Journal Entry

Well, it is Easter Sunday morning when I was young this was a time of great excitement in our home. Mom would be up cooking breakfast the smell of bacon and eggs would be heavy in the air. She would fuss at us to get ready to go to church. We giggled with excitement as we rushed to put on our new clothes. We had spent the night decorating our Easter baskets with artificial flowers and greenery. The Easter egg hunt after morning service was one of the special events of year. The two of us were ruthless as we elbowed other children to get the eggs. Sometimes mom had to pull us aside and remind us we were pretty little girls not boys and to stop what we were doing.

Dad would get his paper from the porch sit and read it as he did every morning. Reading was stressed in our home as well as getting good grades, progressing from grade to grade in elementary school and eventually graduating from high school. Then off finally to college. No dropouts in this household! My mom graduated from high school back in the forties when a lot of black girls had to drop out do to not having money for new clothes or special events. She also went to vocational school and completed some college courses before starting a family.

Dad like many black men of his day dropped out of high school to help earn money for the family. He made sure we understood that education was important. Both my sister and I graduated from college and both of us took some additional courses to enhance our careers after we graduated. I miss those times however I know everything has its season.

Now as I grow older I set goals I feel I can live long enough to achieve. Right now I am researching my family history compiling hundreds of pages of information into large volumes with the help of a professional genealogist. I want to write a book from the volumes of compiled research someday. This has been very long, tedious and expensive journey. I pray I live long enough to complete it. When the pandemic is over I plan to take a break in the research and start writing the book.

There are two research libraries nearby and I plan a visit them to gather more information about Greene County, Alabama and my family. This will be my gift to the family especially younger members of our clan. I pray that it sells enough to recoup some of my investment. Of course as a writer I want to win one of the lofty prizes I fantasize about almost daily. Getting on the New Times Best Sellers list would be a good start and financially rewarding. If you can get on the list at #20 or above, you probably will have earned at least a million dollars. This would make for a very substantial retirement. I write almost daily now and I am getting better at my craft. Practice does make you better. It is a must to write well if you want to produce a piece of work that will be worthy to be on any best sellers list.

Since I did not focus on writing or literature while I was in high school or college I need to develop a personalized course of study now using YouTube videos, reading books about writing and other online resources to fill in the gaps in my education. No sense in feeling sorry or beating myself up about what I did not do in the past. What I do in my second act is extremely important to me.

As my hubby snores like a bear in our bedroom across the hall from my office I hear the birds chirping away through the window. Today it sounds like a chorus of sparrows, robins and those pretty blue birds are singing to each other. Some say in my religious community that they are making their form of salat Islamic worship to Allah (God). We are approaching the 10th month of the year Ramadan on the Islamic calendar. This is the time of the year that Muslims devote to reading the Quran and make salat (a form of worship) done in a precise manner making sure to perfect our worship making it more pleasing to Allah (God). We also fast. Our fast is a different from general fasting. We do not eat or drink from sun up to sunset.

Last fall I had a complete hysterectomy due to developing uterine fibroids. Only the second major surgery I have had in all my 66 years of life. Oh how fortunate I have been to be in such good health all these years. So many times I have taken my life and health for granted. I pray to Allah daily for his mercy upon me as I age. When I was young thinking about being in good health was not what I did.

Waking up daily fully present is truly a blessing that many do not get to enjoy. As I sit here and think about people who are in comas or have mental health issues I say a quick du’a (prayer) thanking Allah (God) for his mercy. I cannot imagine walking around in a fog or being in a bed motionless with tubes and machines performing the task that my organs should be performing. My hearing being inundated by the swoosh beep, beep, beep sounds that those monitors make 24/7.

After my surgery I had a small monitor attached to me that dispensed medication as well as kept tracked of my vitals. All night long the steady swoosh noise, mechanical knocking sounds were enough to keep me from sleeping.

As I sit here and my fingers bounce off the keyboard I reflect upon my life. My husband earns an income as a merchant. Buying and selling items people need and want. He is not a millionaire however he earns more than enough to keep a decent roof over our heads and food in the frig. We are blessed, so very, very blessed!