The Challenge:Stripped Naked

"Be yourself. Above all, let who you are, what you are, what you believe shine through every sentence you write, every piece you finish." -John Jakes

I saw this post both on Starrla Monae's blog and LionsVictory and decided I would bear my soul just like they have. So I'm baring my soul , closing my eyes and jumping out the window with this one.

I was born May 17, 1983 to a working lower middle class family. To much surprise my parents were expecting a boy and sure enough they got me a girl...a very sick girl. My stay with the hospital was lengthy and when they sent me on my way I arrived to join my older brother and sister. I'm not going to say my childhood was all good and I'm not going to say it was all bad it was just what molded me into who I am.

I spent the first 10 years of my life running up and down Grieg st. Not really knowing that those boys on the corner were drug dealers and those funny walking people were crack heads. I thought everyone lived like this until my parents sent me off to all white school and i soon learned that it wasn't the case. It took a girl named Heather Bailey to tell me I was living in the "hood" and those people on the corner who included my cousins were all bad people..will at least that what she tried to lead me to believe. Those years on Grieg St brought me great joy and pain, I met some of my long term childhood friends there and I also learned how drugs could destroy a family. February 1992 would mark the day I realized what grief, sorrow, pain and drugs could do to your life in just a blink of an eye. I sat my little self in the back seat between my older cousin Mickey and Keisha riding along with my much older cousins Tre' and Tone enjoying the first ride in Tre's car. I remember being so excited to be out and about with my Tre and Tone since they spent most of there days sleeping and nights working..rather hugging' the block. We rode along stopping at all the hot spots so everyone could see his new ride but after that last stop it was as things didn't sit right with me anymore and even at 9yrs old I knew something was about to happen and it did. We sat at the light listening to the music when I car pulled up on the drivers side, the window rolled down and that's when the gunshots started along with the screaming and tires screeching. When i looked up Tre was slumped over and Tone was trying to stop the bleeding from his arm and calm us kids down. We lost Tre' that day, he was long gone before he even hit the hospital . His death took a toll on our whole family and I stop talking for 6 months..I had nothing left to say. my parents moved us up out of that Neighborhood asap and I left my friends, family and the only life I ever knew behind.

The rest of my Elementary and Middle School years we typical it was until high school is when I struggled to find myself. High school was the longest 4years of my life. I struggled to fit in and involved myself with Kori who cheated, lied, and abused me on more than one occasion but he brought me the accpetace I yearned for so I dealt with it. I walked out of those doors on June 7, 2001 not knowing what move i was going to make in life or how long i was going to hold on. I went off to college not because I wanted to but because that's what I thought i needed to do. It pleased my parents and older brother who I took a stab at it...and the only good thing that came out of it was my friendship with my BFF Tee because school was just a uphill battle for me. I didn't want to be there, I rarely went to class and my major was what my brother wanted me to do not I. I wasted my parents money and my time. I spent my days sleeping and running from class to class and my nights partying and drinking... I woke up one day closed that chapter and set forth for a road that I surly didn't know where it leads. I cried a little on this road...I'm lying I cried alot of this road from not knowing how i was going to pay my car note to losing my childhood bff Roshon in a car accident...matter of fact the day he dies Oct. 5, 2007 marked the day i lost myself again so the road to get to 2010 meant a little bit more than the one that led me out of school. It took alot of personal battles , addiction, pain and joy to stand here now at 26 years old and smile. I hold my breath with every major move i have made so far and its only the second week of 2010. The years that are behind me was just the foundation for the greatness I'm about to lay upon this world. True, if you ask me 10 years ago if i would be degree less, man less, marriage less and childless I would would have told you no with much attitude. i now see who I am and why god took me through what he did. they say your past is your past and your future is what you make it! so look out world its nothing but achievement, Good days and greatness from this point forward.