It's been an interesting ride so far...

It has been a couple of months now since I started this page. I really like the outlet to express myself, yet I find it strange maintaining an online existence, meeting and getting to know people this way. All these people I only have contact with in the cyberworld. I recently gave my web address to a couple of long time friends we know personally. Now, I wonder if that was a mistake. All the things I have or will say on here is now tempered by the knowledge that there are some who will read this that I will see face to face. Am I getting too personal then? I weighed this question for a while, because at this time, even with all the pics on the Mel B, Mariah, Janet, Race, Flo Jo, and October pages, and I am just halfway through my space allotment. In other words, I have a lot more info to relate. In fact, the challenge is keeping it down, trying to stay more to the point, believe it or not!!

I want this site to be unlike any other you have visited. I trust that the two sets of "real-life" friends we have let into this world are not passing it on to less-deserving viewers that also know us. The internet is world-wide. Millions can view these pages, and chances are, eventually people I know will recognize our pics and connect the dots. So be it. I hope to hit the lottery with odds like that. I want to put aside the rules of the outside world and say EXACTLY what I think, and hope it strikes a chord in you, male, or female, black, white, or whatever. As I always do, I am sitting here, writing this straight out of my head, (dangerous, I know!) getting timed out by my ISP over and over. But I hate prepared text, so the grammar is imperfect, hopefully, I'm not getting graded, and I am damn sure too old to worry about typing in ebonics..."Wass sup niggaz?"...or in that crazy caps/no caps style... y0u kNoW wHaT i mEaN? You can try to impress your peeps, your fellow playahs... and so on. I want to speak to the person you know you are inside. "Keepin' It Real!!" requires a lot of conformity, stepping in line with what's cool to say, how to dress, etc... This whole thing about "Playahs" and "Playah hatin'"... Well, I guess I am a little past that. Each generation has it's niche, and the fact that I can't get into it in my late thirties makes it all the more cool. I know my parents, and even older sister did not see what I liked about the whole Parliament/Funkadelic craze. To be honest, I really wasn't into the ins and outs of "Sir Nose devoid of funk" or Starchild, I just loved the off the wall craziness the parties would reach, people partying in "diapers", strangers rolling with the beat like they were life long friends. Those of you old enough, do you remember "the freak"? It was the dance that came out at the same time the group Chic had the song "Le Freak" out. You rub up and down with a girl, body to body, even rubbing your hands up and down her body on both sides. She is doing the same to you. Sometimes there's a sandwich, a guy in front and in back of the girl. If you are lucky as a guy, you get two girls on you sometimes. There will never be another dance move like that one. People died over that dance, trying it with another man's date in isolated incidents in clubs around the country. But who we are transcends our differences in age or culture.

Above all else, I just want you to know that here, you are not expected to flex or be crazy/sexy/cool. You can be you, and if you identify with what I am saying, cool. We can dialogue on a deeper level, and no it doesnt reflect on our ideas of masculinity or femininity. It's just a human thing. Feel free to e-mail me YOUR ICQ number...I don't have my number on here for a reason. I only have about 12 people on my list. It amazes me when I see folks say they have 50 or more. With that split screen deal, ICQ really makes chat a personal, one on one experience for me.

I have found myself chatting overwhelmingly with females, and they have been younger than me by more than a few years. Each new contact brings the same questions and defensive posturing. I get cracks made about my age ("aren't you a little old?"), about my marital status, ("where's your wife?") and about what a married man running up on 40 is looking for out here on the web. That's actually a decent question. Not knowing me from any other man, I can imagine the moves being put on females by the men who claim to be single, claim to be younger, and the caution is well understood. I know I have missed having good contacts, because the "senario" just seems to be too well..."lecherous" . Well, i can only put so much time into explaining myself. I can't chase down a woman, to beg her to listen to how I don't want to chase her down. Just think of it this way. Chances are, I have been where you are now in life. Maybe the question should be, "Is there anything YOU could learn from me?" I am no world traveler, and unlike many men my age, I still have no interest in golf. Me and my wife, by the grace of God, are still "DINKS". That is, "Double Income, No Kids" I guess I have some fatherly advice to give...hell I don't know, I am not "Frasier"!

My love of music still encompasses hip-hop/rap with the added knowledge of having experienced, as an adult, the music world before it. Keep your identity secret, but let down your personality's guard just a little. All this technology around us, and it still comes down to "talk", just communicating a word at a time.

I look forward to my next new contact with a person I would never have met otherwise.
November 15, 1998

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