We are all migrating through some really tough energy right now. Synchronicities abound, new moons & eclipses, worldwide illness, tense political climate(s), current events renamed ‘bad news’, internal & external revamping of both masculine and feminine energies…the list goes on and on. If you’ve been blessed enough to not feel the constant ‘squeezing’ of the universe, then stand divinely appreciative (and humbled). For the rest of us, I know how ya feel and because it’s A LOT…I’ll keep it as short & sweet as possible and leave you with these words to carry with you and/or look ahead toward…THE BEST PART OF WAKING UP IS ALCHEMY IN YOUR CUP! Be blessed y’all; tough energy don’t last always.
And whatever she reads about herself, may we all commit to editing the guts (and shores) of it in a Gracious, Truthful, Valiant way. Accurate representation is indeed exigent guided breathing. ~Shimah (MAHism2020) @litfortheculture1773 @gonbeallwrite_mah
Timbs ‘n Teddies: Karmics, Soul-Mates, Twin Flames…oh my!!!
The gang (Big Sis, Lil Sis, and our male guest Mr. Jeremy Burris) reconvene for a very special, detailed episode of Timbs ‘n Teddies. Follow the link (click the picture) to hear us discuss spiritual romantic archetypes: karmics, soul-mates, twin flames! Leave us a voice message pertaining to your flow of thought regarding the episode and the subject matter covered if listening via the anchor.fm site. Your message may be chosen as an add-on to the episode.
So we leave you with this… To build the legacy brick by brick with a figurative bare hand – this is the life’s work of our masculine energies. But when those forces come, as they oftentimes do, and your hand is no longer with us, who will know that hand (the grip, the curve, the scars, the power behind it) better than the one who held it? Take a look at the images above. What thoughts come up to the surface? Are the notions of spiritual archetypes something you can believe in? What romantic experiences have you had that frame your opinion and/or belief in them? Do you feel as though you are a twin flame? Let us know… click here to leave us a message and for a chance to have your comments heard on the episode >>> https://anchor.fm/TimbsNTeddiespodcast/message
Listen to Episode 3 of Timbs ‘n Teddies on your favorite podcast app:
This week @ shimaheaster.org we made PB ChocoChip cookies…a small batch anyway. The theme of 2020 has no formal title yet; but it does have a FEEL. I think the term small batches goes along with that feel… Allowing for what you want, keeping it close, and not overdoing it. Your creations need only to feed you; if they are blessed enough to branch out toward the collective then…ok. But we mustn’t overlook the blessing of our own senses sensing and filling/feeling…our selves. There’s a full moon in my beloved sign of Cancer this week – the first full moon of the decade! Can you feel it coming? It would explain this inherent desire I have to make something that reciprocally builds me from the inside out. I’m done rambling… Below are pics of the delish, scratch-made PB ChocoChip cookies with the recipe following! Enjoy.
Double this recipe for a full batch: cream together 1/2 stick softened butter, 1/4 cup brown sugar along with 1/4 cup white sugar (maybe a lil more of each – wink wink), 1/2 large egg, few drops of vanilla extract, large dollop of peanut butter. Add 3/4 cup all-purpose flour & 1/4 tsp of baking soda, 1/4 tsp baking powder, few drops of apple cider vinegar to butter/sugar mix. Add in chocolate chips & bake on a greased cookie sheet at 365 degrees Fahrenheit until golden brown around edges, still gooey in the center. Allow to cool before removing from baking sheet.
Click picture to listen to Timbs ‘n Teddies on Apple Podcast; below, links to additional podcast apps are listed!
On the first episode of 2020, we’re joined by a special male guest who is speaking candidly about his experience at an all-male high school; how this experience helped to shape his spiritual outlook on life in general and within his own romantic landscape. We go deep into the importance of spirituality as it pertains to whom you attract into your space, and how much these mini-relationships (as I like to call them) make a huge impact on your soul and journey. Where are we going romantically as a collective? How does one generation view the other? Where can you go to gain spiritual enlightenment? Are you comfortable within your own spiritual ascension? Does one gain more from the light or the dark? Do you share your birth chart with romantic prospects? Episode 3 will be a continuation, as the trio speaks on spiritual archetypes: karmics, soul-mates, twin-flames…oh my!
The #sistersquad is joined by Mr. J Burris on this very spiritually-driven episode of Timbs ‘n Teddies. Take a listen to his vocal input, you won’t be disappointed. 🤗
I brought in the New Year with my tried and true Lemon Poundcake. Some of us take lemons and make lemonade; I take lemons – scrape the skin and add much more than just water and sugar…watch it rise under heat. As stated many times before, it’s integral for us to CREATE! Baking works for me. As does the written word. I urge you to find those things that come naturally from and to you. Find ‘em and then put them to use & into fruition. Feed yourself from the inside out. No easy task, but we will get the swing of it eventually. Happy New Year folks! May the next decade bring sweet fulfillment!
Loaf pan (double the recipe for a full Bundt):
1 stick softened butter, 1.5 cups sugar – cream together with mixer until fluffy. Add in 3 eggs (one at a time) mixing with each addition of egg. Sit 1.5 cups of flour to the side (together with .25 tsp baking soda and pinch of salt). Also sit .5 cup of heavy cream & buttermilk to the side (I combine cream and buttermilk together to equal .5 cup – you can use ONLY heavy cream if you’d like). Add flour mix and cream/milk mix into the butter/egg/sugar mix beginning and ending with flour mix. Add in zest of one lemon and a few tablespoons of fresh lemon juice (along w/ 1 tsp vanilla extract). Be sure to scrape down the edges of the bowl. Bake in a well greased loaf pan, in a COLD START OVEN (very important) @ 325 degrees until risen, golden brown, and a clean knife comes out when inserted into center of cake (about 45-60 mins depending on your oven). Mix together confectioners sugar, heavy cream and fresh lemon juice to make drizzle – this is all YOU! I’d share how I do it, but honestly it changes with my mood.
2020 Abounds!!! This ‘read’ lips short story is dedicated to my favorite original script of 2019. Gutted. A short apologia was originally published April 27th of this year via ‘Genre: Urban Arts’ – a literary & visual arts platform (& quarterly print) that played an integral role in how I would come to wrap myself in birthed creativity of my own making – from the inside out. In my feelings (this is the way I translate the mundane term of ‘in my opinion’), 2020 will be a year of learning how to walk again; with our idiosyncratic shift of hip, curve of leg, and sugar-dipped swag. A womanly year! A year that scoops the patriarchy up in her arms and holds it close to her bosom, whispers, “forgive the body that grew you – you” in a stern yet loving way that only a divine mother can. Even the shape of the numbers look mostly feminine to me… I’m looking forward to it. Aren’t you?
Gutted. A short apologia. April 27, 2019 Shimah Easter For: Genre: Urban Arts
In an effort to teach him how to love her properly she’d expose his wound at least twice a day. Run a clean hand gently across it. Take sterile water – water she’d boiled and let cool on the same stove she made dinner on every night. She’d take that water and pour it down the wound. Always down. So that any infection would be wicked away – from the heart, past his man-parts, down toward his lower extremities. Each stitch soaked in sterility then dried with a clean cloth. White. Always white. Old folks (from the country) know the dangers of dye on a healing wound. He would wince when she scraped the pus. And she would lift her head to reassure him that this pain was for his own good. Then back to the wound she went. Placing a special concoction of cloves and turmeric and aloe flesh and raw honey from top to bottom. You could smell him from the front door. He had become one with a gummy, saccharine healing that burned. His boys (my uncles) will tell you, “daddy still smells of sweet sticky earth and the insides of my mamma’s cabinets”. Such a substantial contusion – from the top of his groin allllllll the way up past his navel, just below his sternum. She hadn’t killed him; she hadn’t meant to. What she had meant to do was make him ooze from his guts. From that place where everyone’s intuition lives. That place that tells us love this one, head further north and don’t stop ’til you see home…’til you see safe…’til you see free…’til you see love. Head north – like from guts to heart to head. Head. North. ‘Til you see your own front door. She’d made earth in her own belly and let sun shine into a dark place; watered the soil with her own tears and grew eight boys and one girl for him. They were all born breathing. What the world did to the two who died could never be traced back to her womb. Was it wrong for her to want to see what grew in his belly? To want to see how his offering compared to hers? A woman’s love is so literal – so see-able. It grows legs and a beating heart. It walks the earth but never before pulling up. Not before crawling. She just wanted to help him along. Like a classical C-section incision. Wanted to see what he could give birth to. But there was only blood, and wood paired with sharp steel and a scream and a… “are you fucking crazy?!”. Maybe she was crazy. Crazy is as crazy does. And crazy stays even when your husband is making like with the babysitter. Crazy is all that’s left when you’ve given your skin and hair follicles to dryness. Crazy brews and runs over when your biggest boy asks, “mamma, can I have the big piece of chicken tonight? You know daddy ain’t coming home” and you let the bird go cold in empty anticipation. It’s crazy funny…slap-of-the-knee funny (but not really) when you come from women who gut men like fish, then stay to mend their wounds.
Author’s explanation: Gutted. A short apologia. is essentially written by many women while they are in the thick of it. It is a small, yet significant specimen (if you will) of how the femme has been injured along the way and how she may choose to recover when operating from (perhaps) low to mid spiritual vibration. I do not condone violence, but the humanity within me understands the birth, inhale and scream of it. Keep pushin’ my loves… She is almost here! Matter-fact…give a sly grin, ’cause when all is said and done…you are YOURS!
2019 has taught me how to occupy my feminine space. Period. Shortly put, I think that the push towards equality between & amongst male and female energies…movements such as women’s liberation, feminism, suffrage, etc. missed the mark in a very major way. All of this is putting it lightly…while rummaging in dark spaces. We were taught as women (especially as black women) that we could have it all – and thus expected to do it all; that men were mainly the enemy you sleep beside; that this woman’s work was less than and therefore…easily done. We were taught that a full-time job was just as important to maintain as the sacred space of hearth and home. We were taught that if you can’t manage it all then there’s something wrong with you. We were taught to shut up and smile in an even deadlier sphere of ‘cross the damn board. Many of us were put out (of our very own sacred space) … Put out of bodies that were meant to sustain us, in an effort to be fed (and mostly fed to) elsewhere. When here is where it is…where it’s always been. Here is where life grows, love takes huge gulps of water & air, where roots are planted so that they may make good use of the ground we’ve been blessed with. This is the divine feminine space we’ve been taught to sprint from, ignore even. It’s been an anywhere but here mindset; so much so, many women know only how to work from masculine energy – playing dress-up every day because, well, we also live in a society that simply doesn’t care if your breasts are too large to fit under lab coats, hips too wide to squeeze between 9-5, thighs too thick to run corporations that do not know your maiden name. Our energy is one that knows how to push, indeed. But when working from masculine verve, a conditioning took place. Instead of the expected features of ancestors past bleeding through, we came to the realization that we were birthing things resembling nothing even remotely familiar. Herein lies the disconnect 2019 aimed to first shine a blinding light on…and eventually mend. The mending hurt. The mending was for our own good – cod liver oil on a 100-year-old silver spoon. 2019 was the thief in the night sent by Divinity herself – took bags upon bags away from wearied shoulders so that she might have more room for herself. We woke up and all our shit was gone but we did not die. Your breath remained, your blood still flowed, your equilibrium eventually caught up. And after realizing that you were after-all still intact, still whole…you felt lighter! 2019 stripped away all that was stripping you; your higher self finally met you eye to eye and said, “you are beautiful naked”. 2020 will be a blushed-face femme replying, “thank you” and asking for her apron. It’s nice to be naked, yes. But she’s got some cooking to do (and bacon grease burns like hell when it pops up outta that cast-iron skillet). 2020 will be a rubbing down of the patriarchy after a long day’s work in a way that does not emasculate or undermine a genuine purpose, even though it went far left. 2020 will be the kitchen of grandmother’s house – built by granddaddy’s strong hands…but still (and forever) known as Grandma’s House. 2020 is feminine energy beginning to take her space back…because it feels good. Because it is good. Because it is divine…and when momma’s happy…
“I’m awfully bitter these days, because my parents were slaves.” ~#4 Peaches Nina Simone: Four Women (if you’ve never seen the 2011 Black Girls Rock tribute performance of Simone’s ‘Four Women’ belted out by Kelly Price, Marsha Ambrosious, Jill Scott & Ledisi, I HIGHLY recommend digging it from someone’s amateur recorded archives and having a look-see-listen-feel…it’ll change ya life!)
Just a lil tidbit for you to carry around in your pocket and know it’s there: 2020 breaks down / adds up to the number 4. A sacred number indeed, as there are 4 elements (fire, water, earth, air), 4 directions (north, south, east, west), and four equal sides creates a square with no weak points. Though it is considered a masculine number, (when considering the overall feel of 2020) I want you to bear in mind JayZ’s 4:44 – a creative endeavor indelibly not possible without the strong feminine aspects of his wife, lesbian mother and daughter…who all did their own unique part in rounding out his edges just a bit. Go 4ourth (double or nothin’ – make it gr8)!
Excerpt from original IG post @gonbeallwrite_mah: Dec 26, 2019 marked the last #eclipse of the decade – moon in #Capricorn (the formidable sign of my maternal family’s matriarch – forever and ever Amen!). Parts of Asia, Africa and Australia were blessed enough to visibly witness it. But all of us, of course, were affected by it. We are still in its grasp as its energy shall carry us into the #newyear, the #newdecade. Grasp back! But, be easy. Balance, baby. This eclipse is titled (the annular) ‘Ring of Fire’. All mammas know how that feels – the most intense part of giving birth. I’ll spare ya the details…let’s just say, I know you’re ready…but try not to tear! The blessing is here! And if it’s crying then it’s breathing…healthy…your legacy in the flesh. Best sound you’ll hear in all your days – generational #wealth moving at the speed of light! **Perhaps someone’s missing the labor room a bit.**🤷🏽♀️ Much love. More love. And then some. Keep pushin’ (but again, be easy 😉). The synchronicities are everywhere.
This last eclipse was solar. The next is lunar and right around the corner in its opposite sign of Cancer – ushering in a double whammy! On January 10th, 2020 will gift us the first eclipse of the decade. Of course, I could absolutely outline a long drawn-out explanation of what this all means…but nawww! Lol. How about think of it like this: this last eclipse was in Capricorn – the father of the zodiac and the next one will be in Cancer – the mother of the zodiac. These eclipses (one after the other) are meant to expedite the feelings that moms and dads have when it’s time for you to fly the nest. Momma wants her house back and daddy wants his wife back. They will still forever be your parents, yes. But now in a different way. They’ve taught you lessons that will go with you near and far; provided you with love that won’t wash away, no matter the depths of the oceans you sail on; stuffed you to the point of overflow with all things worthy of the stuffin’. And now they just want to see you fly; such that one day you might return the favor. And so it is…and shall be. Annular indeed! The following article breaks down what these eclipses mean for each zodiac sign. It’s pretty dope, so take a moment to check it out and let me know how these intense energies have been impacting you: https://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/features/a30326849/december-january-solar-and-lunar-eclipses/
Full-fat butter, brown suga’, cinnamon, pinch of salt, nutmeg, cayenne & ginger. Melt down ingredients in skillet; add pecans; place in oven (low broil) for a few minutes. Carefully spread out on greased parchment paper or foil and allow to cool and break apart. Enjoy! **a few splashes of water may help to melt down the brown suga’ base**
The holidays can be difficult for many of us. Memories surface of those who’ve passed on and we miss them like crazy. We may be forced around those we don’t necessarily prefer in our energy field. The approaching new year may bring up melancholic regrets of what was and has been – some things we may not be so proud of. And if that’s not enough, the sun decides to hide behind the clouds a bit more (perhaps taking its cue from the humans it shines upon) and the cold weather can leave us feeling cooped-up and lackluster – Seasonal Affective Disorder does it’s thing.
Baking eases some of the tension and sadness for me. What works to pull you out of the trenches of dark feelings will be your own…but be sure to TRY. Try in silence, try at a crawling pace. So long as you try. Something is bound to work in your favor, lift your mood, and push you forward. Forward being the key word.
Make it a point to write down what works, because even though it may seem silly…sometimes we are quick to skip on once the jolly returns; and then scratch our heads in forgetfulness when in need of that mechanism once again. Hence, another good use of gratitude journals and the like. Recently I had a request for my oatmeal cookies from a special someone who LOVES pecans. So I put a slight twist on the recipe (I’on really cook via recipe), but y’all know what I mean… So, candied pecan oatmeal cookies it is…of course with a few cranberries for chew and the quintessential dash of cayenne and orange zest! It smells and tastes like Holiday all up and through here… ♥️🎄
Since it’s coming to Netflix soon, I thought it fitting to revisit. #queenandslim
🥰 An Ode to ‘Queen & Slim’ – Once we’ve reached adulthood, it’s a question asked sometimes many times over. The connection of man and woman is after-all, fated towards reproduction…leaving something of value behind to carry your name, your tangible manifestations/successes, your physical features, your essence, your legacy. The flow of ‘Queen & Slim’ is well thought-out and executed in a realistic yet highly imagery-full way. It highlights the ongoing threat to this very natural way of movement through life as pertaining to the black masculine and feminine form when they dare come together to do what humans do – create a legacy. The movie opens with the start of such unions; a very modern-day scene as two semi-strangers finally shift from web interaction to face-to-face interaction. Angela and Ernest have their first encounter in a diner after a few weeks of online dating. The scene is dreary at best and both characters exude an air of boredom. Angela – lacking faith in all institutional structures that have come to frame her world, and Ernest – just…lacking. However, we are quickly brought into the exciting reality of just how much universal energy is pulled towards the connection of black man and black woman even at 154 years post American slavery and 65 years post Civil Rights Movement. The movie paints a picture of newness being weighed down by issues surrounding race (specifically regarding anti-black legal and social constructs) especially within and amongst two brown individuals attempting to join together romantically with any ideation toward bonding, building, creating and procreating, and (God-forbid) producing a sustainable legacy. ‘Queen & Slim’ is a roadtrip through the sweet, yet volatile, and at times outright terrifying beginnings of today’s black love. Below is a let(Her) from Angela’s (Queen’s) highest self, addressed to her other half, dripping in all the above…read lips: can I be your legacy? “It’s a theoretical truth… Black women look real nice dressed in all white.” ~MAHism2018
If you are reading this, I didn’t survive. Pushed a bit too far, awaiting your return on the other side. It’s nice here. Better than nice. It feels like love walking, love talking, love growing (never going backwards); it feels like you and me…forever. I promise, if I concentrate real hard and quiet my mind past the memory of my own mortality, I can hear the pitter-patter of the children we never had; I can feel the relief of a society that finally believed what we did was (w)holy in self-defense; I can dream of a future that never had a chance…know that it was and will be. Our ancestors have reassured me that you are on your way. “Hush child”, they say. “Worry not. He’s coming to meet you.” They tell me that you’ve stayed behind, hovering amidst those you left, in an effort to provide for them and protect them in a way that you never could in the physical. And, of course I believe them with everything I have, because that is you – my earnest Ernest. In pursuance of love and duty of family in every way.
If you are reading this know that I really liked you the first time we met. And if I’d had the chance, I would have told the few girlfriends I still had left just how much I felt safe with you. Even before the bargaining of your own pride with a white cop to save us both, even before the shots fired to hold down a rabid dog dressed in a pig’s uniform, even before driving us through the night towards my divided family and away from your intact one. You were so good. Not in a way where naivety could slip between your ears; but in the way where you could still believe. I envied you that a bit; it got under my skin – how you actually thought we could go back. How you needed the comforts of home so bad; not realizing how seeking those comforts would be a sure enough death before even living. I knew that I would have to be your comfort moving on. It was the least I could do. If it had not been for you, all three of us would’ve been dead within 20 minutes of leaving the diner – that devil-ass cop, me…and you. So yeah, I would have to be your comfort and that terrified the shit out of me. How do you give something that you’ve never had? How do you give to something that you’ve never had? You didn’t require much of me…allowed me to be who I was, never pushed, only pushed back when what I said nudged your inherent wisdom, allowed space for me to speak of my past whenever I was comfortable (and not a moment sooner). Slim, you were…a too good to be true that needed a little edge and the comforts of home. I hope I was that for you.
If you are reading this, know I’ve told my mom all about you. She likes to look at you through my depiction; a depiction outside of her own hovering energy. She was with us the entire time. She knew my uncle would make a safe space for us. Though she never agreed with his life choices, she will always be his big sister. And big sisters forgive – they must, in order to survive. She made our bed before we reached his home in New Orleans. She decided on a menu for us coming from off the long drive. She worked on his heart while he slept. Do you hear me Slim? She was with us the entire time…a maternal divinity shed of all the weight of the world stood beside our creator and made a way out of no way. This is how things are done on this side. A walking beside oneself, a walking with one’s legacy, a walking into one’s divinity. She knew that our salvation hid in the sweaty palms of whore houses, good ‘ol boy trucks & pimp rides, a broken black daughter dressed in all white stained with her own blood, back-yard haircuts, 2 am braid unraveling, modern-day abolitionists who choose to repay their forefathers’ debt, gentrified Underground-Railroad-rigged houses, and black officers having an exceptionally bad day at work. She worked magic for us.
If you are reading this know that my entire life was formatted around a moment that would crash-land into you. I’d been through so much before that fateful night; before swiping right. So much, that the humble pie served by the familiar plump waitress was a welcome taste in my mouth. Feeding me in ways that allow the wounds to heal – turns scar tissue into butterfly wings. You taste like that pie. My body did not stop taking blows for you – the angels here tell me that is of divine design. My thigh absorbing the bullets of fear and willful ignorance, shoulder absorbing the shock of escape from windows on high. And if I’d had the chance, I would have stretched out my midsection many times over for you – watched your fingers as they traced the roads surrounding my umbilicus…retraced the way. We were going nowhere fast without each other. And I’ll always swear on you. As I crossed over, the light wonderfully concluded in a mirror and there I saw myself for the first time. I saw myself through your eyes. It was the best moment of my life! Though most would say I was no longer living. Most know nothing of life or death. If she is who you see when gazing at my form…then the saying is true! Thick thighs really do save lives. Together we were wounded woman in the passenger seat, slim eyes and midnight’s skin behind the wheel just trying to make it over a body of water to a place where we didn’t have to hide in plain sight. Together. We were.
If you are reading this know that the sheriff with Native blood made it home to his son safely. I made sure of it. Know you can indeed…finally…dead the whole ‘ride or die’ antic…been there, did that. Who needs a t-shirt to show and prove when there are angel wings? Know that the cost of freedom is (and has always been)…everything. Know that your true downfall will be a nigga with nothing to lose approaching with a rifle…while you sleep. Know that we never had to be twice as good…ain’t no such thang. Know that my favorite place on God’s green earth was a movie theater – where nosebleeds are the best seats, and the tickets don’t vary in price. Know that the first bullet was from a white man, but the one that killed was from his wife, his daughter, his mother. Know that the entirety of our union was a road trip towards the sea; and my last words were formed into a question asked only to you, “can I be your legacy?” Shots fired, “you already are.”
***Feel free to leave me more links within the ‘comments’ or ‘contact’ section. I read a few blog posts that completely miss the mark when it comes to this movie, it’s portrayal of black love, and social injustice (some even written by folks with brown hands). Interesting!***
MAHism2025: prose, poetry, peculiarities... 