Harlem (however kitsch you may think it is) is
a ghetto It’s not a wandering around situation
for you.
You’re supposed to know where
you’re going at all times, no matter where you are in the city.
Trust me, you don’t want an authentic black
experience.
You couldn’t handle it.
Take the food, for example.
The places I frequent up here don’t
advertise and there’s always a line to get in.
They’re that incredible.
And I’m
from the South—I know what everything is supposed to taste like.
But you?
You wouldn’t know excellent soul food from run of the mill because
you’ve never had the real thing.
So do
me a favor: Stick to whatever Zagat’s tells
you. Eat at Sylvia’s and leave me
alone.
5
Don’t ask me where
to go to get drugs when you’re in my neighborhood.
When I’m out and about in the ghetto, I look
like a Dazzling Urbanite, an Unemployed Superstar, an International Negress of
Mystery.
Do I look like I smoke
crack? Of course not.
ut for some reason, they presume that I
do.
I’m warning you.
You’d better cut it out or else (see
#1).
4
Don’t tell me I
look just like (insert your favorite kinky-haired brown-skinned black woman
here).
You know why?
Because I don’t.
Need some help with that insertion? Here’s a few popular examples
that get thrown at me all the time: Lauren
Hill.Whoopi Goldberg.
Macy Gray.
None of these ladies resemble each other in
the least but somehow I look like all three of them, probably because no one is
actually looking at me when they say this crap.
They’re just sitting there having some sort of a weird fantasy
about black women.
They’re imagining
things. How pathetic is that.
3
Don’t treat me like
an object—otherwise known as, Don’t fetishize me (see #7).
I am a human
being. I am just as complex and flawed and uninteresting as anyone else.
Embracing this means having to let go of a
lot of preconceptions, which is difficult because people tend to look at me and
imagine things (see #4).
Preconceptions—that’s where the rubber hits the road, folks.
All you’re doing is dehumanizing me—and that
mentality is at the core of what kept the slave trade alive and
well in this country for hundreds of years. (It’s gender, too.
Men and women
do this to each other all the time.)
See me as an individual once and for all and cut it out.
I mean, really.
Is civilization moving forward or what?
Then again, I suppose some progress has been made.
In Shakespeare’s day, they wondered if women
had souls.
2
Don’t touch my
skin.
I know, I know.
I have the softest skin you’ve ever
felt.
That’s because I take care of
it.
Now go home and exfoliate, and then moisturize fer cryin’ out
loud, and leave my shoulders alone.
1
Don’t EVER touch my
hair.
The next white person
that walks up to me as I’m waiting to cross the street and runs their fingers
through my Afro
is going to die, because I’m going to kill them.
I mean it.
What in the
world are you thinking when you do that?
What am I, an exotic animal in your own private petting zoo?
Or do you just walk around doing whatever
you want to all black women, is that it?
I thought those
days were over.
Well.
I’m going to let you know how over those days are the next time you
touch my hair.
I’m going to let you have it.
Believe me, I’m not ever going to sneak up on you and touch that
rank flat stringy greasy mess on your head. So back off.
And Black folks, you aren’t exempt, either. If it’s been
that long since you’ve felt the kink on your own head that you feel
the need to reach out and touch mine, you’ve
got problems.
COPYRIGHT 2003 QUEEN ESTHER