This Way, Naturally

July 9th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

In middle school

I was such a fool

Thinking I needed the approval of those around me

I stayed inside

Wanted to hide

Til this one man found me

He said look at your legs

The shape of your hips

Your slender waist

The curl of your lips

Your a dime

In that moment in time

I realized the beauty I held

In high school they wanted breast

I couldn’t fill a bra

So I stuck to passing my test

Never went on dates

Found so much in myself to hate

Til this guy said look at your legs

The shape of your hips

Your slender waist

The curl of your lips

I realized nothing had changed

The way other people saw me stayed the same

The difference? The way I saw myself

The 12 Things The Negro Must Do For Himself (Updated)

July 7th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

In my About section, I have listed the 12 steps laid out by Nannie Helen Burroughs in the early 1900’s. Here they are the same 12 steps, just rewritten by me.

12 Things We Need To Do For Ourselves

1. WE MUST LEARN TO PRIORITIZE.

We can’t go out and buy a BMW before we first purchase a house. We can’t go out and buy our kids NIke’s and not invest in books and learning material. We can’t go out and buy Grey Goose and Hennessey when they are closing down community centers in our neighborhoods. “WE BUY THE THINGS WE WANT AND BEG FOR THE THINGS WE NEED.”

2. WE MUST LEARN SOMETHINGS ARE OUR RESPONSIBILITY

We as a people have always helped each other out. If you don’t have food, I’ll feed you the best I can. But if you won’t even try to feed yourself, why should anyone help you. Take a step and if you fall, I’ll catch you, but “Even God does not do for man what man can do for himself.”

3. WE MUST CLEAN UP OUR NEIGHBORHOODS

That means everything in them. The houses, the stores, the parks, and the people. Graffiti is beautiful sometimes, but mostly it brings down property value. When addicts and dealers consume parks and playgrounds, where do the children go. We must realize our personal value is directly connected to our community value, and if we want to advance we must take our communities with us. The standards we set for ourselves, will be those expected of us from others.

4. WE MUST DRESS APPROPRIATELY

First impressions mean everything, and you never know where your opportunity may present itself. If you are seriously seeking a career, dress appropriately all the time. You may be in a public setting and catch the attention of someone in a position of power. It’s common sense to know what is appropriate. You don’t wear halter tops and booty shorts to Chuck E. Cheese, or jeans and a t-shirt to court. Nor should you allow your children to wear clothes you feel are inappropriate because it helps them fit in. Teach them character.

5. WE MUST NOT BE AFRAID TO TELL PEOPLE WE LOVE THE LORD

Majority of us believe God is Real. We feel him in our souls, but that’s where we keep him. We go through our evolution, and we give God the Glory, but we don’t tell the little girls and little boys our stories. We walk past them and blow them off instead of taking two minutes to stop and tell them “God loves You, and no matter what is holding you down today, God will take it away if you ask him.”

6. WE MUST STOP TALKING ABOUT THE MAN

I could do this but I’ll let Booker T. Washington handle it. ” There is a class of colored people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs-partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs….There is a certain class of race-problem solvers who don’t want the patient to get well, because as long as the disease holds out they have not only an easy means of making a living, but also an easy medium through which to make themselves prominent before the public.” Why do we only see our so called leaders when something bad happens? No one told me I could be anything, they only told me if I try, somebody will stop me.

7. WE MUST STOP BMW (Bitching, Moaning, and Crying)

Nobody is going to stop you from making money for them. It’s that simple. Black is no longer the important color. The new color of significance in GREEN. If you make a company millions of dollars, they won’t care the color of your skin. Even if he doesn’t like black people, he will do what he has to do to keep you, because MONEY is more important. The major mistake we make is thinking we can do it alone. We try and fail and look for someone to blame. Did you reach out to other black people and ask them to invest? Giving them a sense of pride and ownership of something, and you a chance to see your dream fulfilled. Instead of complaining and making excuses, look around you for people like you and make the climb together.

8. WE MUST STOP EXPECTING A JOB

Don’t go to a job interview late, wearing baggy pants, and speaking broken English and expect to get a job. You wouldn’t hire you. Don’t get the job, call out in the first week, show up late three days the next week, and then tell your manager what your not going to do. You would fire you. Don’t go to work, talk about your other employees, have totally inappropriate conversations loudly, or break an attitude and show out. Realize whether it’s fair or not you are a representative of our race, and we have to change our image if we want more doors to open up to us. Make your habits so impeccable they can’t function without you.

9. WE MUST STOP ACTING A FOOL IN PUBLIC PLACES

Most of the time, I think most black people don’t want integration. If they did, they would realize it’s really a matter of standards. I don’t go to the movies at night time and it has nothing to do with the prices. I see GROWN black folks loud and obnoxious, cutting lines and cussing at attendants for no reason. There are no white people around, that’s how we act amongst ourselves. We all have to realize there is a time and place for everything. If you want to support our local businesses, go in and act like you have sense. Make it comfortable for other races to taste our food, see our clothes, listen to our music, and support us.

10. STOP LIMITING YOURSELF TO WHAT YOU SEE AROUND YOU

Just because the only black successful people you see play a sport, are surrounded by half naked women, or don’t reach out to you, that’s not your only resource. A success story is a success story. If you can’t find one that looks like you and succeeded in the dream you have, just look for one that succeeded. Don’t worry about color. You may find that just because they are a different color, they are still went through the same problems and pitfalls you’ll have to endure.

11. WE MUST NEVER FORGET WHERE WE CAME FROM

This is what ticks me off about Hip-Hop Artist that say it’s not there place to be role models. Especially those that spend money and give back to the community. Yes, the money will help, but listen to the message that comes with the money. You may not have wanted the position, but God gave it to you. He allowed you to live and to suffer through all the pain of your life, and then he put you out front to preach his message. Tell me I can make it out, but don’t tell me it requires me sitting on 22’s. Tell me it’s hard, tell me I’ve got to change my mind set. Jay-Z did it, and he’s successful. Kanye West, Common, they are doing it and making money, is it just that you can’t be creative enough to change the message and still draw people in. Maybe that’s your wake up call to check your skills, and make sure your records reflect your actual life.

12. WE MUST STOP BEING MORE RACIST THAN ANY OTHER GROUP

Chief Moose, from the Maryland Police, lead the search for the D.C. Sniper. He joined the police after college, with the intention of learning the crooked operations of the police, then become a lawyer and fighting against it. He never became a lawyer. We talk ourselves into hating the police, when we’re really more scared of the brothers on the corner than we are of the police. We don’t restrict ourselves from going to certain neighborhoods because we’re scared the police are going to mess with us. Yet when something happens to a brother, we all want to run to his aid, and stand up for him. So the white cops that put their life on the line to protect you, you spew them with hate and disgrace. And give comfort to people you know are wrong. That’s racism at it’s strongest. You know who’s selling the crack to the mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers of our communities. I know there are certain cases where there is police brutality, but you’ve been around that dude that said they wouldn’t take him without a fight, and you believed it when he said it. You know the ones that prey on 13 and 14 year old boys to get them started, and we stand up for them. Why? We give them excuses to believe it’s okay for them to go out and do the same stupid shit over and over again. Why? We call them square if they decide their not going to fall in and ruin their lives? Why? Then when they make it and come back to help, we attack them. They open businesses, we rob them. They open community center, we sell crack in front of them. Is there never a time when we all we have personal responsibility, with no one to blame for our short falls but ourselves?

Please Help! Barack Obama

June 30th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

With the Presidential campaign in full swing, it’s only right I get pissed off about something.

Barack Obama doesn’t want to be just another politician. I didn’t believe it when he said it, and everyday I believe it even less. John McCain has all this experience and a record of bipartisanship, but lacks the charisma of a garden snake. So what to do?

Barack Obama. Everyone knows your black. Even the white people who voted for you all over this country, they know you are black. So why do you show up at a black event and bring up race. Literally. I thought you didn’t want to be known as the black candidate. You had already won the Democratic Nomination, why then would you want to play the race card.

I want to like you. I’m trying. I loved the speech at one of those graduations, when you stood up and told fathers they need to play a greater role in their Children’s upbringing. I loved when you stood up and told graduates to go out and find a purpose instead of seeking out a hummer payment.

What I don’t understand? Number 1, wanting to pull out of Iraq. I haven’t heard anything about that in the news lately. Why? Because we’re winning. We are winning a war and the would be next president wants us to pull out. Only a real politician would change the message that got him elected when it no longer made sense. Oh wait any rational person would change their minds with differing circumstances. What makes a real politician, a presidential nominee that won’t acknowledge his own country’s success, because it would have a negative affect on his campaign.

Iraq, Jeremiah Wright, Trinity Church, time to go when you bring to much negative spotlight on Barack Obama.

Number 2, NO ENERGY POLICY. To hear a democrat tell it, we can get ourselves out of this oil crisis by taxing the oil companies. This is how I figure it. Imagine you invented a new drug to cure cancer. Now over the 15 years it took you to develop this technology, the government has been giving you tax breaks. Basically rewarding you for not really receiving a profit, because in the development phase your not making alot of money.

Your drug is approved and hits the market. It works. Everyone is cured and we live happily. Then there comes another kind of cancer, so you say, O.k. I got these tax breaks, so it won’t hurt the investors researching a new drug. Then along comes the government and says you have to solve this problem. We are going to repel all your tax breaks to help treat the sick people.

Why would you research a new drug? You would be like, people still pay for my first product. Why should I spend all this money, with no incentive. Oil companies have been investing billions of dollars in their companies, and now that their product is in high demand you hammer them with more taxes. Who would want to invest in a company they know will be paying a majority of their profits to the government.

And I have a question. Do the Caribou have to pay taxes for their trips across A.N.W.A.R? Is the cost of their food going up? Shouldn’t people care more about other people? It makes sense to drill where there is oil. To the critics that say we wouldn’t see that oil for at least ten years. That was the excuse over 12 years ago, when Bill Clinton signed the bill that made it illegal to drill of oil off our coast.

Then there’s the alternatives. Ethanol is eating up our food supply. Wind, solar, tidal, etc. are all years and years into the future. The most viable way to get off oil dependency lies in nuclear power, but yet again the democrats say No. The insurance companies say it’s not safe. You would think the trail lawyer democratic party would relish in the thought of suing the power plants, but I guess they draw the line at making policy that would matter.

In the life I’ve lived, you learn to see through bravado and look for substance. I just don’t see any substance in Barack Obama. The thought of him being in office, makes me not want to enter the next tax bracket. If he gets into office, it would probably be better to stay lower class and allow the government to take care of you. Because the harder you work and the more money you make, the more he’ll require you to give to those that don’t make as much.

So instead of having extra money to pay down your student loan, you will be paying for the tuition of someone that didn’t even try to compete for a scholarship. Instead of having extra money to save, you’ll be paying for insurance for someone that’s never worked a day in their life. Instead of having the money to put a down payment on a house, you will be bailing out the companies that robbed millions of people of their dream of homeownership. That’s scary.

I would like to think the harder I work, the more I should have, and the more I have, the more I can use to help people. People I really think need help. Working mothers that need help with childcare. College students that take lower paying jobs helping their communities, because their student loan is held for a year or two. Young people who study hard but have never had someone tell them they can go to college. Not because it’s free, but because you worked for it.

I want someone to write and tell me some substance of Barack Obama. Please help me.

RHIANNA VS BEYONCE: A GROWN WOMAN’S PERSPECTIVE

June 25th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

It’s a painful reality of life, we will all get our hearts broken once or twice. Not to sound like a rhyme, but it happens time to time. I’m kidding.

We women get a real difficult decision in those situations. We can go out like Beyonce and “Ring the Alarm” or we can be Rhianna and let him “Take a Bow” and go.

You have to understand what effect your response plays on a situation. Take Beyonce.

That’s how you feel when it first happens, but that’s when he or she still has control over you. You are so worried about how he’s spending his time, instead of healing yourself. That means if it doesn’t work out for you, you carry all that garbage with you to the next relationship.

Worst than that you allow the intruder know how much they hurt you. I love to show up happy and flossy, like I got gold mines in my living room. You feel better when you look good. You should concentrate of what somebody else it going to get, but it shouldn’t be the next female he plays. It should be the next man you decide to give your heart to.

Now this is the answer. Calm and cool, completely realizing it is their lost.

Even more than that, he or she will be standing there like no fussing or fighting. They would be shocked, because when they can get you to argue back you start to let down your defenses. Not to mention angry sex is awesome, and hard to turn away.

Beyonce’s performance speaks for itself. She is off the chain. When I first heard Ring the Alarm, I was like Hell Yeah. Then you flip through the channels and Court TV is headlining 3 trials where one spouse killed the other. Seriously. I got a little one and I be damned if I’m going to jail because you don’t know what you have.

I didn’t give Rhianna any props until this song. I stopped listening to the radio when “Umbrella” was in heavy rotation. It gave me a real bad mainstream song headache. Then she comes back and makes history. First artist to debut at #58 and make it to Number 1. Kudos.

So from a grown womans perspective. They are both beautiful. Beyonce is more successful right now, but Rhianna is quickly building a strong fan base. That means the choice will be ours. Not in which artist to like, but what approach to take.

Let’s see Beyonce ends her video in a police station and Rhianna ends hers with a smile of her face. Choice is yours.

Oh, let me cut you off. If you say that I should have compared “Irreplaceable” instead of “Ring the Alarm”, I refuse. I can have another you by tomorrow. Why would you want another him? Leave all your stuff in a box, for what? Take that shit. It’s your reward, I don’t want it. Except the car of course.

Hands from the Darkness

June 17th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

With darkness surrounding me, I try to climb

Willing myself, pushing already strained muscles,

Not expecting a hand to reach down and pull me up

Not expecting hands to reach from the darkness

And pull me back, but them come

Reaching out for my soul, forcing the load on my back

To double in weight

Shouts come, barely audible, but so loud

Understanding words, that make no sense combined

Understanding pain, so misdirected

What did I do so wrong?

I see bitterness and anger,

BUT I REFUSE TO MAKE THAT PLACE MY HOME

I see a way out

Light at the end of a road so dark

Sunshine piercing the night hues so common

No force beside gravity affects my ability to reach

Gravity can weigh me down

Problems will present themselves

But crumble at my WILL

Hands from the darkness are my biggest problem

Those that would block me by pulling me down

Instead of reaching up for themselves

Gladly would I fight for Pole Position

Never should I have to fight

Hands from the darkness to get to the light

Build A Network

June 17th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

Most times we look to family for insight. Even though they might not be the example you want to follow. The trick is to surround yourself with like-minded people.

Not people of the same color, religion, or political affiliation. People of the same character, moral values, and same desire to educate themselves and grow, financially and as a person.

“Ask advice only of your equals.” Danish Proverb

KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF OUR MUSIC

June 17th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

People have been using music to keep historical records forever. They write songs about the things going on around them, and those songs are taught to their children. They pass them on to their children, who inturn create new music about how things have changed.

So KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF OUR MUSIC.

As much as it pains me to say it, most of our current history is caught on CDS, Mixed Tapes, and battle raps on corners. It’s amazing to watch a young MC put his pain and achievement in a rap.

I don’t care what he is rapping about. I don’t care if it’s gun play, selling drugs, or women. Keep it on wax. Imagine a world where young black men used their words to solve issues instead of guns.

I don’t think the government could justify arresting young black men for throwing ideas and word play around. It’s alot easier to get the ones that shoot people, rob people, or sell drugs in real life.

The books that are published by us these days don’t get alot of attention. It’s not because white people are holding us down, it’s because we don’t spend money on books. Instead we buy the Cd, or download songs onto our Ipod.

Now I do the same, the difference? I utilize the public library. The problem with the library is you don’t find the opinions of those around you. I’m not talking about the college graduate, or the made it rich athlete.

I’m talking about the young men that turn into these…….

They may not know they are using similes, metaphors, iambic pentameter, and such, but they use it all. They display intellegence, quick thinking and response, and more than anything, hope, a future, a way out.

Not just in music. In thought. In sharing experinces, lessons, and humility. You know it’s nothing worse than losing a battle rap, but to have the courage to stand there and do it anyway. Take that swag into a job interview, mix it with correct english, and you got employeed men than can take care of their families.

Don’t try to restrict the message. We can pick out those that have no substance. They might get a one hit wonder, but we’re not going to spend money on those who aren’t real with us.

Now having said all that. I would like to offer a challenge to all hip hop’ers. Let’s see a message. Not what you have, or about those who tried to stop you. Tell us about how hard you worked to acheive your success.

What did you have to give up? What sacrifices did you make? What lessons did you have to learn more than once? Why can’t I do it, if you can?

And for the Hip Hop’ers that are up and coming, I ask, What is the first thing you’re going to buy? Will you spend all your money, before you have guaranteed long term success? Will you reinvest, and it doesn’t have to be alot, back into the communities that supported you, or will you spend it on women or men that wouldn’t have paid you a bit of attention when you were broke?

What about health insurance, retirement, and high yield savings accounts? Now I know you think those issues wouldn’t make a good song. That’s the thing. Our young ones are so smart, they can flip it into a song. How many different ways have you heard someone describe shooting in a song? Too many, but they always find new ways to do it.

Tupac said he wouldn’t be the one that changed the world, but he would spark the brain of the one who would. Listen to Tupac. He rapped about guns, drugs, sexual irresponsibility, but he is one of my favorite rappers. He talks about loving black woman and treating them right, he talks about how he won his murder trial because he was right, and he talks about how we hold each other down.

I’m waiting for that brain to come alive and to have his or her voice heard. That person is out there. And I’m waiting to hear it.

BARACK OBAMA TRYING TO FIRE BLACK LEADERS

June 13th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

With his successful campaign, without the support of “black Leaders”, Barack Obama has already started signing the pink slips of Al Sharpton, Rev. Jesse Jackson, and the rest.

Now, Al Sharpton can come out a publically make an ass out of himself accusing the Duke Lacrosse Team of Rape, but can’t give his support for the first black candidate to actually have a real chance of becoming president. Maybe a little jealousy you weren’t taken seriously?

Rev. Jesse Jackson was also silent in the big build up to history. Though Jackson’s image was damaged in the black community with his mistress and love child, the Media still hold him as a ‘black leader’. Where was he shouting Barack Obama’s praises?

I thought about it hard, and I figured it out.

Barack Obama is about to cause some major layoffs. He will ship the “there is some magic white man out to get you” jobs overseas never to return. How can they continue to attack a government about not caring, when the president is a black man?

Now we should have been the ones to run these so called ‘black leaders’ off the scene. Take Al Sharton. He was taped by the government trying to negotiate a drug deal. His defense, they were out to get me. Okay. He is constantly in trouble for not paying taxes, most recently before starting his 2004 campaign when investors paid his owed taxes to clean his resume. I have to pay taxes, what makes you better than me? More recent than that, he was promoting Loan Max. You know the company that charges ridiculous rates for car title loans. Yeah they prey on poor minorities, not just blacks, and Sharpton was their spokesperson.

Now Jackson did the damage to himself, and we judged him accordingly.

Now they see their careers going down the drain. If they don’t have the race card, their hand is weak. They can’t win. People will start to realize the boundaries they set are imaginary. There is nothing that can stop them. How are they going to survive when black people are succeeding and they can’t intimidate people into taking them seriously.

I don’t plan on voting for Barack Obama, but I am so proud that he won the nomination. I can’t back his platform, but I respect the amount of work he put into accomplishing his goal. He ran a campaign free of facts and still one, that takes some charisma.

Having said that. Barack Obama sign those pink slips and will personally walk around and hand them out. I mean it. I will personally hunt down all those who tell us we can’t because a white person will stop us. On my own dime, I will tell them, your services are no longer needed.

Then we could place ads for real black leaders to step up. You know the people of color that made millions of dollars last year. Our ads would read:

A GIRL CAN DREAM.

A Walk In Someone Elses Shoes

June 11th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

We love to complain about the things that affect us. But rarely do we look around to see how worse things could be.

We complain about being poor. When there are people who haven’t eaten a good meal in months. We complain about limited rights. When there are people who don’t have any. We complain about gas prices. When there are people who walk 20 miles to go to school.

Take a look at those around you and know you are blessed.

“Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.” Douglas Adams 1952-2001

Dear Mother

June 11th, 2008 | By Sonnie Johnson

Dear Mother,

I miss you. I wanted to think of something poetic, that would truly touch the heart of those who read this, but those who deal with loss know that’s enough. I miss you.

Our family affairs, I spend waiting for the moment you would walk through the door. You never come, I know better than to think that one day you will.

I dream about you, when my mind is cluttered and my soul isn’t as ease. These are the moments I need you most and you never let me down. You don’t come with words of sorrow, validating the feelings I have inside. You come with rage.

You tell me to move on, and to move forward. Even though you’re gone I still fear what will happen if I don’t obey. You did such a great job raising me. I was lucky enough to realize it before God called you home.

I know God loved his children. He even sends angels to watch over us. You were my angel. It was alot asking you to take in an infant when you had one son and a daughter on the way. You did it though.

I never once felt like I was anything other than your child. I got my share of snacks, two of the Klondike bars, I got my share of extra homework, believe if your teacher didn’t send any home you had some anyway, and I got my fair share of ass whoopins, I feel okay saying that cause I give them out now.

It wasn’t always easy, but we never saw you struggle. I know it had to be nights you wondered how you were going to go on, but there was only mornings of getting up and living. Nothing in life was worth sulking. It only required you keep moving forward.

You didn’t teach me politics, you taught me principles. You didn’t teach me economics, you taught me home to stretch a dollar til it popped. You didn’t teach me I could do anything, you dared me to say there was something I couldn’t do.

How do I thank you for that? If you were here you would give me that look that said how dare I ask such a question. Then I would’ve backed down. Now I would tell you, you were an angel, my Angel. I thank God everyday for you.

I miss you, but I’m not sad your gone. You told me, when all your children were gone you were going to disappear. We weren’t going to be able to find you. I laughed but I kinda knew it was true. You filled your blessing meter so high, so fast God had no choice but to allow you to rest.

I have to show the unselfishness you’ve always shown me. I want you to be at peace, watching over our family. Keeping us together when we don’t like each other that much. I

I could sit here all day telling you all the things you did for me, but that wouldn’t honor your memory. Instead, I’ll take care of me and mine. I’ll make sure I stand up and make my voice heard and my words count. I will raise my daughter to be better than me.

I’ll continue to move on. That’s how I’ll honor you.