(Still) Learning to Listen

I have been a road warrior these last few weeks, from Detroit to an unexpected RV breakdown in West Virginia (don’t worry Sojourner-the-Revolutionary’s all better now!) to Durham for a brief night, to New York City, to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, then back to NYC and now I am upstate in Blue Mountain Lake, NY.

Even though I have been delinquent in sending these weekly updates since I got on the road, I have been thinking about you everyday, and I have even had the great pleasure of getting to meet and reconnect with many of you quirky black girls in person! I love it and I love you.

At this point I am noticing a theme in these posts I write to you. I take my accountability to each of you and the sustainable lifetimes of brilliance we deserve as an opportunity to be as generous with myself as I would be to each of you, to mother myself, wake myself up, remind myself that indeed it will be so much better than okay.

On this journey, technological breakdowns large and small (from the alternator falling out of the RV to the thumb drive that fell apart in my hands a few minutes ago) have been forcing me to do what I know I should do anyways. Slow down. Reflect on each and every move. Check in with my spirit. Check in with my folk. Talk to people in person. Sit still.

Imagine.

Sometimes I see elders who walk around like my dream self. Unperturbable. So intentional and beautiful in their every action that they live like oracles. That air and traffic seems to move around them. Their hair, their spines, directing orchestras of everyday peace. Sometimes I see them, all the time I imagine them. I am still growing my gray hair towards wisdom. I am still learning to let go. I am still remembering to have faith in a divine purpose that cannot be stopped, but also will not be rushed.

Or another way to say is that, if life is this beautiful in breakdown what awaits at the other end of this lesson when we are all not only knowing but also ACTING like it!!!!! Maybe you are reading this right now because you are learning this lesson too..maybe you are reading this now so you can affirm how far you've come. Maybe both. I am just grateful to have you as a loving community of sister warriors worth transforming my blues into fuschia for!

So this period of time has been amazing. Much love to everyone who participated in the quirky and beautiful self-organized fringe experience of QUEER Quirky Fabulous Pride during Atlanta’s Black Gay Pride Festival and who cheered on Sojourner, the Revolutionary MobileHomeComing Vehicle during Durham Pride.

To hear THE PROUD PODCAST click here:
http://brokenbeautiful.wordpress.com/2010/10/04/the-proud-podcast-the-visionary-heat-of-black-queer-community/

Also major shouts to QBG Dr. Brittney Cooper, and the rest of the Crunk Feminist Collective and the Department of Gender and Race Studies at University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa for creating the quirky fabulous and loving space of the Recovering Black Women’s Lives Symposium in honor of Black Women Public Intellectuals and including an inspiring tribute to the Honorable Black Feminist Publisher, Writer, Warrior, Superstar Barbara Smith! And yay for the Clark ATL QBG’s in QBG Sheri’s class for making the trek. The love was palpable!

AND Julia and I are grateful to have been able to participate in the small but vibrant black contingent at the Lesbians in the 70’s Festival at the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies at the City University of NYC.

Here are some pictures of how beautiful black queer intergenerational love is!:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2370206&id=103868&l=ca9a2e8d1f

And for your regular doses of QBG amazingness (even though I promise not to leave y’all hanging again for so long)

check out sex-positive QBG brilliance at Aunt Betty’s Basement: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/group.php?gid=76958878939&v=wall

The Lucille Clifton Sunday Rebirth video series at :(blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/category/shapeshifting)

And SOON you can see QBG’s like Moya, L, Lex, Frances and Jocelyn rocking out to the Lost Boi’s “reading rainbow song” geeking out about their favorite books during the new mini-web series THE REAL READING RAINBOW: Queer Black Intergenerational Booklust!!! Coming soon!

And for more chances to gather in person save the following dates:
In NYC On Oct 22nd see Dr. Lex rep for QBG at the SPARK Conference for girls on body image more details here: http://www.sparksummit.com/

On the second weekend of January (1/7-1/10)

IN DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA
Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind will be presenting
MOTHER OURSELVES BOOTCAMP an interactive weekend-long workshop for women of color and the release of the MotherOurselves Manifesta based on Audre Lorde’s key concept. (Be there! And email brokenbeautifulpress@gmail.com about childcare, a place to stay in Durham etc!)

IN ATLANTA, GA
On Saturday January 15th 2011 (MLK Jr. Weekend)
QBG Lex and her QBG Momma Pauline will be co-facilitating a workshop for queer mothers and daughters (and their mothers…or daughters, or gender queer kin) about how to create affirming mother/daughter relationships in the historic MOTHERHOUSE building in West End. (See a video of our fieldtrip to motherhouse here: http://vimeo.com/5557196)

Come and STAY for the first “winter pride” dreamt up by the brilliant QBG QRR mogul JULIA ROXANNE WALLACE!!! Aka a collection of quirky and queerky events centering around the annual Audre Lorde/Bayard Rustin Breakfast in Atlanta!!! Email alexispauline@gmail.com if you want to reserve space and or stay updated on the workshop!