Day 41

We must heal our watermelon shame.

Back in the days when it was okay to make blatant, cruel fun of Black folks, we used to see images of ourselves grinning from ear to ear, eating fat, juicy slices of watermelon. This image was so cruelly used that today, when many of us see a watermelon, we go running in the opposite direction. Especially those among us who have achieved a level of economic status: "Watermelon? I eat kiwi and cantaloupe." How many of us have choked on watermelon? There's some deep collective pain there. This fruit is a symbol of this country's disrespect and mistreatment of us. It's too bad that the image-makers didn't pair us up with greasy fried chicken or coffee cake. Now that would have been a real public service. Those foods have done real damage to our hearts and thighs. And we would have been left in peace to eat our vitamin C-packed, nonfat, colon-cleansing watermelons.

I don't give a damn, I'll make my own rules!

Day 40

We be cool.--Gwendolyn Brooks

Black folks created "cool." Cool is so cool they named a cigarette after it. Black men's cool stares at you from icy, unblinking eyes that say, "I don't care." A Black woman's cool is simmering, with a hotbed of anger lurking just beneath. Her name is Sapphire. This Black woman wears a suit of armor that no one can penetrate. She goes off on folks like a firecracker and brags about it afterward. Truth is, Sapphire's shield is up because she is scared stiff of being hurt. She won't let anyone get close to her. Some of the toughest Sapphires around are overweight, using their weight as a shield. Like the Black man's machismo, Sapphire is a front for insecurity. At some point she must relinquish her simmering cool for real feelings.

Self-love cancels out all fear. Today I will allow my natural, smiling woman to shine through.

Day 39

Ain't I a woman? -- Sojourner Truth

What does it mean to be a Black woman of African descent living in America? Many of us latched onto the feminist movement of the sixties; others continue to cling to male-run religious systems. But when have we, as individuals and as a group, taken time to define our own identity? Apart from our roles as mother, wife, sister, daughter, worker, where do we fit in the universal scheme of things? Black women in America are in a state of psychological crisis. We have a twelve-in-one chance of marrying. We are, in great measure, overweight and unfit, and we lead the nation in heart disease, poverty, and a myriad of other ills. Who are we? Better yet, who should be we become? We are women of strength and beauty and tenacity, who are no less deserving of love and health than any other group on the planet.

I will not allow forces outside myself to define me. I will create the me that I want to be!