All my melanin sisters are walking around with a new glow and confidence because they received external validation through a song, and I can’t help but wonder why Beyonce needed to say Brown skin girls are beautiful and worthy for them to believe it!

I feel like I have been talking and attempting to write about the Netflix movie Nappily Ever After a lot lately. In the Sex Talk After Dark, Shayla Tumbling and I discussed the movie and the impact of hair on sexuality. I am glad to have had the discussion, but I have also been wondering why this movie is so hard to write about. For those who have seen it, feel free to proceed. For those who haven’t and are okay with spoilers, you do the same. IF you are NOT into spoilers in anyway, it might be time to hit the “x” in the upper left hand corner because spoilers are definitely ahead!

Ava DuVernay’s A Wrinkle In Time was...weird for me. I know that, for the culture, we keep our silence if we hate something, because we still want it to do well. However, this prose is not to render judgement on whether the movie was good or bad, but rather to touch on one of the very many things that were thought provoking and some kinda wonderful. Honestly, if I were to render judgement I would likely say that when it first finished, I was not immediately pleased. But I was prepared to place blame anywhere else, including giving it to the original author of the book, though I know and have been told that this movie deviates from the book. However, the more I allow myself to actively reflect on this movie, and the more I speak about it with friends, the more my opinion of the movie evolves. There is certainly something to be said about processing a movie with Black women who, like me, enjoy drawing meaning from what we see. Please note, that there will definitely be some spoilers ahead.

It’s the third Friday, so you know what time it is. Turn the PAGE!!! This week’s book is Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi. Yall. When I heard about this book. When I heard the title. When I heard the authors name. When I saw the book cover. I. HAD. ALL. THE. FEELS! As a Nigerian-American, I was super excited to see and hear about this book. I was even more excited (and anxiety filled) when I started reading the book. Now, I got this book when it came out. I was reading it way back then. The question is: why has it taken me so long to write this Turn The Page for it? The answer is really simple: I have not finished reading the book.

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Since Black Panther came out, there have been so many articles talking about it, critiquing it, and praising it. But one thing remains almost steadily true, almost none of those articles talk about the main character, T’Challa. T'Challa is seen as not being interesting because some say he doesn’t “do” much. But that is where people are wrong. I see him as a hero for the introvert-- or at least the introvert that lives within me.

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I have been of the mind that Black women are (secretly?) the most feared “minority” population. I say this because when Black women speak, and stand in their truth, everyone is implicated; white people and PoC alike. There seems to be a vested interest in silencing the stories of Black women because in those stories, who is free from blame?

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Here is a little disclosure about me, I don’t generally like autobiographies. I find that they can be terribly dull and full of pomp. I know I read The Last Black Unicorn by Tiffany Haddish, but if you’ll remember, I also said that the writing left much to be desired. But Gabrielle Union's book We're Going to Need More Wine: Stories That Are Funny, Complicated, and Are True was a delight to read! It was finished before I was.

Within this book, there were so many nuggets can could be the area of focus. We could talk about how we pretend to be something/someone we are not so that we can fit into various groups. We could also talk about what can happen to a relationship when our significant others' family doesn't like us. We can talk about the impacts of sexual assault, being with the wrong person, or finding the right person. But what I want to talk about is the process by which Gabrielle Union, not only created a wholly new unit with her husband, Dwayne Wade, but also what her experience in Blackness confirms and re-teaches us.

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