LIBRA, July 11
Mix business with pleasure and be creative in your approach to projects. You need to do a few things for yourself. Get out and get involved in some of those hobbies you enjoy. You need an outlet for your stress. You can make new friends if you do a bit of traveling. You'd better finish off those domestic chores you've left undone.
Oh, my boss is out today and I have been trained by the person that I am replacing, her name is Jessica. The only thing is that she has taken a half day today, so I am here all alone for the first time. I am sort of nervous about it, but I think that she has done a tremendous job training me, and anything that comes along that I don't know, I can certainly ask any number of people. That's the thing about a new job, it's all the stuff that they DON'T tell you that always comes up. Anyway. I got some medicine last night for this damm rash that I seemed to have gotten. The doctor told me that it most definitely was an allergic reaction to something....although I can't fathom what possibly it could be....who knows? The medicine is wonderful, and it works brilliantly. It still itches a little bit, but not half as bad as it did. Thank god, I was going through some horrible nights, not being able to sleep because I was itching so bad, it felt like my skin was going to come off of my bones, I was scratching so much. But it's a million times better. Thank you doctor! This is an article that I read, it's only an excerpt, but you get the idea. It's Oprah interviewing Maya Angelou, who I just adore. She's still rockin in her seventies. Read and enjoy it!
You can find this article in full in the December issue of O.
Since the moment I opened I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, I've felt deeply connected to Maya Angelou. With each page, her life seemed to mirror mine: In her early years she was raised by her grandmother in the South; as a young girl she was raped; and, like me, she grew up reciting what the church folks called little pieces—a few lines from the Bible that were usually delivered amid shouts and amens from the women fanning themselves in the front pews. Meeting Maya on those pages was like meeting myself in full. For the first time, as a young black girl, my experience was validated.
And it still is, only now I sit at Maya's feet, beside her fireplace, hardly believing that, years after reading Caged Bird, she is my mentor and close friend. When we met in Baltimore more than 20 years ago, our bond was immediate. We talked as if we had known each other our entire lives; and throughout my twenties and in the years beyond, Maya brought clarity to my life lessons. Now we have what I call a mother-sister-friend relationship. She's the woman who can share my triumphs, chide me with hard truth and soothe me with words of comfort when I call her in my deepest pain.
She speaks of what she knows. Born in St. Louis in 1928, Maya moved to rural Stamps, Arkansas, to be with her grandmother after her parents split. When she went back to St. Louis in the mid-1930s, her mother's boyfriend stole her virginity. In the aftermath of that trauma, 8-year-old Maya became mute and rarely opened her mouth to speak for several years. At 17 she had her only child, Guy. A few years later, when her grandmother died, the grief sent her reeling. It was then that she gave herself what one might call a Maya manifesto: She would live—fully.
Today Maya is a kind of quintessential Everywoman: essayist, entertainer, activist, poet, professor, film director and mother—and she recently guest conducted the Boston Pops simply because she felt like it. She has written more than 20 books, and she once had three titles—Caged Bird, The Heart of a Woman and Even the Stars Looked Lonesome—on The New York Times best-seller list simultaneously for six consecutive weeks. In 1993 she became the first poet since Robert Frost in 1961 to write and recite a poem at a presidential inaugural ceremony.
When I am with Maya, unimportant matters melt away—her presence feels like a warm bath after an exhausting day. In our hours together, we can set aside all pretensions and just be: two women barefoot in a living room, sharing the most intimate parts of our lives.
OPRAH: The big question I have for you is this: Where did your confidence come from? I've never seen anybody who exudes more confidence than you, and I don't mean false, modest bravado, but from the inside out, you've got the stuff.
MAYA ANGELOU: There are so many gifts, so many blessings, so many sources that I can't say any one thing—unless that one thing is love. By love I don't mean indulgence. I do not mean sentimentality. And in this instance, I don't even mean romance. I mean that condition that allowed humans to dream of God. To make it. To imagine golden roads. That condition that allowed the "dumb" to write spirituals and Russian songs and Irish lilts. That is love, and it's so much larger than anything I can conceive. It may be the element that keeps the stars in the firmament. And that love, and its many ways of coming into my life, has given me a great deal of confidence about life.
O: So when you hear someone being modest....
MA: I run like hell. The minute you say to a singer, "Would you sing?" and they say, "Oh, no. I can't sing here," I say, "Oops! I wonder, where is that train to Bangkok?"
O: Because?
MA: Because that person is not reliable. She may not know it, but modesty speaks volumes about falseness.
O: Pretending.
MA: Lying.
O: I once heard you say, "If you want to liberate someone, love them."
MA: That's it. Not be in love with them—that's dangerous. If you're in love with your children, you're in their lives all the time. Leave them alone! Let them grow and make some mistakes. Tell them, "You can come home. My arms are here—and my mouth is too." Tell them, "I'm going to leave you alone. You want to listen to rock and rap? Well, I think it's stupid, but help yourself." When you really love them, you don't want to possess them. You don't say, "I love you and I want you here with me." Naturally, if you love somebody, you do want to see their face every now and again, but that's not a condition of your love. People often get possession mixed up with love, and they say, "If you really loved me, you would call me." How—when life is going on? I think of you all the time, and the thought of you always lifts my spirits. But I'm not right at the phone!
O: Have you been able to manage that kind of love even in romance?
MA: It's hard, but I do it—and I don't know how. When I love somebody, I like him to be around; I like him to take me out to dinner; I like to look at the sunset with him. But if not, I love him and I hope he's looking at the same sun I am. Loving someone liberates the lover as well as the beloved. And that kind of love comes with age. Some of this wisdom came to me after I was 50 or 60.
O: What's the best age?
MA: Seventy-two! The seventies are hot.
I am enjoying this time alone at my job, it gives me a sense of how it's going to be for the next couple of months. There is alot of responsibility, and I have to report to a number of people in this arena, so I'll be accountable to many, which I like. The person who I am most accountable to, is David Courtney. He is my immediate supervisor, and the director of Data Management. I will update more often now that I get a chance to be online, but I can't spend too much time online, that wouldn't reflect well on me....especially with this new job. I put this nifty little time clock on here, so you can compare when I updated this page, to what the current date is!! Check it out!
Mix business with pleasure and be creative in your approach to projects. You need to do a few things for yourself. Get out and get involved in some of those hobbies you enjoy. You need an outlet for your stress. You can make new friends if you do a bit of traveling. You'd better finish off those domestic chores you've left undone.
Oh, my boss is out today and I have been trained by the person that I am replacing, her name is Jessica. The only thing is that she has taken a half day today, so I am here all alone for the first time. I am sort of nervous about it, but I think that she has done a tremendous job training me, and anything that comes along that I don't know, I can certainly ask any number of people. That's the thing about a new job, it's all the stuff that they DON'T tell you that always comes up. Anyway. I got some medicine last night for this damm rash that I seemed to have gotten. The doctor told me that it most definitely was an allergic reaction to something....although I can't fathom what possibly it could be....who knows? The medicine is wonderful, and it works brilliantly. It still itches a little bit, but not half as bad as it did. Thank god, I was going through some horrible nights, not being able to sleep because I was itching so bad, it felt like my skin was going to come off of my bones, I was scratching so much. But it's a million times better. Thank you doctor! This is an article that I read, it's only an excerpt, but you get the idea. It's Oprah interviewing Maya Angelou, who I just adore. She's still rockin in her seventies. Read and enjoy it!
You can find this article in full in the December issue of O.
Since the moment I opened I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, I've felt deeply connected to Maya Angelou. With each page, her life seemed to mirror mine: In her early years she was raised by her grandmother in the South; as a young girl she was raped; and, like me, she grew up reciting what the church folks called little pieces—a few lines from the Bible that were usually delivered amid shouts and amens from the women fanning themselves in the front pews. Meeting Maya on those pages was like meeting myself in full. For the first time, as a young black girl, my experience was validated.
And it still is, only now I sit at Maya's feet, beside her fireplace, hardly believing that, years after reading Caged Bird, she is my mentor and close friend. When we met in Baltimore more than 20 years ago, our bond was immediate. We talked as if we had known each other our entire lives; and throughout my twenties and in the years beyond, Maya brought clarity to my life lessons. Now we have what I call a mother-sister-friend relationship. She's the woman who can share my triumphs, chide me with hard truth and soothe me with words of comfort when I call her in my deepest pain.
She speaks of what she knows. Born in St. Louis in 1928, Maya moved to rural Stamps, Arkansas, to be with her grandmother after her parents split. When she went back to St. Louis in the mid-1930s, her mother's boyfriend stole her virginity. In the aftermath of that trauma, 8-year-old Maya became mute and rarely opened her mouth to speak for several years. At 17 she had her only child, Guy. A few years later, when her grandmother died, the grief sent her reeling. It was then that she gave herself what one might call a Maya manifesto: She would live—fully.
Today Maya is a kind of quintessential Everywoman: essayist, entertainer, activist, poet, professor, film director and mother—and she recently guest conducted the Boston Pops simply because she felt like it. She has written more than 20 books, and she once had three titles—Caged Bird, The Heart of a Woman and Even the Stars Looked Lonesome—on The New York Times best-seller list simultaneously for six consecutive weeks. In 1993 she became the first poet since Robert Frost in 1961 to write and recite a poem at a presidential inaugural ceremony.
When I am with Maya, unimportant matters melt away—her presence feels like a warm bath after an exhausting day. In our hours together, we can set aside all pretensions and just be: two women barefoot in a living room, sharing the most intimate parts of our lives.
OPRAH: The big question I have for you is this: Where did your confidence come from? I've never seen anybody who exudes more confidence than you, and I don't mean false, modest bravado, but from the inside out, you've got the stuff.
MAYA ANGELOU: There are so many gifts, so many blessings, so many sources that I can't say any one thing—unless that one thing is love. By love I don't mean indulgence. I do not mean sentimentality. And in this instance, I don't even mean romance. I mean that condition that allowed humans to dream of God. To make it. To imagine golden roads. That condition that allowed the "dumb" to write spirituals and Russian songs and Irish lilts. That is love, and it's so much larger than anything I can conceive. It may be the element that keeps the stars in the firmament. And that love, and its many ways of coming into my life, has given me a great deal of confidence about life.
O: So when you hear someone being modest....
MA: I run like hell. The minute you say to a singer, "Would you sing?" and they say, "Oh, no. I can't sing here," I say, "Oops! I wonder, where is that train to Bangkok?"
O: Because?
MA: Because that person is not reliable. She may not know it, but modesty speaks volumes about falseness.
O: Pretending.
MA: Lying.
O: I once heard you say, "If you want to liberate someone, love them."
MA: That's it. Not be in love with them—that's dangerous. If you're in love with your children, you're in their lives all the time. Leave them alone! Let them grow and make some mistakes. Tell them, "You can come home. My arms are here—and my mouth is too." Tell them, "I'm going to leave you alone. You want to listen to rock and rap? Well, I think it's stupid, but help yourself." When you really love them, you don't want to possess them. You don't say, "I love you and I want you here with me." Naturally, if you love somebody, you do want to see their face every now and again, but that's not a condition of your love. People often get possession mixed up with love, and they say, "If you really loved me, you would call me." How—when life is going on? I think of you all the time, and the thought of you always lifts my spirits. But I'm not right at the phone!
O: Have you been able to manage that kind of love even in romance?
MA: It's hard, but I do it—and I don't know how. When I love somebody, I like him to be around; I like him to take me out to dinner; I like to look at the sunset with him. But if not, I love him and I hope he's looking at the same sun I am. Loving someone liberates the lover as well as the beloved. And that kind of love comes with age. Some of this wisdom came to me after I was 50 or 60.
O: What's the best age?
MA: Seventy-two! The seventies are hot.
I am enjoying this time alone at my job, it gives me a sense of how it's going to be for the next couple of months. There is alot of responsibility, and I have to report to a number of people in this arena, so I'll be accountable to many, which I like. The person who I am most accountable to, is David Courtney. He is my immediate supervisor, and the director of Data Management. I will update more often now that I get a chance to be online, but I can't spend too much time online, that wouldn't reflect well on me....especially with this new job. I put this nifty little time clock on here, so you can compare when I updated this page, to what the current date is!! Check it out!
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