Love Letter

Who would have thought?

A year ago I could never have imagined that today this is where I'd be.

With her. My love.

The oldest and biggest love of my existence.

This time last year I hadn't even found her.

This time last year I was pining away for a love I imagined might be possible.

She had captivated my heart. My mind and surely my soul.

And she didn't even know it.

For 5 weeks I dreamt up our life together

I did not realise the wonders reality would reach.

I thought she was spectacular in my dreams.

Oh man but my dreams had nothing on reality.

I had this memory of her.

Of her chocolate skin. Long dreadlocks. Dainty features.

And her eyes…her eyes that contained the beauty of the world. The whole world. My whole world.

I dreamed she would love me. Purely and deeply. Selflessly and whole-heartedly.

I dreamed she would make me smile from the depths of my soul.

I was right

But I underestimated her impact and the sheer size of her love.

In reality I sit and watch her speak on the phone.

With her chocolate skin, dreadlocks and dainty features.

And those eyes.

And I think wow she's here. In my life. Full access. All the time.

In reality she has shown me love in ways I didn't know it could be displayed.

She has loved me far

She has loved me deep

She has loved me wide

She has loved me whole

And I have loved her

In all the ways I know how and all the ways I have discovered.

My baby, more than a dream come true because my dreaming underestimated you.

Vacuum Sealed

It has been a while since I have missed you.
I feel I must begin with a disclaimer about the things that missing you doesn't mean.
I will refrain.
Sometimes there is beauty in creating a vacuum around the things that life has tainted.
That I have tainted.
It has been a while since I remembered the good just on its own.
But as I realise and acknowledge this, the dread creeps its way back in.
Again I will refrain.
I miss...
food
the importance of Sunday mornings and Friday nights
Sunday dinners and Sunday brunch
Herbal tea and chicken burgers
white hot chocolate and nederberg barrone
dreaming of venice and Switzerland in the winter time
cheeks and cupcakes
food
Not to disregard or ignore the darkness that surrounds this momentary vacuum
But sometimes the past needs to be celebrated even if I can't currently think of why.
I am envious of those who have mastered the art of salvaging that which we have been taught
is only good for the dustbin.
Sadness
That is common.
So just for today I create this vacuum where the things that were once beautiful
Are beautiful again.

Queer | Black | Woman

I went to church this past weekend. I have been wanting to go back, for a while, to get closure pretty much and to finally decide if I was going to leave or stay. There was a story about an ex-lesbian who was straight, broke up with her ex-fiancé, went to work at a female dominated organisation, met a wonderful girl, dated her for 5 years, stumbled upon church one Sunday, attended, became really involved and decided she had been living a lie and left her girlfriend and gayness behind and is now doing life with a very nice gentleman.

The other day I heard that Flabba was stabbed to death, allegedly by his girlfriend. My initial reaction was “I wonder what he did”. But of course the majority of South Africans did not share my sentiments. Their reaction was more like “OFF WITH HER HEAD”.

On Instagram I came across a post speaking about the definition of ‘Ineptocracy’. It went like this “A system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers. And he commented and said “True for us here”.

By ‘us here’ he means for us, South Africans, here in South Africa.

By ‘the least capable to lead’ he means the ANC

By ‘least capable of producing’ he means black people

By ‘member of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed’ he means black people

By ‘by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers’ he means white people

The I-found-God-and-stopped-being-a-lesbian Lesbian; the woman who so dared to kill a man, a famous man and the so blatantly, hiding his racism in plain sight, racist pastor have all plagued me this week. Leaving a sour taste in my mouth.

The I-found-God-and-stopped-being-a-lesbian Lesbian

I saw her pic on an Instagram post. Her story of ‘sexual identity crisis’ was not written about but they enticed me by telling me to come hear the uncut version of her story. She was so obviously a Dyke, I had to go see what her story with the church was about. And to be very honest I hoped that it would be a positive one. One about how the church accepted her and who she loved in such a way that her sexuality didn’t define her or the role she could play in the church. I hoped for this scenario so much but that was not the case, as I knew it would not be. In fact the opposite was true. They used the story of a woman who clearly had a tough upbringing, who spent her life searching for what was perhaps lacking in her life since early on and made it about her sexuality, sorry I mean ‘sexual identity crisis’, because being gay is so much of a non-thing that we don’t even call it by name.

My friends and I had a discussion about it afterwards and the boyfriend of one of my friends said “I have never heard more bullshit in my life” and I can’t find a better set of words to round up my feelings about it. It is absolutely despicable that they would take the story of one woman and use it to sell their message of ‘crises of sexual identity’ and how coming to church can ‘fix it’. In my opinion this woman’s story had absolutely nothing to do with her sexuality and everything to do with her search and need to belong. She just happened to have been dating a woman when she found God and so of course church cured her of her sinful ways. Sigh. My words honestly fail me when people who are so greatly trying to live the word of God, be the word of God and sell the word of God are the exact people who spout ignorance and judgement and hate. Because telling people that its wrong to be who they are is hateful! It reminds me of when I had a discussion with a friend who I attended this church with and she was asking me why I stopped coming and she said “So you are dating a woman! I am having unmarried sex and don’t tithe as well as I should, but I still come to church”. So basically she is sinning and I am sinning, this shouldn’t stop us from going to church. And of course one day she can decide to stop having pre-marital sex and decide to start tithing every month, and since I was attracted to men before I can decide to stop being attracted to women. And bless her soul she was not trying to be facetious, but her statement said to me “I am comparing your sexual orientation, which I deem a sin, to my sins of pre-marital sex and bad tithing. You are a sinner Amanda and sinners need Jesus”. Also, had me at a loss for words that people could be so flippant and unaware, so unaware.

The So-blatantly-hiding-his-racism-in-plain-sight racist pastor

That person, that white person who has black ‘friends’ and therefore feels like they can make underhanded comments and make unfair and unfounded criticisms of black people because they can’t be racist, they are just being honest. Here is a bit of a newsflash. Saying you are ‘just being honest’ does not make you any less racist. Having black people on your staff does not make you any less racist. Having black people in your congregation…also doesn’t make you any less racist. I am so sorry to tell you. Acknowledging that apartheid was wrong and should never have happened but proceeding to say ‘it’s over now, we are 20 odd years into democracy, black people need to curb this feeling of entitlement, and for heaven’s sake stop bloody toi-toing’…guess what! Yup…also makes you racist, and honestly, it makes you an asshole. The biggest reason that certain women think that men can’t be feminist and certain people think that only 5% of the white population in this country are not racist is because it is extremely difficult to relinquish your power, your maleness, your privilege, your whiteness and open your eyes to what’s really going on in the world.

The woman who so dared to kill a man

A friend of mine wrote “this is so sad. Killed by your very own woman. Unbelievable”. But also, newsflash, no, people being killed by their very own partners is actually very believable. It just happens the other way round. Thousands of women are killed by their intimate partners every single day in this country. There just isn’t as much of an outrage about it. Community members don’t stand outside of magistrate courts and shout “no bail” and taunt the defendant’s family when these scores of women are being slain every day. No one stands outside mag courts and professes what valuable and respected members of society these women were.

I am queer, I am black, I am a woman. And this week I was just pissed off at people shamelessly trying to un-gay me, trying to ‘just be honest’ by making value-judgments about my blackness and by people normalizing the violence against my body.

How valueless is the life of a woman?

In a relatively short space of time the NGO I work for has pretty much become a CBO. We are in a township/informal settlement 3 days a week. When I started working at LvA people would ask me if it wasn't depressing working everyday with women who are beaten and raped. And I would reply no. Working with the women is not depressing, what was depressing was the justice system. The domestic violence and sexual offenses acts are really progressive. The stuff liberal governments are made of. The implementation of these laws, however, is about as backwards and archaic as you can get. As the organisation has grown (seeing more and more clients) and as I have grown as a feminist I am realising that the backwards and archaic that I am talking about is really what the modern is made out of. Queue the music that is suitable for a depressed soul.

My tune for the “is working with women who are beaten and raped depressing” question has changed. I am not only depressed with the justice system, I am now depressed with society at large. The story I hear from every client, day in and day out, is pretty much the same. They are literally being terrorized, every single day of their lives, by men who think they own them. Men who think women are possessions. THEIR possessions. To be beaten and raped as and when they please, because after all, who is she if she is not owned by a man?

You know I was so excited when I found feminism, and I still am. But I am so depressed at how much of a luxury it seems to be. This is becoming more and more apparent to me. I have heard critics of feminism say that it seems to exist mostly in theory and in academic journals. I am not sure I quite agree with that sentiment but I do see how it only survives and thrives in the select few. The fortunate individuals. Individuals who are learned and fortunate enough to have enough education that they can engage in critical thinking. Because even that, something as basic as critical thinking, is a luxury. But the fact of the matter is that critical thinking is not basic. It is an added extra that most people, most women can’t afford. I think becoming a feminist is dangerous for all women. But it is most dangerous for women who are black and poor. Women who live among men who are black and poor. Men who feel the only sense of power they have is over women, defenseless women. Being a feminist is most dangerous for these women, the women who need it the most.

Life is process

I am a big believer in most things that require one to, in situations of conflict and difficulty, most situations really, but mostly those two, look at oneself and ones behaviour as opposed to automatically looking to blame another. Things like process and introspection. I came across this passage in Americanah…

“They did not fight again until the relationship ended, but in the time of Blaine’s stoniness, when Ifemelu burrowed into herself and ate whole chocolate bars, her feelings for him changed. She still admired him, his moral fibre, his life of clean lines, but now it was admiration for a person separate from her, a person far away.”

…and it struck me because it speaks precisely to process and introspection. After their break-up Blaine will probably never realise that his choice of ‘punishment’ for Ifemelu’s wrongdoing played a part in the breakdown of their relationship. He will probably think of this particular fight and credit it with causing the beginning of the end but he will place the blame on her (she lied about why she did not attend a protest he had planned - she attended a friend of a friends farewell party instead) but never think about how his reaction to that mistake also contributed to the breakdown of their relationship. And I guess we have all been guilty of this, placing the blame on our partner and completely neglecting the part we played…we are doing ourselves such an injustice.

2014 has been one hell of a year for me…filled with things I never saw coming. Some beautiful…some tragic. I have often described it as the toughest year of my life, but in a recent post about it in my diary…a reflection post of sorts…I called it my most successful year and that was so refreshing for me. Yes it was tough, but it was also extremely successful because I did so much growing this year. Because growth and success doesn’t usually come from the happy and chilled bits of life. But I believe growth comes, not only when we go through trying times, but when we are able to extract the lessons from them. And no, just living through it does not automatically mean you see and absorb the lesson.

It is very easy to see our partners’ faults and where they can change and do things better. But it’s extremely difficult to see our own shortcomings. One of the biggest lessons I have learned in the last couple of years is to constantly be aware of how my thoughts, actions and reactions are contributing to the growth or breakdown of my relationships. This is especially hard to do in rough patches. But process is process, in good or bad times. When someone who loves us hurts us it is very difficult to take a step back and think about how our own behaviour has contributed, or how, how we behave is going to contribute to making up or breaking up. Because a relationship is never a one sided affair, there is always a push and pull and your actions matter and play a role even if you are not necessarily the one in the wrong.

So what do I mean by being aware of process and your role in it? Here are a few examples:

• Your partner lies to you and instead of immediately placing blame you think “is there a way in which I am behaving that makes her feel like she can’t be honest with me?”
• Your partner starts acting like a crazy person and starts with the excessive where-are-yous; who-are-you-talking-to's. You think “have I done something in the past to lead her to believe that this type of behaviour is acceptable?”

At first glance it seems like I am saying blame yourself for your partners’ wrongdoings, but that is not what I am saying at all. You can ask yourself all these questions and not find anything in your behaviour that contributed to what they did wrong, and note I said ‘contribute’ not ‘caused’. But automatically blaming and refusing to think beyond that assumes that our partners are cruel people who intentionally hurt us, and yes, sociopaths do exist, but more often than not they are not our partners. Like in the case of Blaine and Ifemelu, he could not see past the fact that she lied long enough to sit down and ask her why. The fact that she lied is in itself an awful thing, but it didn’t happen in a vacuum, there was a long (or short) list of events that led up to it. And taking the time to map process does not acquit the other of wrong doing, it helps you to understand and then take appropriate action from there, whether that is to move forward together or apart. But either way you are going to move forward, not wallow in the past feeling bitter and holding grudges, because like some very wise person once said…As long as it’s always the other persons fault, u will always be disappointed. Life is process, process that u partake in. What's YOUR role? And ya vele…that someone was me J

Tomorrow will be different but today I don’t feel like sharing you.

Monogamy: One partner for one partner

Polygamy: One husband, all the wives he can count, sometimes afford

Polyamory: Without googling ‘polyamory’ I am finding it difficult to explain it from memory as easily as I explained monogamy and polygamy. Of course I know what it is but I want to explain it in a way where you won’t sit and think “Oh you mean an open relationship”. Because that isn’t what it is and that isn’t what I mean. But I guess the dynamics of a polyamorous relationship are similar to my difficulty in explaining, properly, what it means.

There has been research and chatter about whether or not human beings are naturally monogamous creatures. And the results of this research and these discussions has always been that no. We are not. And I guess this opinion is largely based on the high rates of infidelity, oh, everywhere in the world. In a recent discussion with a friend about polyamory she said something which I think about 99% of the world’s population might be able to relate to. She said “I don’t know if I could ever be in a polyamorous relationship. I would much rather be with one person and do my other dealings in secret. And I would rather my partner cheated on me and hid it than told me about their love/like/lust for someone else. That would be too painful”.

I have been in monogamous relationships all my life. But the ideas of relationship and our partners that monogamy demands we subscribe to are what put me off. And this is one of the reasons why I have stopped identifying as monogamous.

In my opinion monogamous relationships have their foundation solidly built on ideas of possession. And that is where the problem, for me anyway, starts…

But it’s romantic. God it’s so romantic to be someone’s one and only. To know that they love you and you alone and only you have the privilege of calling them your partner. And let’s face it. The world isn’t designed for polyamorous relationship. Families consist of one mom and one dad. Or in some parts of the world a dad and a dad or a mom and a mom. But many moms and many dads. That’s pretty much unheard of! Even in dating relationships. To try to explain that you and/or your partner have more than one partner and NO! No one is a side-chick. Or even better. You are polyamorous, you identify as polyamorous but neither you nor your partner are seeing anybody else at the moment. It’s maddening.

So for me. Polyamory is:

•          First and foremost, my partner is STILL a human being, regardless of the fact that I love them. They remain a human being who is prone to mistakes and faults.
•          Understanding that loving somebody does not automatically switch off yours, or their, ability to be attracted to someone else.
•         Being able to have a discussion when it happens that you do meet and want to get to know this someone else
•          Being able to understand that this does not mean that I love my partner any less or that they love me any less.
•          Being honest…all the time
•          NOT just going around dating and sleeping with whomever I please when I please
•          Not keeping secrets when you have fallen for someone else
•          Acknowledging that you were born in a heteronormative, patriarchal society, and that shit hides itself in places that you don’t automatically think of so sometimes you act in ways that represent this system. And it’s ok. But you need to constantly be aware and check yourself
•          Acknowledging your own humanness and human desires and good and bad and faults and awesomeness and sharing ALL of these with your person, with your peoples.
•          Accepting and understanding that I cannot, and should not wish to dictate, the ways in which my partner shows love, therefore…
•          Accepting that just because she does not necessarily show love in the ways that I would, it does not mean she does not love me

I recently had a discussion with my wonderful friend Lee-Anne. I was telling her about an incident with my father regarding my sexual orientation and life choices. And I told her something that rings more true to me every single day. I said to her “Lee Lee, reinventing the wheel is exhausting. The world is not only built for a specific kind of person, and a specific kind of relationship, it’s built against anyone and everyone who doesn’t conform”.

I am a very optimistic person, sometimes a bit naïve. I said to Debbie in therapy once that what concerned me most about my relationship, or possibility of a relationship, with Sky was not that she was a woman, but the fact that she was older than me. I had never dated someone that much older than me. Granted I had never dated a woman either, but maybe it seemed more PC to be worried about her age as opposed to her gender. And I was naïve!! So naïve!!! Naïve in believing my life wouldn’t really change. Naïve in believing I wouldn’t really change. Naïve in believing nobody would have a problem with my choice in partner. And again I was naïve in thinking being in a polyamorous relationship was not going to feel like I was literally having everything I thought I knew about love and relationships sliced out of me.

That’s the thing about consciousness, you can’t control which areas of your life it does or does not seep into. It gets into E.V.E.R.Y.thing, like a pair of black socks, mistakenly put in with the white laundry.

There are days when I am the person I aim to be. Where I am killing this polyamory thing (you can tell today is not one of those days because I have referred to it as ‘this polyamory thing’). Where I am confident, secure, where I love the fact that I have been able to shed the veil of heteronormativity and make my own decisions about love and relationships. And there are days where I am not. Days where I am filled with resentment. Where the indoctrination has given itself some sort of energy boost. And it’s hard, it’s extremely hard to fight off. And it feels like a ten ton elephant is sitting on my chest and what else is there to do but give in? Because, like I said to Lee-Anne, reinventing the wheel is exhausting. Unlearning everything you have learned…about pretty much everything is exhausting. Starting from scratch is exhausting. Developing your own strategies and opinions is exhausting. Being aware of when the opinions that you think are your own could very well belong to the heteronorms and patriarchs, is exhausting. Being this person, being in this relationship in a world that is designed, specifically, to extinguish people like you…is exhausting.

But nobody said it would be easy. And fact remains, I would never ever trade any of this life for ignorance and complacency.

Sorry...Not sorry...

"I don't walk into a situation wanting to disrespect anyone, so if people are offended, then they're offended by the values contained within the content of what I am saying. And if you're offended by my values...well then f*ck it! You're supposed to be! I don't want misogynists to like me, I don't want people who hate black people to like me, I don't want people who are fronting to like me. It's taken me a long time, but I'm learning to embrace it, and to realise also, that a negative reaction can also be a positive measure of your impact"

Lebo Mashile

I can remember the exact day I became a feminist. It was the same day I met the One in Nine Campaign, a feminist organisation that also works with survivors of gender-based violence. They had approached the Centre for Applied Legal Studies (CALS) to collaborate on a case. CALS approached us to work on this case with One in Nine and so off we went on a mini-road trip to Rustenburg.

It was a Thursday morning and I got into the taxi and headed straight for the back. We all introduced ourselves and it wasn’t long before there was a very interesting conversation going on. I can’t even remember what it was about but I remember being moved. I tweeted “Sometimes you meet people and just being in their presence shifts something”. I just remember thinking, wow, these women are so smart and conscious and interesting….they are so interesting. I too want to be smart and conscious and interesting. Of course this was the beginning of the end for most things heteronormative in my life. There is something about becoming a feminist that calls for a complete revamp of your life. The seed is planted and one day, nothing but the seed of feminism is growing. It’s like a weed…or rather a super plant that cannot fully grow if everything that breeds patriarchy is not destroyed.

I recently attended a 10 day feminist school organised by the One in Nine Campaign and at the end of the first couple of sessions we were encouraged to write down a question or 5 that emerged from the session. Someone’s question struck me. They wrote “why is feminism so painful”. And I was like YES!!! Why is it? And I thought about it for a while and boiled it down to a similar but more specific question…”Why is consciousness so painful”

My girlfriend and I liken feminism and becoming a feminist to the Matrix and taking the blue pill, or is it the red pill? Either way, becoming a feminist requires seeing the world through a completely different set of eyes. It’s like visiting a new world, except it’s the old world. And it’s pretty and liberating and exciting, but it’s ugly.

I can also imagine though, that becoming a feminist, is hard for everyone around you, everyone who knew you before you became Neyo. I say this because lately I have heard a lot of “I don’t even know who you are anymore”, “you’re just going through a phase, I know the real you”. And I would be lying if I said it didn’t annoy the shit out of me. In a very recent trivialising of the feminist I have become, I was a little more than annoyed, I was hurt. Hurt because I was tired of people demonizing the person I have become and glorifying someone that was a little more palatable and a little less abrasive. But I am a big big believer in process and things not happening in a vacuum, “every action has an equal and opposite reaction” school of thought and I realised that as hard as the change has been for me sometimes, it must be equally as hard for those who knew me, or at least thought they did.

Before I became a feminist, I was a very avid “non-feminist”. Those girls, unknowingly, who believe feminists are angry man-bashers who take everything too seriously. I volunteered at the kiddies ministry at my church. I wanted to get married and have 3 little boys. I believed in husbands being the heads of the household and wives having to be submissive. I believed and wanted all these things. In what must feel like overnight, I have become a very proud and some would say radical promoter of feminism. I no longer volunteer at the kiddies church (which has nothing to do with the kids and me not wanting to volunteer, but more to do with how open the church is to having a openly feminist and queer female leading their kids) and I still want to get married, but my ideas about the marital roles of husbands and wives – or in my case wives and wives – are very different.  I can see how the people who knew me before this transformation might feel duped and perhaps invalidated, not only by the changes that have gone on in my life, but by the things that I write about these changes.

I don’t often take the time to think about how becoming a feminist has impacted those around me, those I have loved and who have loved me back and I think it would serve me well in the future to be aware of, and sensitive to this. But to reiterate…

“If you're offended by my values...well then f*ck it! You're supposed to be! I don't want misogynists to like me, I don't want people who hate black people to like me, I don't want people who are fronting to like me."

I have spent a really long time fighting change. I have gone to therapy because the ways in which I was changing were freaking even me out. It’s been difficult, it is still difficult. But this is my life now. If you are offended…fuck it, and depending on your level of outrage, fuck you!