It’s no secret that I’m obsessed with Moana… that story touches all the soft spots in my heart.
Listening to the soundtrack the other day, when she yells at the ocean/Unknown Possibilities:
I AM MOAAANNNAAAA!!
I got hyped. Stood up & fist-pumped, tears streaming down my face, “GET IT FOR YOUR PEOPLE, GIRL!!” Because that’s a huge theme of the movie: coming into one’s own without losing your roots, etc, the need to do your own thing which may not always comply with the way older generations think they should be, etc, etc…
Coming up in Texas, I’m well-acquainted with those themes. And it was a huge source of internal conflict for me, feeling that my own growth was somehow destroying the very people who helped me become the person who wanted to push limits and discover new things about her self and ways to look at life.
Like, “Shit, y’all, I’m trying to do good LIKE YOU TAUGHT ME TO because I want us all to come up.”
I’ve always had plans. I want to be able to make my people secure and confident and… all that stuff. I want to send people to college and take them on vacations. I have a folder on my computer that’s just ALLLLL trip planning for my Mimi and her friend group (The Fabulous Five – YES, THEY DID).
Train trip… Memphis… marching jackets… I wanna do it for my people, because a few of those ladies were part of my growing up.
My people…
We all have people, the others who we feel we answer to and work for. Some folks’ people are numerous. Other times, it’s just their own self.
Of course, I think of that theme as it plays out in government and politics (it’s a curse of my deep and abiding love for the subject – motions towards degrees), as well as sociology and religion and history…
Who we consider when we make decisions & who we consider “ours” greatly influences our decisions.
Also, I can’t get enough of saying “Get ______” in an aggressive voice. It’s my latest hype-up move.
From the Pickle Rick episode of Rick & Mortty: Rick’s flipping up the player to hit the elevator button (CUZ HE’S TURNED HIMSELF INTO A PICKLE) and says, “Get that Parkour!”
I die every time.
On Broad City, Hannibal Burress as Lincoln the Dentist says, with a raised blue latex-gloved fist, he’s gonna fix a patient’s teeth “for my people” as in, to make black people proud.
✊🏼
And there are single parents, co-parents, married parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents, guardians, caretakers out there GETTIN’ IT… students who have dreams and families they want to make proud…
I had a friend at Baylor University who was from Africa & had an entire family who he was WORKING for. Because, man, he was an astronaut compared to what they knew.
I was always like, “Can I get you something from the cafeteria, bruh?” Like, dang, let me get it for YOU while you’re gettin’ it…
Get it?