Here my story...Enjoy!
Chick Lit is for Pu55ies Or How My Book Will Not Resemble Bridget Jones’ Diary
I have been writing stories since I was a little girl growing up in Birmingham, Alabama. My cousin Imani also has been writing since childhood, and our love of books and writing are one of the reasons we are so close. Imani had the smarts and Ivy-league education to have been published many times over, having her essays featured in anthologies and writing a book of her own. While my stories have been collecting dust in various notebooks, I have been writing all along for my pleasure. In fact, I am quite prolific, but if not one reads it, then it’s like that proverbial tree that falls in the forest, right?
Anyway fast forward to the present… my cousin and I talk frequently although we live in different cities and she's married with a kid. She encourages me to keep writing. She says that I could write a book, but I always wondered what could I write about. After regaling her many times with stories of my tales of a single girl living in NYC, she suggested that I write a Black Bridget Jones’ Diary.
When Bridget Jones’ Diary first came out, author Helen Fielding was a Godsend to many young women yearning for something interesting to read. Now there’s a glut of fiction called “Chick Lit” and it’s getting on my nerves.
OK, I read Bridget Jones’ Diary, saw the movie and I will shell $10 to see the sequel which opens this fall starring the pouty-lipped Renee Zellweger. Honestly I am a fan, but my book will not be like it, because “Chick Lit” is for pu55ies. So I compiled a short list of the top five reasons of why my book will not be like Bridget Jones’ Diary
[Well reasons other than the obvious facts that I am Black and not British.]
5. I don’t obsessed about my weight on a daily basis. Yes I get on the scale occasionally, and I even so no to cupcakes every once in a while. But as long as the clothes fit, I don’t really give a shit! [I learned that rhyme from Johnnie Cochran]
4. I don’t smoke. I never have and I never will. In fact, the smoking ban here in New York is great, since now there’s no smelly evidence of my partying the night before---well aside for the awful hangover.
3. I don’t’ fool around with guys from work. I know the ABCs of dating at work. They are either assholes, boring or conservatives. You know the expression; don’t shit where you eat. [I think Mary-Kate Olsen lived by that one, since she shits and doesn’t eat.] Well she used to anyway, but I digress.
2. I don’t assume that just because I had sexual relations with a guy that we are in a relationship. Yeah, sometimes sex leads to love. Sometime sex leads to friendship. Sometimes sex just leads to a f@ck buddy that you can kick out in the morning. Or you can jet before that uncomfortable moment of a morning after smooch.
1.I won’t take shit from the Smug Marrieds. First, they try to help by setting you up. Then Smug Marrieds pity you. They say, “It must be rough out there.” It’s like I dating out in those remote locales where film the Survivor series. [Come to think of it, I may have even better luck dating on that show than here in the asphalt jungle of The Big Apple.] Next they exclude by planning even-numbered events without you. That’s fine, really since I can’t tell my married girlfriends about my love life. When they got married, they turn in their slut card, and morph into practical prudes. I can’t give them a blow-by-blow account [pun intended] of my last sexual escapade with a guy, because they will look at me in horror and shake their heads in disgust. It’s kind of like telling a vegan about a steak dinner at Peter Lugers.
One day I hope to be published, and I will be doing readings all over NYC from my shiny new hardback book. Until then, I will keep writing my scribblings and pray that I will not be a writing wallflower forever waiting to get a dance from a book agent.
