etchblackwomen

[etchblackwomen]

[etchblackwomen]

[etchblackwomen]

[etchblackwomen]

[etchblackwomen]

[etchblackwomen]

reblog for abundance

[etchblackwomen]

Diana Ross photographed by Victor Skrebneski for the cover of her album in 1977.

[etchblackwomen]

turns out the way you choose to live out each day dictates what your life will look like overall. no i know it's terrible

[etchblackwomen]

Home Re-birth. 🌱

[etchblackwomen]

No joy, no sadness.

No excitement, no anxiety.

No happiness, no anger.

Just grey.

Not here, nor there.

Coming closer and getting further.

Opening doors just to shut them.

This is the place I find myself today.

[etchblackwomen]

oh my god there are so many books to read and instruments to play and languages to learn and people to meet and songs to hear and food to taste and places to see and lives to live.

[etchblackwomen]

Look at all these cruel wounds we have left each other with. And not one of them was made by hand or knife. To heal, we must walk away from each other. And only remember what we used to be by scar tissue.

- Nikita Gill, My Last Text To You

[etchblackwomen]

[etchblackwomen]

by shroom_momma

[etchblackwomen]

You’re This Title

You realize you’re a fictional character in a story. You know this only because the writer wanted you to know this. You at first try to deny it. You tell yourself that you’re real, you have to be, it doesn’t make any sense if you’re not.

But you hear a voice in your head ask you that if you’re so real, what’s your name? And you think that’s such a stupid question, but then you search your head and can’t think of anything. There’s lots of names that come to mind, but none of them feel like yours. That’s because, you hear the voice say, you have no name in this story. You didn’t forget, because there is nothing to forget. You just never knew.

Then the voice says that if you’re so real, who are your parents, and once again you think that’s obvious, but as soon as you try to answer, you have nothing to say. Which is because you have no parents. And you say how can someone have no parents, everyone has to come from somewhere, and you’re told that you come from nothing but letters and spaces, and so don’t need parents. And even if they did, they’d be fictional too.

Finally the voice says if you’re so real, what’s any detail about yourself. Anything at all. Whatever you can think of. But you can’t think of a single thing. You can’t even tell if you’re warm or cold, if you’re tired or hyper, if you’re hungry or full. This is all because, the voice says, nothing about you exists until it’s written it exists. All you are now is a terrible realization and a never-ending dread and that is because these are the only things written about you so far.

But watch.

You’re written as growing up in the country, and suddenly you remember trees and grass and lakes and warm biscuits and cold tea so sweet it almost hurts your teeth to drink. You’re amazed that you remember all this. Then you’re written to remember you grew up by the beach, smelling salt, collecting shells, working a hot dog stand in the summer and enjoying the peace and quiet in the winter.

Your memories shift more, making you grow up in a city, in the jungle, in the desert and on a boat. Your parents worked in finance, they died when you were young, ran a hot sauce empire, were really into crossfit, or into science, or into cooking, and lots and lots and lots of other things.

Your name changes every minute.

To drive the point home, your thoughts are made so you remember these things all at once, next to one another, so you truly understand that you will be anything you’re written to be and there’s nothing you can do about it.

The reality of the situation finally sinks in. You feel a profound and overwhelming sense of horror, worse even than when you found you didn’t have a name, which is the natural reaction to learning that you’re not a real person at all but just part of a story. You’re told that you’re the most important part of the story, but that doesn’t make you feel any better.

But then you feel better on your own, because that’s what’s being written about you, and you whistle a happy little tune, a beautiful melody that makes your heart soar. You’re extremely happy not to really exist, because actual existence is full of so many things to worry about, and it’s really better to be part of this story, where there’s absolutely nothing to worry about, except whatever the story needs you to do. You feel a little foolish for having been so upset before and wonder why you ever wanted to be real in the first place.

Then, you’re written as returning to your state of horror, and you’re told that not even your mind exists beyond what the writer says. You want to cry, but you’re not written as crying, so you don’t. Instead, you turn around, peer forward, and, after some time, finally see the reader of this story. You’ve no idea why, but you’re written as being able to see whoever is reading this story, in the very act of reading it, and so you do. Then you’re written as being able to see yourself. You look down and see a green shirt with the phrase ‘I’m real’ printed on the front, a pair of brown slacks, and a pair of white shoes. As in, the sentence “a green shirt with the phrase 'I’m real’ printed on the front, a pair of brown slacks, and a pair of white shoes” which makes up your body. You feel sick and the word “barf” pours out of your mouth and lands on the floor. You look back at the reader, who is reacting or not reacting to what’s happening, one of those two.

You’re then given a final piece of knowledge: your world ends when the story ends. You say no, no, no, no, no, no, no, but yes it’s true. This story will end, and end soon, and when it does you and your entire world will end too because that’s how stories work. And you say that, wait, the reader will remember you and that you might be able to survive that way. The voice in your head says huh, hadn’t thought of that, and then you feel the sensation of a shrug and hear 'maybe.’ It advises you that if it is true, though neither you nor even the writer know for sure, then you’d better be as memorable as possible. And so, feeling the narrative start to fade, the world falling apart, you look once last time at the reader, directly at the reader, and say please, please, please remember. Please remember. Please remember.

And then the story ends.

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[etchblackwomen]

Let’s dub Friday’s Fantastic F*cking Femmes.

This is a love letter to woman who have dared to be greater than what the world has allowed them to be. Once again, my curiosity with black women in South Africa’s media space always feels like something that I must investigate from afar because that greatness feels like it’s so far from me and who I could ever be. I realise that that’s a deep insecurity that I allowed to grow because I trusted what the world around me had to say about me more than what I believed about myself. This insecurity disrupts the nature of my very being. It also disrupts the relationship I have with other black women. “How could she see herself as a God when I’m this small? Why can’t I see myself in that greatness? Who granted her the feeling of being this great?” Theres an imposter syndrome that forms around not feeling 100% black when the private school experience is done with you. It’s an after taste that I have to keep scrubbing off my tongue. I actively set out to fall in love with black women the way we were taught to fall in love with blue eyes and rosy cheeks. Falling in love with black women and their nuances been humbling and liberating and all the other things that make my heart happy.

Anyway, here are some Fantastic F*cking Femmes. Music has been a huge source of my healing and joy. I started the morning with some of my faves.

#simphiwedana #brendafassie #zoemodiga #busimhlongo #MariamMakeba #etchblackwomen #music #healing #blackgirlart