Old School Flava: 7/23/2008

Yeah – it’s Wednesday and here I am keeping to a schedule with this Old School Flava.  Don’t get used to it, because it probably won’t last.  As I may have mentioned before – Freedom doesn’t take too kindly to deadlines and schedules.  But, alas, here we are.  Speaking of the dadblaned devil, I failed in my first attempt at thirty (30) straight days of postings.  This post should rightly be entitled “Day One . . . Again”.  I got a bit frazzled over a thing or two, percolated on ‘em, then just digressed myself into total anger.  Over.  It’s over now, and we are moving right along.

THE DOZENS

I was listening to Ramsey Lewis earlier this a.m. and he and his cohort, Karen Williams, began to speak of “playin’ the dozens”.  She proclaimed that she had never heard the term before.  OK, sure.  Ramsey went on to explain that it was originally a game played by Black folks that pitted one against the other in a match of spewing out insults about each other’s family.  Eventually, it became more than just a game, and evolved into an intentional dissing of one’s family, usually leading up to fisticuffs.  The ultimate insult?  “Yo, mama!!” Back then, that might have gotten you a black eye, or worse,a real beatdown.  What about today?  Do you guys still used that phrase?

FOOD

When my brother, sister and I were young, real young, we would complain about having to eat those yukky vegetables.  The complaining came with every dinnertime meal, as there were always vegetables on the menu.  Of course, the complaints were neither here nor there, since the vegetables were always eaten before anyone arose from the table to go their separate ways.  As we grew a bit, and aged a bit, we all either became more appreciative of the vegetables, or decided that it was useless to continue to try getting out of eating them – whatever the transformation was that took place, we simply ate the veggies and moved along.  As we ventured into our adolescent years, we became familiar with a newer phrase, and I say “newer” meaning newer to us.  It’s a phrase that’s been around for a long time, so says my mom – “You can either eat it or lay your head down beside it!” That was mom’s retort to the complaints of “meatloaf, again?” or, “tuna casserole????”  In recent years, and only recent years, I have heard a few variations on that phrase but the general intent and words remained very close to the way that my mom spit it out.  My kids hear it and crack up.  That phrase, for the uninitiated, translates to “take it or leave it”, but, to this day, I still don’t know its origin.  You think I should ask mom, don’t you?  You think that would be a good idea, I bet.  Yeah, me too.

That’s gonna do it for today.  I’m going to give this thirty-day thingy another try.  It’s really no big deal.  I’ve always believed that any blogger worth his/her “html” and “publish button” should be able to post ad infinitum without very much effort.  After all, it’s what we do, right?  I know for a fact that I bleed html.  Peace.

copyright  ©  2008  freedom

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Flava of the Day is “Right Direction” by En Vogue from EV3