Work someone’s back out or get your back worked out this weekend.  It’s not technically labor.

Slim Jackson

Eff it being September and summer officially drawing to a close. I want a do over. This summer kinda sucked.

Eff the decision I have to make about keeping my car over the next few months. I may just leave the jawn upstate and have someone cut it on every now and then to make sure it doesn’t die out there.

Eff my affinity for spicy foods. I hope I don’t develop an ulcer.

Eff how hectic work was this week. I really felt like I earned this Friday off…and I don’t plan on doin’ sh*t today. BAWSE.

Eff Jersey Shore for becoming a must-watch show for me. The Situation has earned my respect with his recklessness.

Miss Jenkins

Eff this damn heat. I’ve said that a lot this summer, but dammit, it’s September. I need this to be done. My fall wardrobe awaits.

Eff Labor Day weekend traffic. I’m not looking forward to it.

Eff not having my class schedule together yet. Class starts in little more than a week. I gotta get it together.

Eff Slim for saying “cut it on.” (Slim Addition: Eff you Ms. Jenkins)

The Honorable and Rather Articulate Award Winning RightCoastLexSteele, Under Construction

Eff the Redskins.

Eff this. We out. Your turn.

The 3 Ways Crew

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Shauna: Hey Slim, what’s good? Ain’t seen you in a minute!
Slim: Business as usual. Maintaining and ish.
Shauna: What you doing this weekend?
Slim: Oh, prolly save a few kittens from a 4 alarm fire on the 18th floor of some NYC high rise.
Shauna: You are a fool. Anyway, I’m having a party this Saturday. You and the fellas should come by.
Slim: Yeah, no doubt. Me and Marcus been looking for something to get into. So have all the other wolves homies.
Shauna: Umm, yeah. About Marcus…Can you not bring him?
Slim: Huh? I thought you were cool with him?
Shauna: Yeah, I’m cool with him. He’s never wronged me, but he broke up with Teresa for that Amazon-lookin’ chick.
Slim: Da f*ck? It’s not like Marcus is gonna bring Xena with him.
Shauna: I know. But I don’t want her to feel uncomfortable.
Slim: Isn’t Teresa messin’ with that football playin’ negro now though?
Shauna: Yeah, but still. She’s my friend.
Slim: You know Marcus is friends with your man too right?
Shauna: Yeah. Doesn’t matter.
Slim: Next time we all go to Vegas, I’ll make sure your boy gets nice and drunk in a room full of strippers.
Shauna: What?
Slim: Nothing. See you on Saturday.

Some would say this sounds high schoolish. Others would say it sounds real collegiate. Both sides are right, but such is life. As we get older, our personal circle of friends gets smaller. The thing is, everyone in your crew probably has another circle of friends or acquaintances with commonalities that they roll with when you’re not around. In my case and probably a lot of yours, my closest friends are people that I know through college.

If you didn’t go to college, then your best friends are probably people you went to high school with or grew up with. Whatever the case, there’s a pretty good chance that all the circles you’re indirectly affiliated with are going to bump into each other at some point or another. And since these people are all going to have at least a few things in common, some of them are going to end up dating. A lot of the women I’m cordial with from college have dated or rendezvoused with at least one of my boys or acquaintances over the years.  Throw in Greek life, professional mixers, First Fridays, and every other typical event, and the chains link even easier.

In theory, your friends dating your friends’ friends seems like a great formula. You all co-sign each other and think you know who’s right for who—and sometimes it works. Unfortunately this formula only applies when things are going well. Y’all can all hang out, kick it, tear up the streets, etc. and nobody feels awkward. But what about when a break up happens? You all still see each other at the same social functions and no matter how private the separation may have been, everybody in the interconnecting circles will know and probably watch with a cautious eye to make sure nobody walks up the stairs with a pan full of formerly hot grease or with the new chick in tow. It just gets awkward for everybody. And per the scenario above, it can complicate friendships and acquaintanceships (Yeah, I made that word up) when it comes time to have gatherings. If stuff isn’t peachy between some of these inter-circle couples, it has the potential for this:

And nobody wants to get caught in that common area, which could be the room where the 2 people are sitting within feet of each other trying to play it cool while everyone else sweats or is too drunk to care. I say all this to say that folks really need to think about the long term repercussions when engaging in inter-circle dating. It’s not as unavoidable as it seems. If you’re the person doing the dating and end up on bad terms with the ex, you may never be able to escape them…unless you move to a new state, get a completely different group of friends that you have nothing in common with, or start going to that church on the other side of town. The End.

And I didn’t even have time to talk about the issue of taking sides in these disputes and who cuts ties with who…

So what do you think of inter-circle dating? Do you have any protocols for it? Is it unavoidable? Good idea? Bad idea? Success stories or failures? Do share.

They shoulda never taught me how to use Powerpoint,

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Deep down, he also thinks he's "Big Meech"

…and that’s damn near about it.

Name five black politicians not named Barack Obama.  I’ll wait. Now of the five you just named, subtract the ones you were only able to think of because their names are currently in the news for doing or saying something stupid.  Unless if you live in a very urban part of an urban city, it may take you a while to name 5 prominent African American politicians on the national scene, and perhaps even longer in your particular locality.  That’s because you could fit all the current Congressmen, US Senator, and Supreme Court Justice of African American persuasion on the 4 train.  There are only 4 black governors…ever.  It seems that blacks have been able to work their way up to city and state offices, but the executive offices seem to allude them. (Where have I heard that before?) Winning a mainstream election as a black man makes catching a cab or getting a loan look like 1st grade math.

Now, it’s probably not on most people’s calendars, but the Congressional Black Caucus is right around the corner.  If you’ve never heard of it, think of it as the Howard Homecoming of politics.  It’s a good excuse for a lot of people to head out to the Nation’s Capitol for a nice weekend in September.  And just like Howard Homecoming, you can find a preacher posted at the bar in a 3/4 length jacket buying young girls he probably baptized shots of Henny. Every year, negroes from far and wide descend upon the Chocolate City rain or shine for the festivities.  But for all the meetings, conferences, business card exchanges, and the late night cavorting at this and similar gatherings around the nation, the black political machine hasn’t developed into the behemoth it should be.  For all the progress made, we still lack the ability to significantly affect policy outcomes.  This is no fault of and not for lack of the effort of the Caucus to garner support for their candidates and raise funds, but it just seems that when it comes to our community, black folks end up bumping their gums instead of taking action.

The problem isn’t that black folks don’t have the tools to positively affect change in the government, they just fail to use them.  In the grand scheme of things, blacks people fail to support their own at the polls and supporting them financially.  Votes win elections and so does money.  At first glance, you may think black people may not actually have the capital to match funds with powerful special interests and corporations, but seeing as the black community actually spends the most money and supports many of those powerful companies, it’s almost unbelievable that they couldn’t use that money in the political arena. C’mon…Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em has a diamond encrusted remote controlled car/pendant…are you kidding me?   As far as voting goes, black people avoid it like the plague.  Most black people would be lying if they said 2008 wasn’t their first time they actually decided to go vote. That election will probably go down in history as the highest black voter turnout ever.

I understand African Americans were granted the right to vote centuries after the birth of the nation, so participation in politics may relatively new to us as a people, but if nothing else black people have always had the ability to organize and come together for a common purpose.  There are other groups of people in this country that have overcome their non-majority status to accomplish their goals simply by being organized.  To be quite honest, simply paying attention to what’s going on and holding elected officials accountable regardless of race may actually more powerful than electing a black person to every seat in the land. Pay attention people.

{Insert witty ending and deep questions here.}

The Redskins Suck,

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**Today is the last day to vote for 3 Ways in the finals of the Black Weblog Awards! Please cast your votes for us in Best Blog Post Series (Faith Series), Best Group Blog, and Best Writing in a Blog. Vote here! Hopefully we’ll have some good news for you tomorrow!**

I don't know what exercise she's doing, but it's working.

It’s 6:30am. As the sun begins to really shine, I’m already on the streets pushing forward. Not pushing, pushing forward. See, I like to do my running early in the morning – the only people up with me are too busy heading to work to care what I’m doing and the streets are all mine. In my neighborhood, there are no running groups, there’s no cutting through crowds or running around people. It’s easy going. Mainly because not too many Black people like to exercise.

I really wish I was joking or being hyperbolic. When I’m running in the hood, I can count on two hands how many people I see running or walking with me. And if I’m in a more gentrified or already bougie area, I’m usually surrounded by everything but Black people as I run. It’s disappointing, but nothing new. It’s something my boys and I noticed in college.

When we were in the gym, we would see every other type of women besides Black women in there with us. The only time we’d see Black women was the beginning of the spring semester. There would be an influx of New Year’s Resolution gym heads. They’d come as a crew, decked out in their latest exercise gear that they bought a week before they came back to school, do a lot of nothing but look in the mirror and talk and then disappear a week or two into the semester. Meanwhile the White, Asian and other melanin deficient women would have their bodies all tuned up by March. Which I can’t be mad at.

There’s a reason some of these non-Black women’s bodies are starting to rival the idealized African woman’s body. It isn’t just the booty shots.

There would be all types of excuses as to why this happened. We heard everything from “I don’t want to lose my butt” to “I’m already thin, I don’t have to” to the candid and honest, “I just don’t want to.” I still get those excuses today. It’s sad because a lot of these women would be a lot more attractive if they woke up in the morning and did a 30 minute workout before work. Or if they just took the stairs instead of the escalator. Plus I guarantee they wouldn’t have as many problems finding or keeping a man. We are a visual gender. Every man that’s with his woman now is with her because he thought she was fine.

But it’s not just about looks, nor is lack of exercise gender specific after a certain point. As we get older, the health issues begin to affect both Black men and women.

Since moving back to the hood, I’ve noticed how unhealthy my people are. Most of my observations are done when I don’t get the chance to go running in the morning and have to do so in the evening. On my usual route I pass by a McDonald’s, a diner and a 7/11. And they’re are all packed. I run through neighborhoods and I see both overweight adults and kids who look like they should’ve been a twin, but they ate him in the womb. Kids are not supposed to weigh as much as an adult nor are adults supposed to weigh as much as they do. It’s disheartening to see. It’s not so much the older Black people, it’s definitely people within my age bracket.

Somewhere over time, we became a seriously unhealthy people. We complain that “The Man” is trying to kill us off, but it’s really the high cholesterol and heart problems that are doing so. And that’s something we have control over.

Now I’m not saying we need to all be hitting the streets, doing 5Ks, lifting every day and turning ourselves into video vixens and male models. That’s not going to happen. We each have our own body types and limitations. However, there is a big difference between a women who is built like Toccara and is still healthy enough to run for more than 4 minutes straight without hyperventilating and a man who is built like Uncle Phil from “Fresh Prince” and only curls steak sandwiches. Sure we can only do so much with our bodies, but we should definitely do something after sitting at our computer and reading Three Ways that is.

Am I off base? Is this epidemic just restrained to my hood? I know it’s not, I’ve been to Atlanta, but I have to ask these questions. Why do Black people not like to exercise? Shoot, why do people not like to exercise in general? On the flip side, do you exercise? If so, why and what do you do?

Far from a health freak, but I do like getting freaky with a healthy woman,

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Dr. Jesus, why aren't you taking notes?

I grew up hearing that illnesses like depression, schizophrenia, and obsessive compulsive disorder were not real. Drug addiction needed to be sweated out and prayed away. If people had emotional issues, no matter what childhood or adulthood events they endured, therapy wasn’t an opinion. The source of their issues couldn’t be the result of a chemical imbalance, early exposure to violence, or abandonment issues. “No girl, that’s just the devil.”

I’m not sure where this idea started, but I know in many Black families, the idea of visiting a psychologist is out of the question. I have heard it from my own family members. People needing therapy sometimes presents the risk of putting family business out in the street, or so it is told in Black households. After my own trips to a therapist or two, I can say I firmly disagree. In many Black families the idea of going to a therapist represents a strike against one’s faith in the healing power of God.

She don’t have no depression.  She’s just lazy.

I think one of the biggest issues surrounding mental health, across all races and cultures is a lack of education. Let’s look at some good celebrity examples.

Y’all remember the Nets player Jason Williams, who shot and killed his limo driver?  In April, dude was found to be suicidal in his hotel room. Or what about Houston, that singer/one hit wonder who gouged his own eye out after having a psychotic break of sorts? In an interview, dude claims that thugs and mobsters gouged his eye out. More recently, Fantasia entered the spotlight after a failed suicide attempt.

I used those examples to demonstrate  the extent to which psychological issues can blow up when they go ignored or unaddressed for years at a time. I would bet money that these two men, over the course of their lives or in the moments before their “mental breaks,” displayed signs that went unexplored, explained away, or just ignored. In my own family, I have seen psychological issues manifest for decades and continue to be medicated through drug addictions and unhealthy relationships. Yet all people think to do is “pray for him” or suggest that we “take her to church so she can find God,” with little attempts to understand what was good (or not).

This may come across as harsh, but prayer doesn’t quiet the voices in the mind of a paranoid schizophrenic telling him the government has his house wire tapped. Prayer doesn’t answer the questions and emotional pains caused by insecurity, abandonment, or abuse. And prayer doesn’t take away that itch for the crack-rock or drank of that Irish Rose.

What are we so afraid of?

Or are we just undereducated about the reality of mental illness? Uncle Ray-Ray’s dementia or Alzhemier’s are just chalked up to him being old. John’s pyromania and violent acts lead to punishment and reprimanding, but nothing else. But why nothing else?  To some, going to therapy is a sign of weakness. And we all know, Black folks don’t like to look like they can’t handle their own, nor do we like to feel like our business is out in the street. Going to therapy, or making the decision to even try it out, requires one to put their hands in the air and let a few things go:

For the spiritual or religious, we have to say “God alone can’t help me with this.”

Note I said “God alone.” Prayer is great. The Bible is the bomb for some. Church does the job for others. But those things in and of themselves do not heal mental health issues. In my opinion, the belief that a relationship with God alone will cure psychological ills is the reason why so many of the cancerous cycles exist within our families and communities.

For the practical, we have to be willing to confess that time doesn’t heal all wounds.

Yeah, that happened when I was 8.  I’m 24.  I should be over this by now!

Unfortunately, in many instances, it doesn’t work like that. In all that time between 8 and 24, lots of other stuff has happened, issues have gone unresolved, and questions unanswered. More time isn’t going to undo that.

For the tough and independent, we have to be willing to say “I need help.”

This is where we gotta put the pride aside and be willing to accept the advice and guidance of others, and grapple with the idea that we cannot always talk ourselves out of our pain and problems.

What are your thoughts about mental health issues? Is therapy a cock ‘o crap? Are mental illnesses real? Can they be prayed away? Have you ever been to a therapist/counselor/psychologist/life coach? What’s the deal with the taboo in Black families surrounding mental health? Do tell.

Writing is part of my therapy,

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Intro deez nuts.

Seattle Washington

Eff having a conscience. I wish I could turn it off sometimes. It would make my sex life a little easier.

Eff useless meetings. We all know cot damn well I don’t need to be here. I should be at my desk doing work, not talking about the work that needs to be done.

Eff Steve Jobs. I know as soon as I buy the iPad they’re going to come out with the iPad 2 featuring a DVD player, a 7-in screen and something that spews gold bouillon.

Eff being the bigger person. Eff Sowhatiff.

Slim Jackson

Eff the fact it took me 3 weeks to get back to some degree of normal.
*Cracks neck and shakes shoulders to release pressure*

Eff overlapping inner circles. NYC is wayyyy too small to be this large a city. I smell a post brewing.

Eff how much work got dumped on me this week. I knew something was up when I felt the calm before the storm. On a positive note, this will look great on the resume down the road.

Eff homie outside the club who was chatting with me about local food spots, mentioned his gang affiliation, went to his car, and came back with the heat and let off 2 shots at somebody near by. How the f*ck you gonna talk to me about getting food and then come stand near me and fire shots? Negro is you crazy? Obviously. (NYPD’s Social Media Division: I know nothing. Be gone bitches.)

Eff bubbly bunnies. I’ma marry one and let her chase me around the bedroom with a golf club for fun.

Y’all take care now, ya hear?!

The Three Ways Crew

Make sure you add Slim and Crew on Twitter. We keep the party going all day long!