Lost Ones.

Showed love to you niggas, you ripped out my heart

And you stepped on it, I picked up the pieces before you swept on it

Goddamn this shit leaves a mess, don’t it?

Shit feelin’ like death, don’t it?

Charge it to the game, whatever’s left on it

I spent about a minute, maybe less on it

Fly pelican fly, turn the jets on it but first I shall digress on it

Wasn’t I a good king? (Maybe too much of a good thing, huh?)

Didn’t I spoil you? Me or the money, what you loyal to?

I gave you my loyalty, Made you royalty and royalties

Took care of these niggas lawyer fees, And this is how niggas rewardin' me.

Damn.

I haven't had time to write this. But this post is a few weeks overdue. I learned a lesson that I didn't want to with a person I didn't want to. That lesson is depicted in the picture above. It's always the people who are closest to you that do you the worst. No one can hurt you like family or close friends. They simply KNOW too much. This post will only scratch the surface, but it isn't mean to talk negatively about anyone. The 'friend' i'm referring to here is a good person... what they did to me was fucked up and we're no longer cool, but that's just me. ...The circle got smaller, the castle got bigger, the walls got taller and truth be told after all that said I'll always still have love for you....


Trust was never an easy thing for me. I've been hurt by the people who are supposed to care for me on numerous occasions. From my parents on down. So trusting is hard. But when I DO trust, I trust you with my life. I trust you with every part of my being because I have to otherwise I can't trust you at all. That's what makes being betrayed by a friend so hard. People ask me if I think we'll ever be friends again and I said No. It's that simple. We haven't been friends for a long time apparently. However long of a time it was that you started kicking my back in, that's when we stopped being friends. I can't pretend i'm innocent. I've said some things I shouldn't have. I've done some things I've shouldn't have. But I would never do what has been done to me. On August 1st, 2011, I lost a friend that I thought I'd have until I got old and died. Everyone grows apart but I never saw that for us. "We had governing, who woulda thought the love would end?" I couldn't and REFUSED to see this.

Atleast a true friend stabs you in the front. That's how I know at some point our friendship was real. At some point I could trust him. Cause after he did what he did he called me to proclaim he had done it. It's crazy. Our whole friendship long I'd refrain from telling him anything because my instincts (and other people) said to watch it. But it was always the same thing "I'd never tell anyone anything that you ever told me". So, if in fact I did tell you something or you did think you knew something.... the fact that you went and told someone else because you simply felt like it means that you blatantly betrayed our friendship. There is never a good reason for that. I'm far from stupid, so I'd be lying if I said that logical reasoning doesn't suggest that his motives were far from pure. I won't go into it, but I got an idea of why this happened.

I don't hate him. I honestly think he's a good person. He just wasn't to me. I could never stand to be around him again. Even in the same room. Atleast not for a long time. I get this...almost enraged feeling when I even think of what a conversation between us in person would go like. I won't be over it for awhile. Hurt people, hurt people. And this whole situation definitely hurt me. I'm more upset at what it did to my mental state, ya know? I'm questioning everyone and every motive. I'm cutting off people who've never done anything wrong to me and tying up every lose end. It's unfortunate, because every friendship I form from now on I'm going to have to over analyze. I don't even want to be put in this situation again, and I think I handled this very well considering what my first reaction was, what my first instinct was. I was vulnerable to this. I won't be again. Believe that.

The lesson here? Well, I think there are lines from a few songs that could say it better than I ever could. I'll let Lauryn Hill, Nasir Jones, Kim Jones and Shawn Carter teach this one.

Watch those niggas that are close to you. And Make sure they do what they supposed to do. Cause u know they're thinkin about smoking u. Never personal Nowadays it's the ways.

- Nas FT. Foxy Watch Dem Niggas

Beware of the false motives of others. Be careful of those who pretend to be brothers. You'll never suppose it's those who are closest to you.

- Lauryn Hill, Forgive Them Father

Every nigga around you is a reflection of you when you were at the lowest point in your life, These niggas want to catch you slipping, don't let them catch you slippin.

...It's a foul game, no such thing as fair play and real niggas get railroaded every day.

.....Cause it could be the ones that you laugh and joke wit

......The ones you smoke wit, and sold your coke wit, set you up for the right piece of change

- Lil Kim, Slippin

...But I’m bullet proof, bitch you can’t get nothin’ past me

Got body armor (A nigga gotta watch the throne)

And I’m bussin’ back so niggas in a glass house should not throw stones

What do you do when the love turns to hate?

(Gotta separate from these fuckin fakes)

Caesar didn’t see it so he ceased to exist

So the nigga that killed him had keys to his shit

Am I my brother’s keeper? (Only if that nigga don’t creep up)

Got a pistol under my pillow (I’ve never been a deep sleeper)

Paranoia (cause the nigga that said he’ll)

Blast for ya (is not) blastin for ya, that’s an assassin for ya

(You niggas got a shot there? Shoot.)

Please lord (forgive him) for these niggas (not know) what they do

-Jay Z, Why I Love You

Blacks and Homophobia.

Enough is Enough. Normally, I take the route of neither confirming or denying any stereotypes about black people. Because I'm black, I figure we already have enough other folks giving us negative press. But i've gotta write this. This post was inspired by my weekly trips to the barbershop here in Philly.

Now.... I understand that people think the barbershop is a place where we talk about "everything", but sometimes.... I just want to get my damn hair cut without hearing the views of people who know ABSOLUTELY nothing. It's always the loudest person who is the most wrong. This morning (as well as most mornings recently) the topic of discussion was Marsha Ambrosius's Far Away video. See.... they play Centric in the mornings in my barbershop and the two videos that get them talking the most are Far Away and "Sure Thing". In case you haven't seen it, let me post the Far Away Video:

The video, which Marsha has stated is a true story about a homosexual friend of hers that committed suicide after facing opposition to his lifestyle from his family/friends/ and society, has a HUGE written message at the end of it that explains this situation. Everytime this video comes on someone pretends that it is their first time seeing it (mind you... the crowd in the barbershop at 8am on a saturday is pretty much the same every week...). This week, one of the barbers started the conversation and it was pretty much open season on the gays.

I'll admit it: I was quiet. Anyone who knows me knows that I am usually pretty outspoken and I let people know when they are wrong. But I was quiet. Mostly because I was scared of what would happen if I didn't have atleast one ally in the barbershop. There were my own selfish reasons too of course; simply put... it is hard to find a good barber. Luckily, however, the shampoo girl knows I'm gay and could see I was uncomfortable so she spoke up. There was a woman who asserted that in the song Marsha says "I don't want you around my son" and that somehow, this song is about a guy who she was in love with but turns gay and his gay lover kills him. -____-. She obviously didn't hear the same song or watch the same video as me... The shampoo girl, let her have it. She also let the guys in the shop have it who were talking about how gays SHOULD get beat up. Corrected, they were quiet until Miguel's "Sure Thing" came on. "These fuckin faggots are taking over" the same barber who started the first conversation stated. This conversation continued until they got onto another subject: immigration. Something else they didn't know SHIT about. I was so angry, I didn't even tip my barber (who hadn't been apart of the conversation...he knows im gay too).

I'm all for someone having an opinion, just have an EDUCATED opinion. Homosexuals aren't the only topic blacks are upset about. There's the mexicans (cause every latino person is mexican), and the chinese (cause every asian is chinese), and "habeeb" (because every person who looks middle-eastern is an arab including people clearly from INDIA) who are making life so much more difficult for the "black man" It's My biggest pet peeve when people present their misguided opinions as fact and people who don't know any better take their words for the gospel of truth...

I guess what bothers me the most is that there were kids in there. Kids, who will grow up thinking it's ok to talk about people for their differences. Kids who learn a culture of hate and misunderstanding. Someone once posed the question to me if I thought people were wrong for not wanting their kids to be gay. No. I don't think they're wrong for not wanting their kids to be gay. I think they're wrong for not showing their kids that they will love them despite their sexual orientation. I think they're wrong for not teaching their kids to respect people as humans. I think they're wrong for teaching their kids the gospel according to man and not according to Christ, whose message was simply that of love. I think they're wrong for being bad parents. We as a culture gotta start to raise our kids right. We gotta do better! I'm starting with my nephew. He's gonna be a musically eclectic, racially unbiased, lifestyle accepting young gentleman if it kills me because we teach him to be a person of this WORLD not a person of a small community. Yes, at 5 he knows his uncle Hershawn was a boyfriend. At 5 he likes Chris Brown (his idol), fall out boy, jay-z, beyonce and lil Wayne. You know what he hates? Peas, naps and needles. Hate is learned, not inherent, which means it's up to all of us to break the cycle of homophobia, racism, sexism and other prejudices...we just gotta do better.

-CJ. TheWayItShouldBeSaid

I Trusted Him.

I'll admit it: I'm terrified of dating right now. And anyone who gets close to me is going to get hurt. I got hurt twice last year. Twice. And one was my fault. Completely. See.... here's what happened:

I had someone that I was kinda-sorta 'involved' with. But it wasn't working out. And I, by chance, through a friend, met someone else. My first thought was "you're cute". Not sexy, not attractive, but cute. I wasn't interested in "that way". Then he started talking and I said "you're different". Different made him attractive. Attractive made him sexy. and right away I wanted to know more about him. Here's the truth though: all of my friends were like "WTF?". They just didn't get it. Idk what it was either honestly. This guy was intriguing. I'd drop what I was doing, whenever, wherever, just to go spend like 15 minutes with him. I wanted so badly to be the one he wanted. It's crazy; the whole time I had someone who wanted to be with me that I guess I wanted to be with but my attention was directed elsewhere. I did things that.... I don't do. I broke every rule I have in terms of boys and what I find them to be "worth". He had this CRAZY wall and it was like I couldn't get him to trust me, and I did EVERYTHING. I felt like I was putting in more work than I had ever put in... The more he pushed me away the harder I tried. The harder I tried and the more I got to know him, the further I fell. It ended with me...crushed.

Truth Moment: I don't do well when I don't feel like I'm winning.

It's almost therapeutic to type that because it helps me to admit that I... got... crushed. It's only happened once before. But this time, it really hurt. Not only did he sleep with someone (that I wouldn't have really cared about I mean.. he wasn't my boyfriend, we weren't in a relationship. etc) but he SLEPT with one of my FRIENDS. So you know what I did? I served Poker Face while he was in my truck but as soon as I hit North Avenue [Baltimore...] tears hit my face. and for what? It was so dumb for me to even be mad. People are free to do whatever they want, so how could I even care? I guess it was because the possibility was now gone. Whatever hope I had of something down the road between the two of us? extiguished. I don't share my sodas with people, there's no way i'm sharing a guy. No. That's not how I roll.

Yet and still... Sometimes I find myself on his facebook. He gets cuter in every picture. I can't be mad at him, but I am. At the end of the day though he did what he thought was best. In the end, I know he's the one that missed out. I'm..... yeah... I'm a good catch. Even right now... and I'm not being cocky but come on, BITCH I GOT CREDENTIALS. Not to mention a car (or two...), a job, $ in the bank, and i'm an attractive dude. and I'm intelligent! I'm... I'm different then the competition. But it wasn't enough. There's this Tamia song that KEEPS coming on Pandora (fuck u pandora. again.). And well, it fits.... here's some of the words:

I miss the times that we never had//What happened to us we were almost there//Whoever said it's impossible to miss when you never had//Never almost had you.

I mean, it's all good. I'll find better. I don't know what makes me more upset, the fact that it all went down the way it did or the fact that I almost lost a friend that I love behind a boy who didn't really like me in the first place! In "dating myself" I've found that it takes me a long time to get over stuff. When I'm mad, I'm mad. When I'm hurt, I'm hurt. and I think hurt people hurt people. and I didn't realize how much that whole situation really effected me until I looked at my interactions afterwards. Secretly, way down where no one would ever have to know...It.... really fucked me up. I'm going to need to learn to trust people that I meet. I'm going to need to get the courage to be aggressive again (because I typically am not). I'm gonna need...some time.

No 'Commitment'

"I was cool with no commitment / wait, let me take that back it was you so I was with it / guess I didn't get when you showed you didn't miss it. Now it seems that you're interest ain't here and we ain't the same." - Is She The Reason (Destiny's Child)

(btw...this was written awhile ago...but it's a good story so I thought i'd share)

Damn. I'm sitting here rereading a text message that was sent to me last night. I asked a simple question, but I didn't really want to know the answer. I hate when I do that. There's this guy I've been dealing with for quite some time now off and on. Honestly, it started the way most m2m relationships start... He was cute, we hit it off, we slept together, and then we did this weird "dance" of calls/texts and pretending to be more in each other's life than we actually were until recently he started barely calling me at all.

Now, I'm normally not the one to play the desperation game. But I had called him three times. I had texted him more times that I'll admit publicly. Now I could sit and pretend that he was busy, hurt, his phone broke, etc... but the fact is: I was being ignored. I could have lied to myself but honesty with yourself is always the best policy. I had to wrap my mind around the fact that someone else was occupying his time.

What sucks the most about when we find ourselves in situations such as these is that we can't even be mad. Mad at who? Mad for what? With him, we were always "chill" because it was always a "no strings attached" thing. He'd often tell me about the boys who were crying/falling all over him and I'd laugh with him at their pain / anguish. And these boys? I've seen them get DESPERATE. They'd spill their hearts out in texts that were too long to fit in one message and we'd laugh. Sometimes I even sent the responses for him. I can't help but to wonder.... is that what happened to the texts I sent? Does he have some other nigga, some other version of me reading what I sent? No ma'am I'm not here for that.

So the text I sent? "Is that how we doin it?" His response: "What do you want from me?" My response "Nothing. Have fun with that boy" His response: "I did." I didn't want to hear that. So, I did what any other self-respecting man who just lost his own war of words would do. I hit up Orange Motha (lingo...you'll pick it up later, lol), she's always there when you need her. I couldn't even believe I let myself fall for this clown. He showed me EXACTLY the guy he was, and my feelings got all caught up anyway....After this day though, we became strictly friends.

Point of the story? When someone shows you who they are, believe them. He showed me he was only DTF, but for some reason me being "Captain Save-A-Hoe" I thought I could change him. Partially because he made me feel different, partially because I was just like all the other people we laughed at: I wanted him to want me. Men, however, are not like Mr. Potato Head. We cannot put them together as we see fit. And as far as the no commitment thing? I think it only works for one night stands, folks. If it's gonna be an ongoing thing expect some sort of feelings to form. Remember it's all fun and games until someone catches feelings, and you better hope at the end of the day that someone isn't you.

ps. My life isn't all about casual sex, boys who ain't shit and gay drama. this is only the 3rd post, stay tuned. :)

-CJ4TheKids

The Way It Should Be Said.

Allow me to Re-introduce myself.

The name is Carl. Or CJ. Or just 'J'. Actually, I don't care what you call me. A little about myself: Born and raised in Jersey. Moved to Baltimore for college. Live in Philly for work. Every now and again spend some time in NYC. Yeah, I get around. I'm black. and, I'm gay. I've come across a lot of blogs (video and text format) over the past few years of social networking that have been about gay life/lifestyle, and I've only enjoyed a handful of them. Some spend too much time worrying about overcoming gay "stereotypes", don't worry I won't do that. Some spend too much time fighting imaginary wars for gay rights, don't worry I won't do that. And some...don't talk about gay issues at all, there's just gay people writing them... and I damn sure am not about to do that...

I don't knock anyone else that writes a gay blog or has a gay social network presence. I think they're all great, and all serve their purpose. I'm just here to be real. Through my own experiences and experiences of my friends I hope to give a voice to our community that is not often heard. The voice of the average, everyday gay young adult just trying to find my way in the world. I go through shit, some of it bad and some of it good. What I'm NOT here to do is highlight the wonders of gay life, I'll leave that for other people. I'm pretty much just gonna tell my story and the story of those around me. On ocassion, I'll get up on my high horse. and hey, you might even catch me on a soapbox....

I'm sorry if i'm talkin shit, but I swear I mean well. We, the LGBT community of color have a long, long way to go. I'll deliver this blog the way it should be: Unapologetic, not always classy, but always real. And whether 1 person or 1000 people read this, I hope it helps someone along the way...even if that person is just me. :)

Let's raise a glass to 4 The Kids, The Way it Should Be Said.

-@CJ4TheKids