Three pages after I wake Sun-Dec-20 (4)

The safest place to hide things from anyone is a book, because most people don’t read, and most people wont read anything a page long if they aren’t grabbed by the first three sentences or are already interested in what they are reading. That explains why I write and say some of the things I do, with little fear of backlash. Though I suppose once I…

I have found the right music to help me write some thoughts I usually keep locked away, share some things I usually only confide in with my closest confidant. The reason is because failure is such a shame, and more than anything I don’t want to look back on my twenties as the time I was a reckless dreamer. I am staring at the cover for a reason, and that is to give me confidence to continue on with what I want to get out in the open. It is scary to see something so vividly and then have to realize that you were only fooling yourself. How could I ever trust myself again. The first time was love…

I have dreams at night that I cant let go, and I know before I go on into further detail that this makes me seem like a crazy person and that’s all fine and well I have long accepted that fact. As I have been told I do a lot of preamble so I’ll stop and get on with it.

I had a dream so real that it made me sad to wake up to reality. I was in a music studio, sitting in front of a beautiful women who was singing in the booth. I saw the woman, but I didn’t see her. I saw that she was beautiful, I knew that I was awe struck by her and her singing, and I knew in my heart that song she was singing was written by me and was being sung to me, as the beautiful woman was looking and smiling right at me. I feel the glare of people behind me though I did not see them, I could feel the heat of their eyes on my back, but me and the beautiful woman kept looking at each other. In my dream I saw myself getting up, and walking into the booth with her showing her what I had written on a piece of paper, she smiled nodded and kept on singing as I walked back out the booth. The dream ended almost as if the whole thing was a movie and the ‘camera’ slowly panned from behind me to a high corner in the studio and all I could hear was the song of the beautiful woman, though to this day I do not know the words even though I know I heard and wrote the complete song in that dream.

I make no guesses as to what that dream means, if it is a sign of things to come, or if its just a by product of random assortment of things I saw and thought about the day before. I can only hope that is a omen. This brings me to the subject of Rihanna. I have never admitted this, because as I said before it makes me sound even more mentally unstable than I know I already seem. But damn the appearances!

I became aware of Rihanna around the same time most Americans did, with the song umbrella, though I unknowingly had heard her songs and voice before that. When I first heard the song I didn’t really care for it, as I don’t care for most music I hear on the radio, but when I sat down and watched the video, I guess maybe it was the smile, maybe it was her singing accent, maybe it was something else all together but I was taken by her. I am not so naïve to call it love. I don’t even know the woman any more than the next man that has only read about her in articles or seen her in music video’s. I cant even claim to have gone out of my way to know about her. All I know is that when I look at her pictures or listen to her songs I feel as if I should be there. Almost in the same way as I feel when I see Kanye West and others doing what they do, I feel as if I am missing from that picture. However the way I feel ‘I should be there’ is slightly different when I see Rihanna. I cant say that I obsess over her, or that I plot and plan to meet her like I want to meet Mr. West. As a matter of fact I have assured myself that I would introduce myself to Mr. West when the opportunity presents its self. I could never be so bold as to introduce myself to Rihanna.

I admit that her picture, or hearing her voice is always an inspiration to me, the kind of inspiration that send shivers up my spine, goose bumps really. I would gladly write music for her, and as a matter of fact I plan to in an effort to better my song writing skills sit down and write songs with certain artists in mind, Rihanna being one of them. I’m not claiming that I think I could ever date the woman, or even know her anymore than you can know a person by watching you-tube videos of them but I am claiming that she inspires me in a way that no other artist male or female does. Of course she is not the only woman that I would consider beautiful or would be shy about introducing myself to. I don’t think I have the courage to say “hello” to Alicia Keys, another artist I would gladly write with, and whose songs inspire me and give me Goosebumps.

There is something unmistakable the creative effect Rihanna’s image has on me. I suppose that is why I picked up the Issue of GQ the way I did on such impulse. It is not the first GQ issue I have purchased and I know it wont be the last as I have made it a goal to write something for GQ and have it printed. I am very familiar with the magazine. I knew that whatever was inside that magazine would inform and inspire me, a little more than usual. I was not let down. While I don’t think it a huge accomplishment to say that I have never lusted over her body, I am not going to lie and say I don’t find the woman sexually attractive, but what I do like more than anything is looking into her eyes, and on the rare times people can make her smile. But its no secret to know that I love the smile of a beautiful woman.

Leaving Rihanna to go on to other dreams I have had, I once dreamed myself in the white house, inside the oval office Sitting in the room with me was the President and the father of one of my friends. We all sat on a couch and they sat on either side of me glaring at me saying that I was a disappointment and that I had let them down. I woke up from that dream very sad why was my sub-conscious trying to tell me the President of the United States thought I was letting him down. I suppose I was feeling let down by myself and what better way to make me see that than by using a man that I have much respect for. I am sure my mind knew not to use my father in place of my friends father because I am already very familiar with how he feels about me and my progress so far in this life. What makes this dream weird is that a few days after that, maybe a week or so I had the exact same dream except this time they were congratulating me, saying what a wonderful job I had done and that what a credit to the black race I was. I don’t recall doing anything differently, but maybe my attitude had changed maybe sub consciously I had changed. I was pretty shaken up by the first dream, something is pretty wrong when the president shows up in your dreams to scold you.

I mentioned before that I had dreams of being on Oprah, I have actually had sleeping dreams of being on Oprah and her asking me tough questions about my life before I ‘made it’. I have had it more than once actually and sometimes they vary a little bit but they are always the same and they all seem to real. Certain dreams seem as if they have already happened and I am just seeing a sneak preview. Yet it is so hard for me to walk away with a good feeling for more than five minutes, because I quickly realize that it was a dream nothing more than a dream and now I am stuck with the reality of my situation far far away from what I had been dreaming of moments ago.

I would have given anything to be back in the white house with the president or back in that studio in front of that beautiful woman singing to me, but I was back where I always was, at the bottom. That is why I get so upset with myself for what I feel like is me burning my youth, because these dreams are all fine and well while I am young and still have a shot of making them come true. There is no reason for me not to believe that I could be shaking hands with the president, laughing with Oprah, writing for Rihanna. No reason at all. I think about all the time and trials and work it will take, and I suppose I get scared and daunted by it all. Its not that I am lazy, I don’t feel I am lazy, I suppose I just don’t have the confidence yet to claim my dreams. Its almost like its right there in front of my eyes but I don’t see it, I don’t see it enough to reach out and grab it. Maybe just like the dreams of the white house and the presidential scolding Rihanna is a symbol of my dreams. Not so much her, but what she represents to me. I suppose I have always wanted those far away things. As my brother always likes to quote. “Ah the unattainable dreams, those are the best kind.”

I don’t see my dreams as unattainable, hard yes..sure. but not unattainable. I don’t believe that I would be tormented with such vivid dreams if they were not the utmost longings of my soul. As I have heard it said. “hell is not a place you go if your not a Christian, but the failure of your life’s greatest ambitions.” Rihanna represents (as least at this stage of my life) my life greatest ambitions that is why she effects me the way she does, I don’t know how she came to symbolize that but I realize now that she does.

And to think about it…I wouldn’t have it any other way my ambition is very sexy. Yes, my ambition has been beaten, it has been made fun of it, and it has been doubted, but it is still strong and it is embodied perfectly by a young woman from the Caribbean.