"What's love? It's about us, it's about trust babe".

Hello Strangers or People I Know,

I have made it a goal to do two things. 1. Read my bible more through d365.org or the physical bible that I have at home. My heart has been drawing me to the book of Hebrews at home, but d365 is quick and allows me to organize my thoughts. I'm also going to finally download this app that I see on a friends snapchat all the time. It's called "eternal sunshine", and I promise not to delete the app in order to make more room for pictures. 2. I decided that I would blog more, because I need a healthy way to express my feelings and hear my own thoughts. I have chosen not to be sad and to try and be positive about my life choices and everything that's been going on. Writing my feelings and expressing myself if a great way to do it. I have learned that I don't enjoy talking about myself. I can talk about my friends and things going on in their lives, but I don't like talking about just me. What's going on with me or what I'm feeling. I guess that's partly, because I don't really focus on me. My life is just something I'm pushing through to get to the other side or a better place. The fact that there are only 6 more days of summer school after today makes everything better, because that has been a big cause of stress. I want my degree. It's important to me.

But I told you it's hard for me to worry about myself. The two things that have been heavy on my heart are my boyfriend and one of my friends. My boyfriend has been incarcerated for 48 days now. It is my hope and prayer that he comes home soon. It would be great if his release from jail was the answer to all of our problems, but it's not. I'm all in when I love someone and I truly believe that him and I are building a life together. We are trying to get careers (through school for me and finding a job for him) in order to eventually move in together, get married, and start a family. I don't know what his timeline is, but I see all of this coming together within the next 3 years. He doesn't get scared when we talk about marriage and commitment. The truth is that neither of us can imagine being apart. Even when we talk about the idea of him moving to Topeka or Kansas City, we both decide that its impossible. Yesterday, he ended up saying exactly what I was thinking. If he moves away, then one of us would have to commute to the other every night. We can't sleep without each other. Aside from this period of forced separation, we see each other every day. It's not a burden or something we do just to keep it going. We just love being together. But when he comes back, he has to navigate life after a felony. Most of us don't think about these things. I didn't know any of this before meeting him and trying to help him navigate everything. But having a felony excludes you from living in most apartment complexes and it makes finding a job extremely difficult. He's going to need a job to survive and pay for the legal costs hes accumulated. None of it is pretty. My role as a girlfriend is to just be there emotionally. I've enjoyed room hunting, because wherever he ends up is going to be somewhere where I spend a lot of time as well. I'm worried about how hard it will be for him to get settled, but hoping for the best. God doesn't close a door without opening a window, and like the rest of the world he forgives and looks past mistakes. God is full of second chances, and I believe that love between one another should be modeled after the love that God has for us. That being said, I'm willing to forgive my boyfriend not 7 times but 77 times. This doesn't include abuse or cheating or anything like that. But if he makes a mistake that sets him back, I don't think being there to help him get back up is a bad thing. Everyone needs love. Especially in tough times. So I'm constantly thinking of things that could go wrong or things ways that he could explain his criminal history to make things easier. He tells me not to worry about it and let him handle everything, but that's hard for me to do.

As for my friend, she has become my boyfriends arch nemesis. To be fair, he hates her a lot more than she hates him. He doesn't want me to be friends with her anymore and rightfully so. Most of my friends don't want to be friends with her either. They didn't like her from the beginning. She's the type of person that fights with a majority of the people in her life and has lost countless friends over the years. It's easy for her to cut ties with people. I'm upset with her, because I turned to her in my time of need. She wasn't there and she hurt my feelings. It matters, because I was already down. That was additional hurt that I did not need and couldn't handle. The fact that I don't open up much and actually tried to open up only to be shut out, sucked. She had a lot of excuses or reasons for why she acted the way she did. She had specifically asked me not to talk about my boyfriend. She said that that's because I was going through a phase where I made anything and everything about him. What she thinks of as a phase is something I think of as love. I was falling in love and she didn't want to hear about it. She didn't want me to have my moment. That's rude. When I mentioned the mean things she said, she said she was only speaking to me the way I speak to her. But I know for a fact, I don't speak to people that way. Yes, I've said that some men are a bad idea and even gone as far as saying I hate them, but I think it was for good reason. I was doing all this to prevent what ultimately happened from happening. Her listening to me would have been a good idea, but I still didn't hold it against her or say "I told you so" to her face like I could have. I feel like I've spent hours of my life listening to her talk about things and she says that she does the same for me, but I just don't think so. Yes, she'll listen to me talk about random things (celebrities, stories I read, religious stuff, and other random facts that live in my head). And there are times when shes listened to me talk about serious stuff like when I was going through all this family stuff. I just don't see it as the same. I feel like I'm a way better, more invested friend. And I'll never get that same friendship back. Overall, I've decided that that's okay with me. I decided that because this friend really needs a friend right now. And by right now, I mean for a long time after now too. She is going through something life changing. I've chosen to support her, but my boyfriend doesn't understand. He doesn't believe that anyone should hurt me or be rude to me. He thinks I need to stand up for myself, which I agree with. I just can't abandon a friend in need. I'm too need. God gave me too big a heart.

Song of the Day : What's Luv by Fat Joe ft. Ja-Rule and Ashanti (I was listening to this 2000s radio through Apple Music and found this song. I used to love it. It goes hard.)

Quote of the day: "You weren't always the person you are today, and thus, give others a chance to evolve as well. Before you judge, sympathize, and inspire" - Eternal Sunshine App

This app is already exactly what I need to hear. I feel like it's okay to sympathize with both my boyfriend and my friend during this time. I need to give them both a chance to evolve and have no right to assume that that won't happen.

"Oh, Darling Don't You Ever Grow Up"

So, either I'm depressed or my life is a pile of shit. It honestly might be both. If I had to pinpoint when I started feeling like I might actually be depressed I would say October/November of last year. Right around the time the African guy stopped talking to me. For those that don't understand depression, him dumping me did not make me depressed. I just started feeling gloomy and sleeping a lot during that time. I cried a lot as well. That hasn't stopped. I cry at least 2 times a week these days. It's usually a full on breakdown. Getting on birth control just made everything worse. More tears and more uncontrolled emotions. I also went through some family things in November with my parents. It was an uncomfortable situation,and it caused me to see them differently. No one wants to see their parents as less than perfect people, and the situation forced that to happen. They only people I talked to about all this were them, my aunt, and one other person. I went to counseling for awhile, but it was $15 a session and money was a big part of the life issues I was having. My sessions were productive, because I felt relief after but I also just cried a lot during those too. Ugly, snot filled tears. 

That's why for the first year in my life I didn't make my birthday a huge production. My parents and brother both had to work, I had a final, and I didn't want to be a burden to people. Going to events and keeping up with other peoples birthdays and events had started to feel like a burden to me, because of how down I was feeling. I didn't really have the energy to do for others, so I didn't want anyone to do for me either. My family went on the Atlanta trip over Christmas. That was nice. I enjoyed site seeing, but I still wasn't feeling 100%. It got to the point where my grandmother noticed it which broke my heart, because I want her thinking everything is okay. She has so much on her plate with everyone else, I didn't want her worrying about me too. The good (well not so good) news is that my cousin was feeling the same way. We got to talk about it on the trip and it was nice opening up. 

My aunt (who's not really my aunt but I love anyway) also came up and gave both of us a talk about life and love. I of course, had to hold back tears through the whole thing. That's a common theme through this entire thing. I just want to sit in a corner and cry. Her talk was about how now is the time to love and cherish our parents. They are lonely and going through a transition too. The transition from raising children to letting them fly on their own. It can be tough starting to not be in such good health and move closer and closer to retirement. She also told us about her dating life. You know you only ever think of your aunt as being with your uncle. It was funny hearing about the bad boys she dated. The one thing she emphasized is never bringing a man that you don't want to marry to meet your parents (I broke that rule and brought my very first boyfriend home, but it's okay because I want to marry him). For the first time in my life, an African, adult woman encouraged me to be promiscuous and figure out what's out there. What I like. She also emphasized finding a man that can take care of you financially, because life is hard. She said my uncle won at the end, because he could pay tuition after her family ran out of money. These aren't all glamorous things, but it was nice to hear the truth about life from someone who has been through it. The fairytale idea of life that people sell to you just hasn't been my experience. 

Failing out of school set me way back and I still feel like a failure for it. I've officially been in school five years. Starting the 6th in August, and it is absolutely exhausting. I'm tired of studying. I still have 3 years of pharmacy school to go and to be honest, I don't think I'm going to make it most days. It's just too much. It's even harder not having any money through all of this. This past semester I tired not working much and focusing on school. It failed, because not having any money just added to my unhappiness. Even when I wanted to do things to cheer myself up, I couldn't afford to. I felt ugly, because for the first time in a long time I couldn't afford to get my hair, nails, and eye brows down every six weeks or so. I gained weight, because eating is where I find joy. At this rate, I am well on my way to being on my six hundred pound life. 

On top of all this I was in a new relationship. That added stress and took it away. I experience real joy when I'm with my baby. He makes me happy and makes me feel less alone. We're just both at a rough place financially, so it makes starting a life together really difficult. Sometimes his problems on top of my own make me just want to explode. The cheery on top was the $113 speeding ticket I got today from a white cop who stopped both me and a white man. The white man was let go, but I had to pay a ticket. I will be in court to fight that, but I'm tired of court rooms after everything I've experienced with my boyfriend. I just want to sleep and cry, but I can't do any of that. Today's schedule is 9-11 class, 12-5 work, 6-9 class. It'll be 10 by the time I get home and eat dinner. Y'all know I'm not missing no meals. I'll shower watch a little tv and do it all over again. I don't want to do it all over again. I just want to try. 

"I Think You're Truly Something Special; Just What My Dreams Are Really Made Of"

Two days into the new year, I received this message on Facebook."Hey Mariam. It's A from the Ass Jams party, I don't know if I had disrespected you any last night, but I do truly apologize if I did. I was drunk, but that's no excuse. So I do apologize if I did disrespect you in any manner". I was really surprised by the message. 1. I was surprised, because this beautiful individual went out of his way to contact me. He didn't just say hey. He apologized even though he didn't know if he did anything wrong. 2. I hadn't texted him and that wasn't reason enough for him to give up. 3. He was able to find me on facebook! I have a name that no one can pronounce. He not only knows how to pronounce it, but he knew how to spell it. Issa husband! I accepted his friend request and assured him that he didn't do anything wrong. I told him that it did seem like he was interested in hooking up, but that wasn't what I was interested in. He said that he respects my decision not to hook up and just wants to spend time with me.

I told A that I don't drink or turn up and would probably bore him, and he said my favorite line. "It'll never be a dull moment with me". *insert apple heart eyes emoji here*. We continue to talk and he opens up about some serious things. He tells me about his brother that passed away and how his family hid the death from him at first. He also says that he would love to get together again. I told him that I like dates (girl code for take me on a date). It was a brand new year and I didn't want to back track on my search for love. 2016 was a year when I started going on actual, adult dates and I didn't want to back track from that. He mentioned he didn't know where anything in town was,s o I would have to help. Being the stubborn woman that I am, I didn't want to suggest anything. I wouldn't him to make the effort and find a place to take me. I also wanted to see what type of places are good to him and whether we like the same things. His first suggestion was a coffee shop. While a coffee shop date sounds very romantic, I don't drink coffee. I had to decide if I was going to tell him that or not. I decided to tell him that I was up for going but wouldn't drink any coffee. I was hoping for food and that's exactly what bae came through with on the second suggestion. Fuzzy's Tacos. A place I enjoy.

We ended up setting a time to meet and he smoothly tried to make the transition from Facebook messenger to regular texting. I sent a message to the number he gave me and got no response. Turns out that he put the wrong number in my phone while he was intoxicated. The number was one off. I told him that the number he gave me wasn't right and he gave me an updated one. I worried, because I wasn't going to be ready in time for our date. I still had to shower and do my hair which wasn't in great condition. It was a month into the weave, and it was starting to look bad. I told him that I was going to be late, and he told me to take my time. He wasn't ready either. I asked if he wanted me to start driving to meet him there and he told me to wait for him to call. This was AMA being AMA. He likes being in control. Not in a bad way, but in the way I've been looking for my entire life. I want a man that will lead, and he does that in our relationship.

The first date was amazing. I parked my car right next to fuzzy's. A was waiting in front of the restaurant for me. I like that he hadn't walked in before me. He was a gentlemen. He was wearing a black sweatshirt and khaki pants. He smelled delicious. What I thought was cologne was actually blunt effects to hide the fact that he had just smoked. I gave him a hug, he held the door open for me, and we walked in. I knew exactly what I wanted to order, because it was the second day of the new year and I was still counting calories (we all know that didn't last long). He ordered something that involved a pig and beans. I knew it would be gross, but I let him get it anyways. He ended up being pretty disappointed with his food and mentioned how mine looked amazing. The food wasn't the focus though. The focus was that in that moment we knew we found something special. We opened up and talked about a lot of different things. He gave me an unedited version of his past. He made fun of me for getting food all over my face and handed me napkins to wipe it off. I told him in a letter that that moment makes me think that he was taking care of me from the very beginning. He agreed and said he only makes fun of me about missing my face, because he thinks its cute. I could end this right here my friends. That's love. Loving someone for their imperfections. But the story doesn't end here.

After the date we walked outside to my car. He had walked to Fuzzy's from his sisters house. It was cold outside, but we still wanted to talk. We were standing incredibly close to each other the entire time. Lots of kissing and rubbing was happening. This went on for quite awhile and we were enjoying every moment. He pointed out how comfortable I was with him which made me notice that all my guards were down. I was 100% in the moment. That's when he asked me to be his girlfriend. I reminded him that we had just finished our first date and we didn't know each other. He insisted that he told me everything on the date and he can tell the kind of person I am, so what is there to know? I still said no, because committing after the first date is crazy talk. He asked a second time, and I said no. I knew that I liked him, but I was stuck on the fact that it was too soon. We eventually got in the car, so that I could drop him off. We parked outside of his sister's house, but not right in front because we didn't want them to see us. He asked a third time, if I was going to be his girl. This time or the time before he had added in a story. He said that his grandmother told him that when you like someone, there's no point in waiting. He has an uncle who was engaged for a really long time and they didn't get married. His grandmother said they didn't get married, because they didn't want to be together. Two people that want to be together do just that. They are together. That story really resonated, and this time I said yes. On three conditions. 1. He has to realize that I'm in school and that's a priority. 2. I probably wasn't going to give up the V card (out the window). 3. He had to quit smoking. I told him to throw what he wad smoking out the door right then and there. He told me that that would be a bad financial decision and as soon as he finishes smoking what he has, he'll be done. That one was out the window too. He never actually quit smoking. But we did fall in love. And for about 3 blissful days we were a normal couple. Young and in love. We both were working and making more money than usual. We were in a good place. That was before the police called his place of employment and said there was a warrant for his arrest....dun dun duuuuuun.