My book PHAT BOI is now available on KDP audiobooks on Amazon. You can listen to a sample or the whole story for free if you have a subscription to Kindle Unlimited. Here is a summary of what my story is about.
Cedric is a gay, overweight black man with self-esteem issues, which he hides behind his sense of humor. He has a smart mouth but is vulnerable when it comes to love. At a spiritual retreat, he meets Walter, who is attractive, masculine, intelligent and entirely out of his league. Cedric is immediately infatuated. To his surprise, Walter responds favorably. As their friendship develops, so do Cedric’s feelings for Walter. When unsettling secrets about Walter emerge, Cedric chooses to overlook them. A devastating event takes Cedric by surprise and forces him to confront the truth about Walter—his life will never be the same again.
Stage two of my birthday celebration. I’m in Greece. On the island of Thassos to be exact. Staying at a lovely resort on the Aegean sea. It is very hot here; reminds me of home. Thank god there is good AC. The people have been friendly even though some stare, not sure what is behind that? I’m a coffee junkie so I’ve been having several latte’s and cappuccinos per day. This is a great place to come if you want a laid back kind of holiday.
I’m in London for my birthday. I love this city except for the lousy weather. So much to do culturally and all kinds of entertainment. Plays are a must for probably the best acting in the world especially the classics. Great museums and the great wealth of The Royal Family to visit.
June is Gay Pride month. Happy Gay Pride! What do you plan to do to celebrate? I plan to post more on here. Go out a little more and be in the presence of my gay brothers and sisters. Not take for granted that the way this country is polarized that hard-fought rights could be taken away. I intend to do me and you should do the same.
I loved this movie. It was simple yet complex in some ways dealing with issues like; selling out your values and the guilt in doing it, white people’s privilege and their stereotypical concepts of black people, homosexuality especially with the black father, and having to take care of an aging parent a with debilitating illness. There was a lot of laugh-out-loud humor though and some pertinent one-liners. I loved Tracy Ellis Ross’s character. Too bad it was a cameo as was Sterling K Brown’s, who was hilarious and tender. Since watching him on This Is Us he has mastered the craft of making a tender moment bring one to tears. Jeffrey Wright is always good, he’s an excellent actor. I didn’t think that Sterling or Jeffrey’s performance is Oscar-worthy but my opinion does not take away from their very good performances
I saw The Color Purple today with my friend Juanita and we both loved it. I would see it again when it comes on cable. It was very well done. The singing and dancing was terrific. The energy of the dancers and the choreography was superb.
Danielle Brooks as Sophia was outstanding. She stood out the most and should win awards for her performance. Taraji Henson (was not Cookie from Empire ) as I’ve heard said on social media but Shug Avery and delivered the necessary elements of that character. Who knew that she could sing like that, she sounded great.
Fantasia was fine. She was adequate in the role however I needed to hear a more powerful impactful singer. Her voice would get lost in the chorus of background singers. Domingo Colman was good as Mister and unlikeable due to his character. All the other performances were strong. It is odd to make a musical on a book that tackled domestic violence, racism and lesbianism. For the people who are critical of this, I say Operas tackle dramatic subjects that are sung.
I came to this movie with an open mind, even though I’d read both positive and negative feedback about it. I did not let the original movie of thirty-eight years ago influence my feelings. I tend to be critical but was pleasantly surprised that fifteen minutes into the movie, I realized I was enjoying this and that continued towards the end. What surprised me even more was that I teared up a couple of times during tender moments. I have no idea why that happened except that I was moved.
Go see this movie for yourselves and form your own opinion. I did feel a sense of pride towards all the black people who contributed to this movie with the hopes that ‘the suits’ in Hollywood will finance more projects like this with people of color in the lead.
Inspiration, you never know when it will show up. It happened to me yesterday at work. A visitor showed up and when he told me his name, I instantly knew it had to be one of my characters in a pending book, whenever that may be. His name was Bakary Darbo except that I would turn it around and call my him Darbo Bakary, which sounds much better. I told the visitor about my inspiration with his name and asked his permission to use it in a future book. He agreed with a huge smile. It tickled him that someone would use his name in this fashion.
Lately I’ve taken to carrying a small note book with me to jot-down moments like this. This is a practice I’ve done in the past but never kept up. I do keep a journal and have similar issues with that. My excuse for not journaling as often as I should is that my journal is bigger and sometimes I just forget and have to recap anything interesting I may have overlooked. This is sometimes not a good idea because the moment when it happened has passed and my recollection may not be as authentic as It could have been.
I’ve been getting inspiration from dreams in the last couple of months. I don’t normally dream as frequently as I have lately so I’ve been taking advantage to recall and write down what I remember. One such dream I had recently which I will share with you by paraphrasing. I witnessed a young six year old boy get physically abused by his parent or guardian (bare with me the details can be fuzzy in dreams). They suddenly disappeared and the boy was left homeless and orphaned. I decided to take care of him because I was struck by his intelligence for one so young. He observed everything and formulated opinions in his head expressing them or asking questions of me to clarify the thought. People naturally were attracted to this cute kid with the adventurous mind.
Considering all the abuse he endured he was resilient, and probably hid that sadness deep within that I knew had to come out someday. I found myself caring for this kid more and more as if he was my own. He became my own. I found myself having the feelings of parents that would do anything for their child. It was a really good feeling that I enjoyed experiencing. Unfortunately I was fighting a system that was making it difficult to adopt him because I was gay. I woke up at this point, but my attempt to fall asleep to continue this dream was futile. So I lay there thinking about the dream, still having that feeling for my boy until it eventually faded. I think in my future I’d like to experience that feeling again but in real life this time.
I’m loving this very cute British rom-com on Prime. The two leads are good looking but especially Leo is drop dead gorgeous. His acting is so-so. But it’s an enjoyable look at interracial relationships without the baggage of racism.
Aaron Blackwood 