I’m grateful for everyone who reads the blogs I keep. In my own way I hope to make a positive difference in the lives of others.

This year I’m donating money and material goods to nonprofits making improvements in the lives of the individuals they serve.

At the end of this blog entry I’ll link to the websites of two nonprofits that I donate money to.

The first is the Black Feminist Project that serves Black MaGes (shorthand for MArginalized GEnders.) I found out about the BFP when an interview with their founder was featured in Women’s Health circa two years ago. They are an organization in the Bronx, NY that gives residents of the South Bronx fresh produce from Black Joy Farm on a sliding-fee scale linked to income.

The second charity I donate to is Thistle Farms located in Nashville, TN. They offer residential treatment for women recovering from drug abuse. On their website you can buy products whose income supports women throughout the world who are victims of exploitation like human trafficking.

This year I also donated clothing and household goods to a local nonprofit that gives donors a tax receipt should we itemize deductions on our tax return.

I recommend you seek out local nonprofits in your neighborhood to donate money or your spare time to. With little free time it’s often better for us to donate money.

Black Feminist Project

Thistle Farms

Today October 7, 2023 has been designated Let Freedom Read Day.

As a professional librarian I’ve unwittingly become what author Ibram X. Kendi calls a Freedom Fighter.

I wrote before in a blog entry here that our constitutional right to free speech has become illegal in Texas, Florida, and multiple other states.

Book banning is only the tip of this censorship iceberg.

I urge you to consider getting a library card and checking out books to your heart’s content.

In the 1950s John Lewis the former elected leader of Georgia was 16 and went to the local public library to get a library card.

He was told Black persons couldn’t get a library card. This likely provoked him to become a civil rights activist.

Sixty years later Lewis published a book that won the National Book Award–our nation’s highest literary honor.

It’s chilling to me the history of how Black persons were not allowed to get library cards.

Which is why I urge everyone of all colors and creeds to get a library card. You will likely need to show ID and proof of current address to sign up for one.

I’ve checked out over 2,500 items with my library card. So I’ve become a Power User. I received a black aluminum Power User water bottle and an ivory Power User tote bag.

Plus a silver library card with the Power User label on it.

This program is for individuals with a Brooklyn Public Library card.

I’ve read the banned books New Kid and Between the World and Me.

My reading history is curious.

Unlike if I were a young kid in Texas or Florida whose parent didn’t want them to read books about Black history–not the American history that excluded Black experience–I had the opposite thing happen.

In the sixth grade I fell in love with reading Little House on the Prairie books.

When I entered seventh grade my mother forbid me to read them again. She told me I could only read teen and adult books.

I was a 13-year old white girl and checked out Nikki Giovanni poetry books then.

This gets at the quote in the Hip-Hop blog entry where I quoted Big Sean.

The artist spoke about not allowing other people to dictate how he felt about himself.

His quote mirrored the famous Eleanor Roosevelt quote: “No one can make you feel inferior without your permission.”

The media darlings use hateful and hurtful rhetoric that only serves to sow division not unite Americans for our common good: that good being the healing and recovery from what’s going on.

More than a culture war going on I’ve coined the term “shame war” to talk about how people attack and label others.

We cannot continue to internalize shame.

How could reading about Critical Race Theory cause a teenager to feel ashamed. That’s what the parents think who try to ban books.

Whoever we are we should not allow ourselves to feel ashamed.

Reading books is an act of self-development. It’s a free college of knowledge when you check books out of a public library.

Teenagers are being denied the right to read books and to think for themselves about what they’re reading.

It’s a slippery slope America is going down.

We cannot give up on ourselves and our future.

First the right to read whatever we want is taken away.

Segueing into causing young people to give up on reading altogether.

Please I urge readers to get a library card and check out books to read.

Today multiple libraries across the U.S. no longer impose late fees.

As long as you return any item the late fee will be waived.

Come on join the new Freedom Fight.

Read all the books you want about whatever topic you want.

Liking ourselves at any age comes down to not believing the lies about our worth.

About how inferior we are and that if we only buy a product / do what other people tell us to do / conform to how everyone else acts and lives we’ll be accepted and adored.

Our need to feel like we belong is likely hard-wired in our human nature.

Through a series of interactions with other women I’ve come to learn life lessons about letting go of the need for other people’s approval.

One time was when I went to a funeral and was talking with a female mourner in the viewing room. I could see the makeup coming through on her face.

You saw the makeup as it was obvious she had makeup on.

Right then I chose to have a fresh face in a room full of women spackled with makeup.

In the photo taken above this weekend the sole makeup I have on is Sephora Collection matte black waterproof eyeliner and the Valentino Rosso purple lipstick Unconventional Babe.

Like Alicia Keys initiated in her #NoMakeup hashtag I’ve come to be okay with my natural face. The tube of MAC foundation lies unopened in the train case.

I think that what a person eats and drinks and the moderate exercise they do can do more for their beauty than a miracle cream.

Turning 58 I saw that wanting to have a flawless face or body forever is a fool’s errand..

You really don’t know how you look in other people’s eyes.

The people who care about you won’t care that you don’t look like a famous actress.

I’ve stopped caring what people think of me. That is their issue not ours when they judge people.

Find your merry band of friends to hang out with instead. They’ll cherish you when nobody else does.

The new cat’s eye frames I’m wearing are Kate Spade eyeglasses. I wear them all the time.

The men haven’t come knocking. So I’m not trying to impress them or anyone else.

I no longer look at my face in the bathroom mirror like I’m staring in a microscope.

What do you say?

Isn’t it time to like ourselves and be our own best friends?

I recommend you do what I did and pre-order the Lyn Slater (Accidental Icon) book How to Be Old. It comes out in March and is destined to give more insight than I could here.

She’s 70 years old. Proof that age is just a number.

I’ve become obsessed with Marie Kondo’s ethic of doing what sparks joy.

In my view everyone can life a life of joy, meaning, purpose, and passion.

Even if our circumstances are less than ideal I say: do what sparks joy for you.

I’m saying ‘no’ to busywork and ‘no’ to doing backbreaking work at my job.

The idea that ANY of us should endure burnout on the job just because we have to pay rent and bills is bullshit.

The six root causes of burnout are factors linked to how management treats employees.

I say: do whatever you can to do things that spark joy on the job and off the job.

In a coming blog entry I will talk about how I decided what kind of life I actually want.

In her book Pretty Good Advice: For People Who Dream Big and Work Harder Leslie Blodgett wrote: “When you see beauty you become beautiful.”

The author is the founder of Bare Minerals the makeup line. I recommend you buy her book which is why I quote from it.

As the year ends I’ll quote another beauty–South Korean model Sora Choi who was quoted:

“To me, beauty is when a person is living and embodying their truth, no matter what that is.”

On the cusp of 58 I’ve learned that no one else gets to speak for me. Only I can speak my truth, or else others will impose on the world their view of who they think I am.

2023 I envision as the year when everyone is free to live and embody our truth freely and fearlessly.

We should be acting to lift each other up. Not cutting each other down. I stopped reading editorials because the hateful rhetoric only serves to divide people instead of bringing us together.

Believing is seeing. Believing that others are beautiful you will see the beauty in everyone.

It starts will looking in the mirror and feeling that you are beautiful.

I’m no saint. I won’t be exercising this week. I view this lapse like taking a holiday vacation week.

If I could give my own Pretty Good Advice I would end here with:

The two foolproof ways to achieve any goal–even a New Year’s resolution coming up–are to understand that change will happen incrementally. And that compromise is called for when you can’t do what you want to do in one day or in one week.

Lastly:

It’s time to unshackle ourselves from self-limiting beliefs. Internalizing shame about who we are will rob us of the energy to set goals and go after them with gusto.

2023 is going to be even better than 2022 was. I firmly believe that whatever happens in our lives we can live through it and emerge stronger and better.

Hiding our light is no way to live. Beating ourselves up because we feel like we’re a failure is no way to live.

I urge followers to see the beauty in yourself and everyone else.

Together we can move mountains of hate. We can create the world we would like to see.

More coming up on what I’m doing to shift the needle toward love and forgiveness.

The Italian written on the Davines holiday box stated the hair products were for capelli indisciplinati. The Italian word for frizzy hair sounded like undisciplined–which described my incorrigible hair.

So, I was willing to save up the $75 to buy the shampoo conditioner and leave-in treatment that might just help my hair blossom into gorgeous after all these years.

Who exactly did I want to look beautiful for?: Every guy I sent a message to on OKCupid ghosted me after my second response. I got the idea that circa 2022 things hadn’t changed: It was okay for a woman to open her mouth to kiss not speak.

My photogenic face compelled men to click “like” on my profile. A few guys went further and sent messages. What’s with the “likes” guys? If you like a woman, send her a message–don’t be coy. We’re not communicating via the Pony Express–this is 2022.

I got the idea that they were shocked when a pretty face had something intelligent to say. Not what they were expecting Cupid to shoot them with?

Getting ghosted. Every. Single. Time. I got the hint and canceled my account.

Not relishing spending an hour or two every day reading match profiles to see who I wanted to send messages to. Acting as a caregiver to your mother you have no energy or time left over to conduct love combat in the hopes of getting one man in your scope.

Pat Benatar got it right: “Love is a Battlefield.” It doesn’t have to be this way.

Living my life Left of the Dial I’ll use the hair products for my own joy and love.

What was I going to do instead of hunting for a boyfriend? I’ve begun sending emails to my Republican congressperson asking her to do the right thing on humanitarian causes.

One January night 12 years ago I attended a candlelight MLK Vigil for Peace. Five of us–I had thought hundreds would show up–stood in a triangle park holding lit votive candles.

My candle fell on the cement path and broke. After giving the host of the vigil my email account ever since then I’ve been sent in my inbox pleas to act on social justice issues.

Ever since Mr. Toupee–my nickname for Donald Trump–became president the emails have escalated. LL Cool Joe–President Biden–has been no saint either.

Sending messages to Nicole CacaCola–my moniker for Malliotakis the Republican who won the election–is my way of participating in our Democracy.

A girl in the world who’s an Activist I can’t get any play on OKCupid. The men want to Meet Cute. Then when they find out I’m No Hello Kitty they bolt.

This holiday season since I have no love interest–I’m going to wash the men right out of my hair–and wash and condition my hair with the Davines products.

What’s cooking in my Protest Kitchen? Peace Love and Happiness.

This is what the world needs. We don’t need endless wars, bipartisan bickering, and the ongoing hate.

Have something to say. This is what I would tell readers: use your lovely lips to speak out.

Our time is here. We have the opportunity to change society for the better.

Whether or not our hair is frizzy. And whether or not other people like that we have loud mouths.