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 Instead, she met my great grandfather. A poor, dark-skinned man jumping from job to job working for farmers and trying to make a living. The two of them fell in love. They were just teenagers. Her parents threatened to disown her if she continued seeing him, and like a rebellious teenager, she refused. They wanted her to do better. She wanted to be in love. They might have broken up eventually, if she didn't get pregnant. But she did, and that was the end of it. Her parents basically said "you've ruined your life" and disowned her right there. The whole family disowned her. No one would speak to her- aunts, uncles, cousins, not a single person stood up for her. So she had no choice. The two of them moved to California, so he could get a job picking oranges. He built a house. They had their first daughter. She was 16. She never saw her family again.Until the day she died. But I think she was always a little bitter about being disowned by her family, and ended up bein...

 My siblings and I have stopped interacting with my oldest brother. We found out that years earlier he had molested at least two boys. He was an adult at the time. He showed no remorse, and turned the story around to say that those boys were at fault. It was so disgusting to watch someone you grew up with treat people so poorly and show such a blatant disregard for others. The good news is that the remaining four siblings have become closer and we now are able to appreciate the good we see in each other. It’s true when they say that if you could pick your family it would look much different than it is! She was a young creole teenager- french creole was her first language, and she was a quarter-to-half black like me, with tan skin and loose brown curls. She was born in Florida, but when things started getting worse for black people in Florida, her family relocated to Texas. For those who don't know, creole people tend to play heavily into colorism. Although they are definitely mix...

 In the majority of churches, ordained ministers are styled "The Reverend". However, as stated above, some are styled "Pastor" and others do not use any religious style or form of address, and are addressed as any other person, e.g. as Mr, Ms, Miss, Mrs or by name.Or call you by your first name. It’s always the old guys who wanna call me by my first name (either look it up online or read it off my badge). “It’s Dr Thicket, sir.” And I never assume I can call patients by their first names. Respect: give it, demand it. I started, years ago, addressing all women I deal with professionally (trial lawyer) as "Ms." regardless of status. It's the best analog to "mr." That is, unless the person I'm addressing has a doctorate then it's "dr." unless they tell me different. we have and all who present male get that. Why is your marital status relevant to whatever interaction we are having? It's not and neither is mine.

 In my public elementary school in the 70's, there was ONE teacher who went by Ms. All the other women teachers were Miss or Mrs. Even when my kid went to school the 2000's, teachers were Miss or Mrs. I've been using Ms since I was 16. Fortunately, in the business world, I have found people are more likely to default to Ms because you really don't know what a person's status is unless they tell you. One of my favorite teachers in high school (who was married, in her 50s, and had her husband’s last name) absolutely insisted that people refer to her using Ms. instead of Mrs. She would even politely correct students when they said Mrs., saying that she worked hard for her professional career, and that her identity is completely based on her being her own woman, not “her husband’s wife”

Here I always thought that Mrs. was never used unless the person told you to use that or one is 110% sure they are married, though the latter situation is less commonly used as it often leads people to believe that a married couple shares the same last name. Teaching kids that married women go by Mrs. without mentioning that it is that person's choice is problematic. Do the people at your office generally address you by your last name? I get that the West Coast is more casual, but standard practice here seems to be to address everyone by their preferred first name unless it's a legal document. There have been times when I haven't learned a person's surname until much later. Even the CEO is referred to by their first name. This also helps when one doesn't know a person's pronouns. 

 Papa DO preach! I vividly remember being on my own for the first time and super disgruntled about the price of garbage bags. Could not believe you have to pay money for something thats only purpose is getting thrown out. To this day one of my biggest beefs with the cost of living in my city is that garbage men don’t get paid a living wage. Who the f wants to live in a city without garbage men?! Our trash and recycle both come on the same day but at different times. Last week I thought the recycle had been picked up, so I went out to roll the empty barrel back into my garage, and ended up chatting with a neighbor and getting the mail while I was out there. I brought my barrel back in, and 5 minutes later the recycle truck came and picked up the barrels. I was distracted by conversation and mail, so I didn't recognize that my barrel hadn't been emptied yet. This week my barrel was filled to the top, and I had anxiety about it all week.

 It is a silly joke about life for middle-class people leading a comfortable suburban life. Trash is picked up once a week, and most of us are limited to a single bin. If you forget to put the bin out on trash collection day (once a week) you now have too much trash accumulating until the next week. Especially funny to men who take pride in a clean garage/clean yard & cannot stand the extra garbage. My wife doesnt understand it. But I refuse... REFUSE to run outside like some kind of goddamn animal and race to put out the trash can. Running out there with my dick poking out of the front of my PJs like it always does when you try to run, my extra small tshirt (shrunken from repeated washing, not my increasing girth) riding up my belly, looking like some 3rd world peasant chasing after some feces wagon. If we hear the truck coming and the can's not out, sorry, it's too fucking late.

 Just a reminder: My bin is at the end of my house where we park our cars, we put the trash in there during the week, and I take it to the pick up area when its full. Because I have 2 bins I can take the empty can immediately and the Garbo Patrol get the full bin and it sits there empty all week. That what has me in your brain rent free right now, y'all. That I bring my empty bin back to my house instantly while y'all wait 12-48 hours like savages. As someone who has to literally hoist my trash can into my truck every week to drive it to the pick up spot, I’m so jealous you can leave yours out! My trash truck won’t even come down the road I live on so I have to take it all the way down to the highway. Even if I could leave it at the end of my actual drive, I would still have to drive it because it’s a hell of a walk. Maybe I do need a gator....

 My mom a single mother, raised me and siblings. award winning in her industry, multiple business owner. tried her very best to raise us without a father figure at home and tried to teach us the virtues of self-improvement and self help. she has been a key motivational figure in my life. she took us to all sorts of seminars and workshops to try to make up for what she thought she was lacking.My aunt, OBGYN never married, lived a quiet modest and humble life and spent it instilling curiosity and a love for science in us. honestly all the books she bought us growing up played a huge part in my life path. she wanted to be my penpal when I got my first email address, we still email each other , every week for well over a decade. My sister, literaly a child prodigy, top of her graduating class. successful business owner which she sold off for low 7 Figures to fund her travelling the world and now she's doing her MBA at another top school. she's not even 30 yet. but she's an intr...

 Honestly this may sound weird, but Oprah. I dont really like her as a,person but, her rise to fame happened in the height of segregation. She worked her way up the media ladder and convinced millions of people to watch and support her, many of which wouldnt even drink out of the same water fountain as her. Dispite starting poor and literally everything being stacked against her she still succeeded tremendously. Always makes me think, "what's my excuse". I have a few that are celebrities but the ones that I really admire are the ones that follow their passions with no reserve and are able to love themselves and what they do. I had a friend in highschool that I'd chat with and have deep long conversations with as teens. She was always having a hard time and just seemed lost with herself. She eventually came out as a lesbian and started to embrace it. But when she went past that honey moon phase of coming out, she genuinely accepted herself and it's been amazing w...

 But she won and put that money aside for our college educations. A few years later she met my stepfather and settled down with him. It was clear she did it because she wanted us to be taken care of. Though she loved him it was because he loved us. She constantly sacrificed in order for us to have everything. When I was 22 she was diagnosed with a rare tumor behind her eye. Thru experimental treatment they saved her life. She lost her eye.  Then had to fight the insurance company to pay for 3 yrs. Just when this was done she was diagnosed with breast cancer and had to have a double mastectomy. Mom 2 Cancer 0. Few yrs after this and now its lung cancer. She beats it. But the treatments have caused a rare leukemia that has caused her body to start rejecting her blood. In between this mess she helped me to overcome an addiction to heroin. She also had to suffer thru my beautiful nephew being turned into a near vegetable due to the negligence of a daycare provider and a traumatic...

 My Mother. Passed from relative to relative as a young child because her mom was more interested in her new husband than her children. Spent many nights going to bed hungry. Went to live with her father when she was 7 and her abusive step mom would force her to stay up late and smoke cigarettes with her at 8 yrs old so that she didn't have to drink alone. Married to an abusive husband at 16 so that she could finally get free from her parents. She divorced him and met my bio dad. He left 2 weeks after I was born because drinking was more important than her or me.  Worked 3 jobs to make ends meet. Met my adoptive father when I was 2. A yr and a half later my brother was born and she finally was getting the life she deserved. He adopted me the same week my brother was born and told us he was the luckiest man to ever live. 5 yrs later he was killed in a chainsaw accident at work. He was starting his own business within months. The owner and of this business and my dads supposed ...

 At the dances I was one of the most untiring and gayest. One evening a cousin of Sasha, a young boy, took me aside. With a grave face, as if he were about to announce the death of a dear comrade, he whispered to me that it did not behoove an agitator to dance. Certainly not with such reckless abandon, anyway. It was undignified for one who was on the way to become a force in the anarchist movement. My frivolity would only hurt the Cause. I grew furious at the impudent interference of the boy. I told him to mind his own business.  I was tired of having the Cause constantly thrown into my face . I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it. "I want freedom, the right to self-expression, every...

 They've created a cusp generation for us. Xennials. Also mentioned as the Oregon Trail Generation. We spent half our childhood with lessons about tech but not around daily tech and half with technology at our fingertips. We aren't typical GenX and we aren't as young as the typical Millennial... We are our own generation.My dad has a long-standing habit of making dense omelets filled with leftovers from the fridge which he flips once and cuts like pizza, and maintains that he has never in his life made a frittata. This is my issue with their supposed measure of inflation in the CPI. They exclude all sorts of things but you can easily see heavy inflation in anything that has any supply limitations at all. Computer parts are up like 100%+ for high demand things like GPUs-even five year old GTX 1070s and 1080s are worth about 300% what they were worth a year ago. Playstations, Xboxes, used cars, housing, etc. are all skyrocketing in price.