5 Reasons Why I'm NOT Competing Against [White] Women

So…apparently anytime you mention the words black & white peoples panties get all knotted up. My guess is we all have some deeply rooted hidden toxins we need to purge from our systems. But guess what? Not today. The conversation, one sided as it was, revolved around relationships & some new black jerseys vs white jerseys phenomenon that I’m truly unaware of, with the exception of the media telling me it exists. Does that make it so? Not for me.

Competition, of any kind, for men, just doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. The reasons are as follows:

1. Competing for men turns men into the same trophies women have resisted being for the length of my memory at the least. I actually have male friends who married the “it” girl that ALL of their peers wanted, only to discover she was a bum. Many of those friends are in the process of trying to figure out how to escape the trophy cases they built for themselves or just stay away from home a great deal to keep from having to actually encounter the paperweight they married. I ain’t tryna live like that.

2. Making men the ultimate prize in a woman’s life serves to completely negate the value of her life without a man. Actually, now that I’ve said that, just like that, I’m thinking this shoulda been the 1st point. Perhaps it’s not supposed to be, but my life is enjoyable in the way it’s being lived currently—without a man. Would I make room for 1? The right 1, absolutely, but I ain’t pressed about the sitcheeation. I enjoy making moves without having to consider how they affect another. I actually have no qualms about sleeping alone. It doesn’t bother me at all that I can do what I want, when I want, & how I want. Are there times when I crave companionship? Absolutely. Am I willing to give it up just to be able to say I have any ol’ a man? Hell naw!! See, my parents effed around & actually taught me THIS woman’s worth. That makes it hard for these cats out here to run game on me & turn me into the aforementioned paperweight in point #1.

3. My other problem with supposed competition, especially with white women, is that I don’t see ANY woman as my competition. This ain’t cheerleading tryouts. I don’t see my own girlfriends as competition out here in these streets. I don’t know that I have 1 friend who has ever dug a dude I was with & I’ve NEVER dug a dude they were with. Easy, right? I’m not out here with a fishing rod trying to reel in the 1st seemingly available fish that swims by. You wouldn’t even be able to tell I love seafood by the number of fish I allow to swim by. I just realized how not straight that just sounded. You get what I’m sayin’ though.

4. I’m just too cocky to be out here bein’ told “no.” There are clearly times when I don’t get my way, but I’m tryna tell you this life is charmed more than those Tiffany bracelets. I understand the power of words & have to be careful what I speak into existence. There are times when I’m just playin’ & say something & then find myself stuck with some simp I wish would go play in someone else’s yard. Other times, things just take a little longer than I’d anticipated. Funny thing though—teaching has helped develop a sista’s patience. Any woman who can wait out a stubborn child can certainly wait out a man who is slow to come into what’s best for him. Like anything though, attention deficit is more than Wale’s album title & I just always hope I still give 2 dayumbs by the time he comes around. That doesn’t knock the truth that he eventually gets there.

5. Back to those cooky, zany parents I come from…well, my mama anyway. My mother has all but declared if the pickins get too slim in these United States she will surely farm her girls out to some other country that is predominantly Brown. I’m clear that there are more men than the 1’s I have access to in DC. Beyond that, the world’s a big place. If I could get past my hang-ups about black men from other cultures & religions, I have a wealth of other brown men at my passport fingertips. I could have had no less than 9 Senegalese husbands & 3 Guinean husbands. I have a Ghanaian who would proudly marry me off at the slightest hint that I’d be down for it. I have a thing for the Afro-Latino, though I’ve not personally experienced it. Don’t let me get over my personal hang-ups & find that I could African dance or Merengue through the rest of my life with wild abandon & expectation. I’m adaptable—I can just as easily learn to cook Yassa as I can arroz con habichuelas.

I said it before that sometimes I’m a little naïve, but mostly not. I tend to read AND listen in English. I pay attention to road signs, neon signs, & sign language. So far I’ve read nothing that says my options are in dire straights. I hope I haven’t ignored too much of this brush fire only to find later that my home is aflame. For now though, I feel pretty safe in continuing to live as I live, comfortable in my own skin but not adverse to the warmth of another’s. If any woman is in need of a black jersey, I’m not using mine…lemme know.

Watch me move.