running cross my mind

it's that time of night.  when the sun has gone home to rest. the moon has come out to play.  you've been working all day.  perhaps out for a night with the girls.  but now you're inside.  home.  alone.  stripped down to your t-shirt and your panties.  crawled into bed.  pulled the covers way up over your head.  and waited for sleep to come. over take your body.  quiet your  thoughts.

of him.

you place the phone on the nightstand.  slide it as far away from your itching fingers as it will possibly go.  you could just turn it off.  or put it in the front room.  but what if someone tries to reach you?  what if someone dies in the middle of the night?  or has the irrepressible urge to hear your voice at 3 am?

like you long to hear his.

that's when the feeling comes on the strongest.

to grab it back.  scroll through the phone book.  select his name and start typing.

hey. how u? what ya doin?
i miss you.
u up?

and then you stare at the screen.  the words.  going over in your mind all the reasons why this is such a bad idea.  or all the ways that this might be just the thing to open up the lines of communication.

but "you know if you pick up that phone, write that letter, send that two way, you gon say some things" that you might regret.  and he might say somethings.  do somethings. plan somethings that you don't really really want to happen.  aren't trying to do.  but something is better than nothing right?  you just want to hear from him. talk to him.  see him. 

or he might not respond at all.  and then you're worse off than you were before you caved to your weaker inner woman.

cause you had said you wasn't gonna text/call/blackberry messenger/gchat/facebook his ass no mo.  and you meant that.  you promised yourself, your 3 best girfriends and baby Jesus himself that you were done.  that it wasn't worth it.  that it wasn't goin nowhere.  that it had been over for weeks, months, years. that you wasn't really feelin him like that to begin with.  so why pass the time or fill the space with something less than? 

and you can't go back on your word.

even if it's that time of the night.  and you're lonely.  and you want to so so badly.  and you could blame it on the alcohol and the hour.

but you can't
you won't
you don't

cause that would be too desparate.  a lil thirsty.  bold and brazen.  un-lady like.  out of order.  and against everything you promised yourself you wouldn't do.

so you reach out, place the phone back on the nightstand. breathe deeply.  close your eyes.  and let common sense quiet that voice inside your head.  let sleep overrule that part of you that wants to give in.

stay strong.  until tomorrow night.

cater to you

A friend and I have this running conversation about B&B's, that is bold and brazen (black) women. Ladies who claim him! After observing the aggressive tactics of another woman my friend wondered aloud whether she needed to start being so B&B: picking out a man, claiming him as the one, being ready willing and able to do things for him, generally catering to him cause every day is his day. I countered her query, suggesting that this particular woman's actions (buying opera tickets, saying he's the one for her) to my thinking were more like catering-lite and actively showing and stating interest, a step down from bold and brazen, albeit a tiny step. To me being B&B is self-explanatory: the woman boldy intiates the contact, doing things like asking for his number, calling first and brazenly goes after a man while he goes along passively for the ride until such time as he opens the door and jumps out while the car is still rollin. But with most things in life, there is a fine line between B&B activities and those that are not.

Case in point. During my training last week, one of my male colleagues got sick. While drinking at a local spot, he reached over and partook of some oysters from somebody else's plate. Unfortunately these oysters did not agree with his stomach and the next morning he was down for the count. He'd be throwing up, take a nap, try to eat, and throw up some more. So commenced a vicious cycle for the next 4-5 days.

Some time around day 3, his girlfriend of one month, upon hearing about his distressed state, came to the rescue. Without any prompting, she jumped in her ride and drove over to where the training was being held. Keep in mind that we were training 6 hours away from home and co-worker didn't know she was coming until she called him from the road. Homegirl swept in with groceries and proceeded to cook and clean and nurse her man back to health.

My friend chalked it up to the magnificence that is him. But I wondered.... Had I just witnessed a B&B sighting, wifey auditions if you will, before my very eyes or was this woman simply being considerate? On the one hand, they'd only been dating a month and 6 hours is a hell of a long way to drive to spoon feed some grown ass man crackers and gatorade. On the flip side, you only have one chance to make a first impression, to show yourself to be the concerned homemaker who will drive any distance and clean any surface in order to please her man. This is a quasi-extinct black male with an advanced degree, no kids, and a good head on his shoulders we’re talking about.

Me no know. It could go either way, right? But if you held a gun to my head and made me make a choice about whether this was B&B behavior or not, I'd say it wasn't although the length of the relationship would cause a raised eyebrow. My only concern is whether she did all this out of the goodness of her heart or because she thought it would get her brownie points. Does it really matter her motivation especially if he isn't aware of why she's there, only that she IS there, showing him that she's willing to be down for him. He said he thought it was nice of her and maybe somewhere in the back of his mind she gets a check in the "could be a good wife" column. So who cares what other people (read: women) think about her actions. Maybe some times B&B behavior is called for if you want to survive. I say just don't make it a habit.

What say you?