V.

My best friend in this city is a gorgeous Chinese girl who makes too much money to be so directionless. At the age 24 she earns over a half a million dollars a year, and yet draws a blank when I ask her what she hopes to gain out of life. She’s impressed by the tranquility of my bedroom. The incense, natural lighting, and record spinning have lulled her into a drunken sleep. She is still wearing her BeBe party dress. Her 5-inch snake-skin heals are downstairs. Last night at the party they were in her hands. I wore combat boots and never complained of the pain like some of the other sexy girls. I see the muscles in her legs contract and extend and thinks she likens of a crippled giraffe. I told her that she is still binding her feet. She doesn’t think that’s very funny. She seems to hate everything about her Chinese heritage except her Grandmother and the food. She wants so badly to be White. I want so badly for her to love who she is.

There is not much I understand about the issues of a first-generation immigrant, raised by wealthy parents who physically strike their children... besides the sorrow I see in my dear friend’s eyes. She drinks herself into a stupor every weekend, maybe to make the sex with losers feel less terrible. At our weekly dinner date, every conversation starts with “so I met a guy.” I don’t hear much about that guy after 3 or 4 weeks. But she’s a princess. And she’s so special. And I cannot articulate how important she is to me. Still, she’s hurting. I watch her move on the dance floor while I wait to use the toilet. She’s scouting the room, sifting through the Whose-Who of our small town, trying to find the one man who will save her. What she doesn’t realize is that no one will. They may take her out to nice dinners and invite her to fancy parties, but the end goal is not to love, but rather to use her up. The rich and powerful under-40-somethings at this event have their choices of pretty dumb girls to fuck tonight and any other night. And we are beautiful and expendable. We are only here to entertain. All the time, effort, and money we invested into our careers and education have made us nothing more than  silly American Geishas. 

IV.

I had a crush on a boy with blonde hair and blue eyes, which made me uneasy. I know I should probably marry a White man, if only to enhance my biological fitness, but the idea of a life of such servitude make me sick to my stomach. Sexual selection and evolution suggest that the best fit male will provide for his offspring and unsure their survival until they reach sexual maturity, thus assuring the propagation of our genome. I know that the white man’s education and physical possessions are just as the male peacock’s brilliant feathers. It’s very attractive, but there is a high cost associated with such a display. If I married for the sake of my children and not my own heart, I would perpetuate the slave-master/slave-mistress motif. Even if I were successful in my career and highly respected, the White man would dominate. His power lies in his lineage’s superior capabilities of conquest and imperialism. I would rather marry someone with whom there is an equal playing field.

But marrying a Black man was a disaster. I wonder whether the Black man suffers greater than his female counterpart? The Black female feels cornered into a stereotypically gendered role, but the Black man has no role. Not beyond the buck, or the buffoon, or the neighborhood terror. Maybe he has been sexualized greater than I. He needs to be buff and work out to maintain his strong physique, or we question his sexual identity. His bravado requires him to participate in pathetic displays of territoriality and violence. He is lost. He fights to suppress his complex feelings of insignificance. The white man made the Black man dispensable. His family estranged. His masculinity mangled. Now he calls his woman a bitch, and desires nothing greater than the white woman’s approval. I have seen so many Black men cry.

Disproportionately Black men express feelings of confusion, anger, despair, and fear, compared to White males. Maybe I hear it because they trust me; I remind them of their mommas, their figure of safety. Maybe I attract Water signs that are intrinsically more emotional beings. Maybe Black males are just fucked up.

My husband used to cry all the time, especially when he wasn’t getting his way. It’s so sad to see a 25 year old child throw a temper tantrum. African-American males are in a state of arrested development. Neglected and left to fend for their own, never maturing emotionally from the trauma of the Hood or even the Suburbs. Where does he fit in? His is a tragic story, because he hurts no one worse than himself, despite his externally abusive behavior. To his surprise, all of his selfish endeavors backfire. And so he cries. He’ll be crying until the day he commits suicide.