I came to a point in my life where few people understood me...Black or other. I kept getting, "Well, that's you." or "Most people aren't like you." It was very frustrating. Usually I get nothing but respect from brothers and I love my Black culture. However, after 8 years, I have to admit that no one has really clicked with me. I refuse to be anything other than myself and if that's intimidating or threatening then so be it.

Last year, I fell in love with this brother from Miami. We met face-to-face and corresponded via email for a couple of months. When we met again he admitted he was in love with me. When I told him how I felt he backed off. He said he didn't think he deserved me. What?! We were in the same field of work, on the same level career-wise and financially. I had to detach, let him go.

I am already out in the world meeting people of different cultures and backgrounds. I live in a Jewish neighborhood, work in a Black neighborhood and get along with people regardless of ethnicity. What's funny to me is that I met and fell in love with a Jewish guy in a Black community. This relationship has challenged much of what I thought I was capable of.

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"To be as good as someone else is no high ideal...I am myself." - Paul Robeson

"It's quite an experience to live in fear isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave." - Roy in "Blade Runner"

"Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own."
--Paulo Coelho, "The Alchemist"

"There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path"
--Morpheus in "The Matrix" (and a Buddhist philosophy)

"It's our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities"- Dumbledore to Harry Potter "Chamber of Secrets"