Dedication: This is to my unborn whose life I have great desire to watch unfold. This is to my sister whom I empathize with, here's me being what you need. This is to every woman who knows the real, the high from first love and the agony of first heartache. This is to every girl who needed a guide but was chosen to find her own way. And to every mother who has felt like they didn't know how or what to say, here's some inspiration. This is to you.
Chapter One: Fall
Shae Fields
Preface
Some are meant for a day, others a lifetime. We all experience seasons, and in every season a lesson is learned. This winter you may not have learned how to walk across the pond without falling through the ice. But I am confident you’ll be better prepared for next time.
As you navigate through this book you may wonder why I speak the way I do. I made a conscious decision to break the cycle of disconnection by building on the relationship with my daughter before she is even thought to enter this world. Here I write to her in efforts to create a future guide she can one day carry. Though my words are directed towards her, she is not the only one thought of here. Whether you're a woman seeking empowerment, growth, understanding, a little laughter, or just some damn relief to know you're not alone, there is something here for you. Many of us love the beauty of the beach; however, don't know how to deal with the waves when they come crashing. Hopefully this book will help you to ride past it and more importantly rise above it.
Who You Gonna Choose?
Fall was the season. He was my first love, lover, and confidant. He was my vulnerable space. Wipe the snot from my nose, kiss me on the forehead to console, lick me when I'm ashy, pimple popping love. He was my everything, my study, my craft. I majored in him and graduated with honors. He was my world.
Fall and I met in high school. We were young and infatuated in love. Every day we spent together. And if we weren't together, we were on the phone sun rise til nightfall. We’d often wake up to the other drooling on the other line. No one could tell us anything about our relationship, for we were certain we'd be together forever. Falling in love felt good, it felt like the answer to life. However, I would come to learn that falling in love wasn't the only way to live life.
It's the summer entering into my first college semester and Fall and I are dreading the near separation. Secretly though, I was excited for a new experience; always had been. I move into my dorm and the adversity of separating from one another grows stronger. So strong that I skip out on the scheduled activities planned for the new incoming freshman and spend the weekend at home. I was happy to be with Fall, since it was more time that we could have together. But I was sad at the same time because when I returned to campus people in my dorm had already made connections. And I was the girl who was too consumed with her boyfriend to seize opportunity.
Academically I had it down packed, I memorized my schedule and had my routine flowin'. Socially though, I was failing. I have always been good with my outgoing side. I enjoy getting to know people. But with me being in a relationship it made things...complicated. See, Fall was highly supportive of me going to college. What he wasn't supportive of, was me getting to know the people that came with college; which meant men. Out of "respect" for my relationship I limited my male interactions, to the most ridiculous degree. If I needed to ask a question or borrow a book from a male classmate in the same dorm I would stand outside of the door. One time, out of the very few times, I went to a house party with my friends. Since they all knew the guy who was hosting it, they went to chit chat with him in his room. Ask me where I was? Standing outside the door frame talking through the threshold looking like a damn idiot. And it came with the sad excuse of "I have a boyfriend." Fall didn't want me in any guy's room and so I "respected" that. But that wasn't respect, that was having no control over my own life.
There came a point in time when I realized how little control I assumed in my life with Fall. Rarely did I go out during my first couple years of college. If I did ever go out, Fall was upset about it. So, I stayed in doing homework most of the time. It wasn't just my social interactions but it was also something as simple as the clothing I chose to wear. There was a time when we were shopping together and I picked up a skirt that was cute to me. I wasn't one to wear skirts because I wasn't raised to. But my taste was evolving and new things were becoming attractive to me. When I showed Fall, he displayed an attituden just for my mere interest in the skirt. For my 21st birthday, I bought a nice dress to wear my first night out in Vegas. I avoided showing Fall that dress. It wasn't anything out of the ordinary, nor was it provocative or too revealing. It was your typical form fitting little black dress. But because of the simple fact it was a dress that was going to be worn without him present, it would have been an issue.
If anyone asked me a question about myself just to get to know who I was, my response always had something to do with Fall. It wasn't until late in my college years that I realized it was because I didn't know myself. And I didn't know myself because I didn't live for myself. I had no control over my life because it wasn't my life I was living. Once I recognized that, it was time to change.
So, I took a chance on me and traded falling in love for loving myself. I decided to find out what made me happy, what made me me. This way, the next time someone asked a question pertaining to Shae, I'd be confident in the answer.
The state of being in love feels good. But every love that feels good baby girl isn't a love that is always meant for you. You have to know what it means to love yourself in order to recognize if it's the right love, or what I like to call righteous love.
Loving yourself can carry you through any season that comes to pass. It is the one love that is always meant for you. It may be scary and you may want to go back to what you were used to, because it was comfortable and familiar. But once you find it, once you find what makes you happy, once you find your self-love, you'll look back on what was once comfortable and familiar and chuckle to yourself out of amusement. Because where you're headed is far greater than where you've been and the thought of stepping backwards would be a joke. You have to choose yourself before you can choose another. You have to love yourself before you can love another.
I encourage you to choose you, so you can know what it means to choose another.