Health Care Reform

I'm not a political blogger, but I couldn't very well allow the passage of the 1st Healthcare Reform Bill for the United States to occur without comment.On Monday morning, as I slowly came out of my sleep, the first thing I did was power on my iPhone to my email inbox and the first message was about the passage of the bill. I remember thinking, "Ok, cool." No big deal. Then I tuned into the news and immediatley learned how big of a deal it was. As of today, members of Congress have received threats against their lives in the form of phone calls, bricks being thrown through their windows. The brother of one Congressman--his address posted on a healthcare opposer's website-- even had a gas line to his home cut. This stuff is getting SERIOUS! I can't believe this hoopla is over such a humane effort as providing healthcare to ALL Americans. Of all the things we taxpayers have to pay for, healthcare for ALL Americans is one I'll gladly see come out of my paycheck.

Yesterday I almost suffered a relapse. If you've read any of my most recent posts you'll know that I recently decided to pull back from being a total DIY'er. I've signed up to have my certified Sisterloctian cousin begin maintaining my locs, my licensed esthetician cousin maintain my eyebrows, and a friend's nail technician perform my manicures & pedicures. Right?

Well, yesterday was my second appointment for my loc tightening. I set the appointment a week and a half ago, believing that Friday was the perfect day because it is the least likely day of the week that I have something to do. Long story short, this particular Friday didn't hold true to my rationale. The night before the appointment I learned that an activity that I really wanted to attend was happening the night of my evening appointment and my daughter had band practice after school, which would run directly in the middle of my hair appointment. Thing is, the new way that I'm having my locs maintained takes much longer than my twisting my locs. So, I was like immediately in a dilemma. My hair really couldn't stand being put on hold another week or two--well, it could have, BUT, I really didn't want it to. Also, the timing of my appointment and the time that my daughter would be finished practicing was in direct conflict. When I realized I was having all of these issues, I was trying to get in touch with my cousin to see how she could accomodate my needs HOWEVER I could not in touch with her. She wasn't answering her cell phone, house phone, or responding to my text. Naturally, the thought that kept floating around inside of my head was that none of this would be an issue if I was maintaining my own hair as I had been!!! As I frantically kept trying to reach my cousin, I fought those thoughts out of my head because I knew I made the right decision to stop relying on myself for everything. I DESERVED to have regular pampering sessions.

At the end of the day, everything worked out perfectly. I managed to reach my cousin, reschedule my appointment for earlier in the day--using some personal time off work, but it was worth it. My daughter's practice was cancelled and luckiliy my sister was in route from her job and was able to pick my daughter up on her way home. The earlier appointment time enabled me to be done much earlier than intended so I was able to attend that activity AND had a great time. Regardless of how well things worked out this time, my busy lifestyle is definitely indicative that this will not be the last time I will encounter such a schedule conflict. I'll just have to find a way to work around it then, too.

Yes, I am EVERY woman!

It took a long-standing good friend of mine to remind me of this fact--that I am every woman! I am a mother, I am a daughter, I am a sister, I am a neice, I am a cousin, I am a friend, I am a best friend, I am an employee, I am a author, I am a financial planner, I am a homemaker, I am a romantic partner...As you can see this list could go on and on. Sometimes it takes someone on the outside looking in to remind us of how extraordinary w are!

TTYL, L.A. Jefferson

Take That, Chase!

I had to change my post because my payday has come & gone and I'm experiencing a different kind of joy from what I was going to post a few days ago. Before I was excited about what I'd planned to do. Today, I'm excited about what I've done. You see, I'm in a battle with my debt--one creditor in particular--JP Morgan Chase. Sometime in January, they sent me a warning letter that they were raising my interest rate to a astronomical rate of 29.99% Crazy, right? According to them, since I had paid them a few days late on two different occasions within a six month period, my punishment was a drastic decrease to my credit limit (by over 50%) and increasing my interest rate. Lucky for me, they gave me 2 billing cycles to adjust my budget for the seriously increased monthly payment. NOT! Well, if JP knew anything about me, they'd know I had absolutely NO intentions of allowing them to practically rob me. So what'd I do??? Without having to rob Pete to pay JP, I dipped into my special savings and put a hunk of cash on my balance. That was two weeks ago. Then when I got paid last Friday, I put 90% of my net pay towards the balance too! "Ha! Take that Chase!" I wish I could see the look on somebody's face with their organization when my balance decreased by nearly 50%. I've been struggling to get credit card debt free for over 10 years. Thank God,  I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Our Family Wedding

Loved it, loved it, loved it! Sure it was another remake of Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, this time, featuring an African American man and a Mexican American woman. But it was still great. A wonderful celebration of brown skinned love! I loved Forest Whittaker's as the sexy, womanizing, single-father. I know I was byfar not the only person leaving the theater with love and marriage on my mind! Although I married the same man twice (more to come of that story in my 2nd novel Reconciliation to Hell), I never had the experience of the excitement of planning a wedding. Thank God I don't have a drama-hungry family so when I do plan my wedding, it will really be a joyful time. My previous marriage made me realize how important it is to REALLY celebrate the beginning of the marriage with a beautiful wedding, reception, and honeymoon because once that part is over, the REAL work begins.

Til next time,

L.A. Jefferson

An Important Note to Self

In church today I was really trying to focus on why I was there, but something really bothersome kept pulling my attention away. There was a young lady there who had a baby somewhere between 6-9 months ago AND her belly was smaller than mine! And I'm almost sure that she didn't come out of the hospital exercising and doing crunches! She was just blessed with better skin elasticity than me. While this distubrs me greatly, I'm learning to not focus on things that I have no control over and work on the things I do have control over--myself and what I put into and do with my body. So, right now I'm kind of bummed about the box of girl scout cookies that I ate today :( but I'm looking forward to the 100 jumping jacks, 5 minutes of running in place, and 20 push ups that I'll do before bed tonight.

One of my good friends often tells me of what one of her cousins tells her often. And that is that she MUST exercise everyday and watch her food intake to control her weight because she knows her body. She can't compare herself to others and that's how I need to be.

So note to self, "No more getting down about other women's small stomachs. And most important, you are beautiful AND sexy with a beautiful curvaceous body even with curves where you might not want them. You're just one hot mama!"

All Things Will Work for my Good

In this real estate market everybody and their mama has housing on their minds. Whether it's buying a first home, buying an investment property, trying to short sale ones current home in hopes of buying a better, but cheaper home, or, unfortunately, losing a home to foreclosure. No matter the situation, I've come to the understanding that if whatever you're hoping for to happen doesn't seem to be working out how you want it, you must know that God is going to work it out for your good. That is what HIS word says and I BELIEVE it!

I currently already own a home. When I purchased it almost 10 yrs ago it was perfect for myself and my daughter. Now I have a son too and would love another bedroom. Notice I didn't say need??? It's important to REALLY know the difference between wants and needs when making big decisions. Yes, a huge part of me feels that I need a 3BR home. Then there's another part of me that feels the need for the bigger home that I want is not worth the consequences of foreclosure or bankruptcy. I've worked too hard over the years to keep good credit to destroy it--even just for a few years--because I want what I want. It's important for me to do things the RIGHT way as much as possible. This is something that I've had to think long & hard about AND be prayerful about as well.

What I keep being led to realize is that, as unfortunate as it is for what I want, I am simply not in a financial situation to buy the bigger house that I want while I still own the one that I live in. But you know what? I AM in a financial situation to do some other things that I have on my plate. Those include remodeling my basement, decreasing my debt, increasing my savings, taking my children on a spring vacation, and promoting my self-published book, Unfinished Business.

How you view your circumstances is all about your attitude. Even when things aren't going the way you think they should, God may have something totally different in my mind for you. My advice is to make the best of whatever situation you're in and give God the glory!

Temporary Insanity

I take back everything back that I said in my previous post. And from here on in, whenever I feel frustrated about my locs instead of considering taking them out I'm simply going to make a quick stop to YouTube and check out some loc styling tutorials because that's usually what my problem is. As much as I love not HAVING to do something to my hair every morning, I still get tired of looking at the same 'ole same 'ole day in and day out. And what changes that besides styling options??? The thing with being still kind of new in this loc journey I have to get more creative with styling since I can no longer clip on a phony ponytail or pay the African hair braiders a billion gazillion dollars for some zillions.

So anyhow, the day after I posted my frustrations I was checking out YouTube and I was immediately rejuvenateda about my locs.