, black folks.”

That's a pretty sad statement. Most movies are made with the assumption that everybody will see them. How often do you see a movie and go, "That's a white movie. I'll pass." Never, right? But DuVernay is pretty much saying that those who make black movies shouldn't expect the same kind of interest across the board. Here's why that's even more troubling, according to the article:

"According to a 2009 survey of moviegoing compiled for the Motion Picture Association of America, African-Americans, about 12 percent of the North American population, accounted for only 11 percent of ticket sales and less than 9 percent of frequent moviegoers. (By contrast, Hispanics, who make up 15 percent of the population, bought 21 percent of tickets, according to the study.)"

If the only people who "care about" your movie barely go to the theater and buy tickets, then..... what's the incentive for the movie to be produced or distributed by a major company?

Here's a link to the rest of the story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/08/movies/08urban.html

This is NOT OK

This, on the left, is Miguel. Miguel of whom I am a fan. On the right is Megan Good, of whom I am NOT a fan. But that's neither here nor there. The issue, ladies and gentleman, is that Miguel is wearing leather jeggings tucked into Peter Pan boots. With a boatneck tunic. A big funky tribal statement necklace and a fancy-collared fitted puffer jacket. WHERE THEY DO THAT AT?

If I was going on a date with a man and he showed up in this, I'd leave and tell him never to call me again. I don't care if it was Lance Gross or Dwayne The Rock Johnson. And please, don't try - you can't justify this.

The Golden Voice

I was trying to stay away from Ted Williams and his golden voice." I tend to hold out on watching all these videos folks post and re-post on Facebook as long as I possibly can.
However, Ted was on "The Today Show" this morning being interviewed by Matt and Meredith, and this man was just so genuine I had to watch. It literally warmed my heart to hear how excited he was to be going from homeless to employed in a matter of days. What stood out the most, aside from homeboy having 7 kids, is that when he was asked the obvious question of what's going to stop him from misusing his second chance at life, Williiams said there was one major difference this time:

"The difference between my successes of years gone by is that I didn't acknowledge the Lord or thank him for anything before," he told them. "This time around, I have God in my life, acknowledging him on a daily basis."
 
No, religion doesn't guarantee success. Yes, a lot of ppl drop Him in the mix at times like these. But here, check the interview yourself:
 

American Idol

I've been over "American Idol" since Ruben won, literally. I occasionally check in through the "watch Simon destroy people with his accurate assessments" tryout sessions, then as I did with Adam Lambert, check back in at the end. But for the most part I was #done.

However, this very interesting article from The Hollywood Reporter details many of the changes to come. I already thought they all lived in a house together, but I guess not; that's new. Also albums will drop faster - which is much needed to capitalize on that Idol momentum, and they might add music videos throughout the show.

What I like is that during "theme week" they'll no longer force people to sing songs outside of their genres, as in asking a country singer to do rock. And for people who thought Idol was just glorified karoke, I can't believe they will now allow people to sing original content! This article says producers like Rodney Jerkins and Timbaland will help select and arrange new songs suited for each contestant.

My bf hates cover songs, but at the same time when you sing songs that no one's ever heard of it's more challenging to hold people's attention, I think. How bout you?

I'm not saying I'll tune in now, cuz I don't do Randy Jackson or Jennifer Lopez, but it's clear these ppl had to try something quickly in order to save the show!

The Cost of Living

The next time I go to the grocery store and my total is less than $100, I'm going to kiss the clerk.

Because it's the Season for Lists

We all know the end of one year/beginning of another gives people a reason to create a plethora of unnecessary lists and countdowns. Here's one of my own, completely in jest so don't take it personal.

TOP 3 MEN I WISH WERE STRAIGHT:

3. Adam Lambert (I almost forgave the makeup when he was on Idol, but that album cover had me #dead)
2. Nate Berkus (I wanted to believe that a man could be a great interior decorator and simply have a great eye for style, but then he told us about losing his boyfriend in the Indonesian tsunami)
1. Anderson Cooper (no, he hasn't confirmed or denied. But his mom is fashion maven Gloria Vaderbilt, so the man probably grew up woth some very colorful industry ppl)

Transitioning

I thought I had decided that I got my last perm in 2010. However a brief convo with my boss's boss's boss (as in the top boss) lead me to this question:

Well, let me give u the replay then ask the question.
HER: "Oh, your hair was long last week. Now it's short."
ME: It's different every week.
HER: We had a picture in the paper of you over the weekend with the longer hair, which is not to say you don't look nice with shorter hair too, and I thought it was a great picture that they took.

So the question here is, when going natural, am I altering the texture by continuing to press it, or is it better to just let it grow like it wants to and leave it alone?

Madea's Big Happy Family

I don't want to engage in the now-popular debate about how Tyler Perry is destroying Hollywood and the Black community. I may have lost friends going down that road, lol. All I intend to say with this post is that I watched TP's newest play, "Madea's Big Happy Family," over the weekend and was reminded why I'm a fan.

I've been stalking Redboxes all around this city since before Thanksgiving attempting to rent the play. It was worth it.  "Madea's Big Happy Family" was consistently laugh-out-loud funny; TP said some things men need to hear, some things women need to hear, some things single people need to hear, and some things not single people need to hear; and as always, I love when he speaks to the audience after the show because he shares some insight that blesses my soul, seriously.

Tyler has a message to share and was extended a platform to share it with more and more people, so I don't fault him for taking the chance to make movies and TV shows, which I will flatly say, seem to be outside of his lane. I watch them simply because several years ago, I saw some plays featuring a character who reminded me of people I knew, thereby becoming relatable and hilarious.
And it was clear to me after watching "Madea's Big Happy Family" that plays are what he does best - just connecting with his audience on his terms, through humor, song and real talk.

IT'S ON!!!

Making a new year’s resolution always seemed like a vain exercise for a person like me. Being a constant goal-setter was countered by chronic procrastination, yet for some reason I began 2010 making a list of resolutions sparked entirely by a photo shoot I envied in a magazine.


Serena Williams, with her abs of steel and zero percent body fat, inspired me to scribble “getting fit” on a piece of paper. Writing it down was the easy part, and before I knew it I’d filled the paper with resolutions. If I could find that list now, maybe I could tell you how many of those I actually accomplished.

But this year, as I approach 25 years old, losing weight is again my top goal, and to accomplish that I plan to do something crazy – literally. If you’ve caught the infomercials, you know “INSANITY” is billed as the hardest workout program ever put on DVD. “P90X” is another popular and intense workout used by several of my YP friends, but it costs about $200, you have to buy additional equipment, and, well, I don’t want to wait 90 days.

INSANITY is a 60-day “total body conditioning program” created by personal trainer Shaun T. He promises to push me past my limits with 10 discs of plyometric drills on top of nonstop intervals of strength, power, resistance and ab and core training moves. No equipment or weights are needed, which is great because I’ve had a gym membership for six months that was used infrequently, to say the least.

Joining me on this two-month journey is my boyfriend, a 22 year-old-college student who looks great to me but says his goal is mainly to have more energy overall.

“I want to be able to carry all the groceries at once – little things like that,” he said.

INSANITY comes with a free “elite nutrition plan” that Martell and I have both deemed impossible. Shaun T wants you to spread something like 1,400 calories over five meals a day, and says your body doesn’t need carbonated beverages or artificial sweeteners. If that’s what Shaun does, take a look at him, ladies – it’s obviously working – but me and my coffee shall never part. But I will make small dietary modifications, like drinking more water, cutting back on sugary snacks and adding more fresh fruit and veggies to my meals.

I’m excited and plan to share updates throughout my journey. Feel free to share your thoughts and especially your encouragement or questions. The fun begins today, Monday, Jan. 3.

(Does this sound like an article? Cuz it is, lol)