I have been a writer for most of my life; There I said it. For a long time, if you asked me what I did that would’ve been the last thing I’d mention. As a curious and outspoken Gemini child. I knew I was destined to be a writer because my parents gifted me a typewriter. I loved writing speeches for shit like Rev. Dr. MLK Jr. day celebrations and black history month programs. This same gemini little girl coming up in the Baptist church, enjoyed playing preacher and making up fake sermons with bible verses. At some point I took on a challenge from my big cousin to write a book. She offered to pay me $10 per chapter of my first attempt at a novel. It was called What do they know? (those girls). It was A YA novel, written in a pink spiral notebook about two rival girl crews. How they’re stories were intertwined through their traumatizing home lives. Based very loosely off my rivalry with the white girls in my childhood neighborhood. In real life the rivalry led to me challenging them to a dance battle in the alley next to my house. They declined because they knew what was up.

Reflecting back on my teen years when my auntie Lisa gave me my first diary. It was white with pastel flowers all over it, its best feature being a metal lock and key. When I unwrapped it with excitement, she told me “a girl needs a place to keep her private thoughts.” I felt liberated with the idea that I could write something down and no one would have access to it. (Shout out my Auntie for always giving me access to autonomy.) At that time, I felt so many things that I couldn’t tell them, so I wrote and wrote. Every entry starting with Dear diary before getting into the gossip and secrets. There were list of who I wanted to lose my virginity to, the advice my friends were giving me and big plans of running away and never coming back. I re read it as an adult during the Covid-19 lockdown and the first entry made me cry. I wrote, “Happy new year, I don’t want to be here.” What became clear to me was that my teenage self was full of depression and anger. Life was clearly affecting her, and she was so insightful about how. I cherish my diary as a precious artifact from the past.It has been helpful in my healing journey to have the voice of my teen self. After some time when my diary became obsolete, my father confessed to me; he read it. I was so upset but not surprised, even with a lock, nothing was private. To this day he says it was sitting opened on my bed, which was an invitation for him to read it.
All this to say, words and writing were my upbringing and what ignited me outside of dance. The buildup of thoughts and words inside me created a mounting pressure. To release that pressure, I had to write or dance. Often times dancing felt safer. Inside, I always wanted to document what I felt and thought about my experiences. I had this inner knowing that it would be important to reflect back. The best part was that no one could dispute the truth on MY pages. So, I continued airing out my unfiltered rage and frustration on the pages of composition notebooks.

In a college I was sexually assaulted, and having been traumatized by it and the response from people close to me. I found solace in two spaces; the dance studio and my creative writing class. During a writing assignment, I wrote about the sexual assault I had experienced. I decided to write about it as a comic tragedy. A naive girl going to an unknown city in the middle of the night to help her homegirl get some. Making fun of the rapist and his crooked smile helped me find power in sharing the story of my sexual assault. I wish I had a copy of it now! Proudly, I hung it up on the fridge of the one-bedroom apartment I shared with my three friends.

Accomplishing the task of pouring yourself into a story is powerful. To allow it to be read and appreciated is thrilling, scary and vulnerable. When I think no one will ever read it, I’m honest almost with brutality. I’m vengeful and villainess in my descriptions of things as they are. I become an unrelenting truth teller, beating you with the truth until you’re a pulp. Now that I have decided to self-publish. I find I’m not immune to my own brutality and self-editing. Sometimes to the point of debilitating perfectionism. I try to think of every way I could be critiqued so that I can be ahead of them. If I already knew that it was trash, I won’t be heart broken when my reader tells me the same thing.
When my personal writings were read it was an utter violation. My secrets had been let out before I gave them permission and, I didn’t like that at all. In some ways I feel that by publishing I am doing that to myself. Violating my own agreement to keep myself and my vulnerability safe and protected. That’s the thing about being a writer though, I don’t fully have a say.
James Baldwin put it so well in his notes from a native son foreword; “One writes out of one thing only–one’s own experience. Everything depends on how relentlessly one forces from this experience the last drop, sweet or bitter, it can possibly give.” So, I share my experience and what I’ve learned to be an exhibitionist for the healing possibilities and flexibility.

So, I completed my first zine in the fall of 2023. Thanks to my very dear friend, I was able to print A Holyheaux’s guide through the underworld. A collection of poems, musings and villainess stories. It’s the journey of a fast black girl who finds autonomy through sex and later sex work. I have a slight obsession with mythology and it’s multi layered truths. So I wanted to share a story that wasn’t just mine. In the process I found that it belonged to women before me, and women like me. I worked on it with my ancestors present, sometimes yelling about generational trauma. In the end they understood my anger and we got somewhere.

My intention with this blog is to be honest. I want to share what is true for me at the time of writing. I have found that life is mutable and change is the only constant. Change of location, mind, friends, life expectancy. It all will change and although I am deciding to declare these opinions and beliefs it doesn’t make them exempt to change. At present I am at the end of my stripping career, a practicing yogi, a gardener and a Heaux. With dreams of being a conduit of healing, understanding and love. I’m charting a course to become a recognized writer, Zine maker and choreographer.

So now, after the end of the world, I decided to start a blog! I want to be cataloged amongst the voices of these changing times. This website/blog is my little piece of real estate. It is my high rise with a balcony and a beautiful view on the internet. I want to talk about being at the end of my stripping career and becoming a published writer. I’ll share musings on my yoga and spiritual journey. And talking about how sex and sexuality has become an agent for healing. What makes sense to me is that from that first diary to now, I have a lot to say. The difference now, I have decided that there is no better time to share.