Black History Month

Happy Black History Month! Thanks to my mother I know a plethera of things that I wouldn't have, had she not taught us. We were given books to read about different black people when we were younger. It was always a treat for me cause I loved reading about people and their lives when I was younger.

      I say this to say TEACH your children. TEACH our babies about their history. Stop telling them just about Dr. Martin Luther King, Harriet Tubman, Soujourner Truth, they are all wonderful/inspirational people. Learning about our history is not limited to slavery. That is not the only thing we went through, again not downplaying ANYTHING, by any means. Tell our kids that we came from Kings and Queens in Africa. That Africans were amoung the first to have a governement and have laws recorded.We are SMART, INTELLIGENT, BEAUTIFUL, AND CAN BE ANYBODY WE WANT TO BE.


This is my reasoning for saying this. I was in my mother's classroom when she asked on Feburary 1st, What is today? The kids looked around at each other or stared back at her with blank  faces. After they shouted out the obvious things,( February, Valentines Day etc) they looked around in complete confusion when the answer was NO. My mom had to give them some hints, they finally go it. Then she asked another question. What President ended Slavery? Why did a student begin to say Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Really? Dr. Marting Luther King Jr. ended slavery in the 60's. C'mon man.

Tell your children to put down the video games, give them books let them read about the Tuskegee Airmen, Mary McCleod Bethune, Medgar Evers, W.E.B. DeBuois, Benjimen Banikar, Josephine Baker,Bessie Smith, Angela Davis, and Marcus Gravey. Give them a book about Macolm X, the black panthers. Fill your children with this knowledge. Expose them to other music like Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Sam Cooke, Nat King Cole, Duke Ellington, Bill Withers, Instead of them just thinking Lil Wayne, Jay-Z, Kanye West Wiz Khalifa (sp) is the only kind of music out there. Let them know that we have invented things, we have written things, created things (paintings), written songs and sang them.

We have to do better as a people to educate our young black children. Let them know that while having the dream to be a rapper, basketball player,football player, model, singer, actor/actress, while it is great, not everyone is meant to be one of those. There are other things to do outside of that. Just take the time to eduacate your kids on our History.Most kids don't have the desire to go out and try to find books on their own.

What do you think?

Loss and Life

This is technically my first blog. It has been on my "to do" list for a while now. I figured no time like the present to get started. New Year, which means new goals to set and accomplish.
   I started out the New Year with the Loss of a loved one, my godfather and Uncle. Death always sucks no matter what package it is wrapped in. Whether is was old age, disease/illness, or completely unexpected. I do believe it is the unexpected ones that suck the absolute most. This one was most certainly unexpected and freak accident. I think my cousin said it best, "You fought in Vietnam and won, won the battle against colon cancer, then you fall off a ladder in a freak accident and die." Whatever the case when Contreras' honor their loved ones it is a LONG weekend. We had the wake from 2-8 that upcoming Saturday, the funeral and repass on Sunday. Then there was a Verterans Memorial service for them, where they shot the rifles and everything in honor of him. ( I definitely got to rifle shells, they will be a necklace soon.) Then Monday morning my godson Macen Lee Hernandez was born. He is handsome. And a blessing. 

      The cycle of life continues. It never fails, after every death a couple months later their is a new life in our family. We mourn the loss of the loved one, we recall memories of that person. It really doesn't sink in until the next family function, and you realize yes that person is gone. Death is so much easier to deal with when you're surrounded by family, love and support.( My Uncle was the first to pass on out of his 14 brothers and sisters.) It's when you get home and you have to do it on you're own that is the rough part. What you do from there, how you deal with it and move on that's what counts. There will always be a missing piece to the Contreras puzzle. My heart hurt the most for his wife, his kids and especially his grandkids. They were close to him like my daughter is to my father. Which still brings tears to my eyes when I think about it. He lives on through them. He is in heaven rejoicing with Jesus, what more could anyone ask for?

      Macen was born to one of my bestfriends, who also happens to be my cousin. He was healthy and long.
He has his whole life ahead of him. Learning to grab, crawl, walk, talk, run everything, Watching him grow is going to be a jounrney.He is truly a blessing.

One thing I can say is that death brings our family together. And as dysfunctional as we are, cause we are, just for a couple of days we were a supportive, loving family and acted as such. I know we get on each others nerves, we fight, argue, fuss at each other. Sometimes we make a muck out of things. After all that we're still family. Family is suppose to be there no matter what. Like I mentioned earlier, it was a wake up call. We have to get it together. I hope this family unity is permanent and not temporary. We just need to do a better job of checking up on each other, seeing each other and just loving each other . The pointing of the fingers needs to stop and we just all need to do our part. It just makes me want to be the best me, a better wife and mother, a better writer and it makes me want to attain my goals. Life is precious, we can't take it for granted, I know we keep hearing that but are we Listening?