On: Staying In Your Lane
7:45 PM
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To quote a great, Cameroonian woman who is so privileged to informally call herself my mother, and formally goes by the name Marguerite, stay on your lane. I am unsure about just what was happening in the air this week but, my goodness, I am flummoxed at the rise in people's aversion to staying in their own lanes. I know some don't know when to listen to Jill Scott's advice and maybe just be quiet, and I know others are afraid of the sound of silence, but sometimes minding your business is the best business to have. Lord knows this devil of a windstorm plaguing the DMV has misaligned my own ~chakras~ (I bought and lit sage, so I'm basically a healing and wellness bird at the moment) for the past 10 hours, but that has yet to make me allergic to minding or finding some business.
Being witness to someone's sheer, unabashed display of opining subject upon subject at which they posses neither the range to hold the microphone nor sing on the track is one of the more perplexing side effects of social media if not most media. Having grown up part of a generation that is constantly taught the importance of using one's voice (which, as I've grown older begun to realize, much like everything else, has been a victim of reductive thinking that strips the ideal of any true meaning) has resulted in a sonic boom of both good and evil. A yin and yang that both over contextualizes and oversimplifies people, places and things. And being that there are those who get off on both the shame and reward of using their voice, there is constant regurgitation of the same, unimaginative thoughts based upon the faith that either reaction will garner attention. But, that's not the point of this post, is it?
One of my favorite Black Christian Auntie proverbs, as I loosely recall, follows this simple premise: idle hands are the Devil's playground.
Please stay in your lane and mind your business. Do not swerve out leaving behind obnoxiously large skid marks and damages for someone else to fix. I it does not apply, just let if fly; stay within the confines of your lane.
There are far too many bodies with voices, even the well-meaning ones, in far too many arenas wreaking havoc with their long throats and empty heads droning, ad nauseum, about things in which they know nothing about or are unqualified to present comment. Tiffany "New York" Pollard did not give us legendary quotes like, "you should've just sat there and ate your food" and, "you better shut your mouth and read that damn magazine, girl" in 2006/2007, just for us to ignore it. Please, in this big year of Rumi, Sir and Blue Ivy Carter 2018, let's make active effort towards reducing the act of inserting ourselves and our voices to narratives not meant for us. It is truly not everyday center yourself into dialogues and rooms you were never invited to enter.
If your commentary was not requested, TRYra Banks:
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Keep it very cute and mute.
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