Lost Ones

A lost girl. Not in the film. Boys are more important.

You'd think that after 2 stemless glasses of Beaujolais Nouveau, a 1/2 hour of Billy Ocean soundtracked Everybody Hates Chris and the satisfaction of cleaning my stove, still grease splattered by haphazard Thanksgiving cookery, I'd be good and glad for the evening but the Netflix selection that had been collecting dust on my desk changed it all. Since I finished Season 2 of Lost a few weeks back I've been on docs. The Lost Boys was the latest preceded by Outfoxed and The Fog of War. But I had to pause The Lost Boys 45 minutes in. Santino's talk of African's black Blackness vs. our brown Blackness, the loneliness, and the shaming stares was just too much. And that's not counting David's anger at surviving war and crossing the Atlantic only to daily get got by Black Americans. So to keep their red eyes from watering mine, I'll talk about Ciara. "Promise." Unreasonable weave, suspendered leggings, clownish coquettishness, and long platformed feet gainfully grinding her way into all of our iPod rotations. "Turned Away" just came on BETJ. Flat top, rat tail, prominent synths, obligatory 80's R&B rock riff, more leggings and in the background what looks like a moonlighting Fly Girl (Deidre?). I'm already feeling better. God bless Diane Martel and Chuckii Booker.

Jesus. I think "Looking for You" will be on my 2006 singles list even though the album from whence it came dropped in late '05 and its author is a booty shakin' kiddie porn addict. What else is there to look for? It's no surprise that the Nazarene plays prominent in The Lost Boys. From Sudan to North Dakota or Kansas. From survivors to buck toothed haints who may or may not be too old for school, who will fail drivers test, who will struggle to find friends, who will learn about garbage disposals and electric stoves and deodorant, who will rack up three too many tickets, who will miss friends who are family since family was slaughtered. I'll probably Google a place to volunteer or donate tomorrow and hit up service on Sunday. Jesus saves.

I only found the lost girl above when doing an image search for the lost boys. I assumed she and her sistren were excluded from the film because they were slaughtered along with the boys parents. I didn't know it was willful exclusion although I'm not surprised. Much like my response to Luda's foolishly earnest "Runaway." He really means well. His baby mother's a Spelmanite who used to rock a natural (possibly still does), he shouts out African women in his pimping anthem and now he's confessed to empathy with abused young women. Chicken & fear.

And one more thing to all those with Save Darfur banners stickered to their blogs or emblazoned across tees, who will save you for whom Black is still bad just fashionably pitiable. Too many, stateside Blacks, White and others are pervesely enthralled by the charcoal colored continentals. That way of seeing, instituionalized no doubt, and at its root the cause of the current death knell, has got to be overcome. Let' talk personal transformation.

PS-BETJ is a much watch. Smokey and Rick James are acting very badly in the clip to a video I have never seen and doesn't John Legend recall Smokey in countenance and composure?