We all have them, those “blah” gray sort of days.  Days when we don’t feel like doing much of anything, but we have to anyway because our work/children/spouse/project demand that we do.  That’s when I put on my Get Happy playlist because these songs never fail to put me in a fantastic mood.  All of these songs either morph me into a happy, Sunday-afternoon-at-the-park sort of mood or make me want to get up and dance.  I’ve got good music and I’m good to go.

“Love Shack” by B-52s

I secretly think that I am a member of the B-52s; I have the white go-go boots already.  ”Love Shack” is my number one song to put me in a fantastic mood.  It makes me want to dance around and do the pony.   I would kill this song at karaoke!

“Pump” by B-52s

If you think the B-52s greatest hits are old school, think again.  Their latest release is just as rocking as songs of old.  ”Pump” is classic B-52s: addictive guitar riffs and esoteric (or just crazy) lyrics.  Listening to this song makes me wanna swing my hips wildly while shaking a tambourine.

“Back to Love” by The Brand New Heavies

Most of The Brand New Heavies music is funky and groovy–perfect for creating a sunny mood.  But this song has the benefit of uplifting lyrics as well.  It’s a message that everyone needs to remember: “…we seem to lose our way, somehow got lead astray, that’s why I’m here to say, got to get back, get back to love.”

“Groove is in The Heart” by Dee-Lite

Do you see a pattern here?  I like groovy music.  Peace signs, disco balls, go-go boots–give it to me, baby!  This song is a flower-child dance party, with a 90s house beat.  I dare you to listen and stay in your seat.

“Cherish” by Madonna

A bouncy, feel-good beat and sing-aloud lyrics about love keeps this song on my Get Happy playlist.  True, I can’t get the image of Madonna wearing all that lace out of my head, but I don’t hold it against her.  How can I?  I used to dress like her!

“I’m Every Woman” by Chaka-Khan

This song makes me feel like I can conquer the world.  Chaka is belting out those lyrics with the force of nature.  By the end of the song when the music crescendos,  all I need is a cape and a big W on my chest and I’m ready to fly!

“All This Time” by Sting

Soul Cages is one of my favorite albums by Sting; the writing is incredible.  Even though this song is about his father’s death, Sting’s poetic lyrics and great music makes it a up-beat tribute instead of a dirge.   You can feel the maritime intentions in the song–the waves rolling, the sea breeze, the boat rocking.   I love the beach and this song takes me right there.

“Dancing Queen” by ABBA

Yes, I know it’s clichéd, but despite the over-use of this song, it still puts me in a good mood.  With the disco ball twinkling, I can hear the DJ saying, “It’s time for ladies only skate, ladies only.”  In my tube socks and shiny shorts, I can see myself gliding around the roller rink.

“P.Y.T” by Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson showed his talent through many songs, but whenever I play this song I feel his passion and happiness.  And that happiness is then transferred to me.  I don’t try to moon-walk though.

“I Like It Like That” by The Blackout All-Stars

There aren’t that many lyrics to this song, it’s all about the beat.  Latin music is made for dancing; the horns and Congo drums make me want to throw on a twirly skirt, some high heels and do the merengue.

“Haven’t You Heard” by Patrice Rushen

Another song with limited lyrics, “Haven’t You Heard” is all about the music.  Patrice Rushen is an incredible musician and arranger and her blend of jazz, funk and R&B always has me tapping my toes and bopping my head.  This is perfect Sunday afternoon, life-is-good type of music.

“Let’s Go Crazy” by Prince

A musical genius.   I love many a Prince song and different songs put me in different moods.  ”Let’s Go Crazy” is Prince in a zany mood and the song makes me feel zany too.   With lyrics like “let’s look for the purple banana ’til they put us in the truck” how can you not get in a great mood?

“Rebel Yell” by Billy Idol

I love to rock out to this song.  À la Jennifer Beals I want to wear ripped sweatshirts and leg warmers while dancing a scene out of Flashdance.  Or sometimes I play it really loud in my car when I’m frustrated and it never fails to make me calmer and more in control.

“The Biggest Part of Me” by Ambrosia

This is my singing in the shower song, the one that makes me croon into my pretend microphone.  Singing this song I have my audience in the palm of my hand; all eyes are closed and they’re doing the church wave.  This image never fails to put a smile on my face.

“Sunday Morning” by Maroon 5

Smooth, jazzy and groovy, “Sunday Morning” is what I want to hear while taking my dog for a walk.  Sometimes walking my dog can be a chore, but a song like this puts a skip in my step.  My dog thanks you Maroon 5.

“Flashlight” by Parliament

After the 9 second intro, right when the song really begins, I want to jump up, land in a splits, jump up again and do a James Brown spin.  From there I would go into an impressive robot dance, then snake on the floor.  If only.  Instead, I do my own version of a funky dance.

“8th Wonder” by Sugar Hill Gang

The beat is fresh and the rap lyrics memorable.   It’s my ring tone and I have a mini-dance party every time someone calls me.  An interactive party song asking you to sing along, how can you stay in a bad mood reciting lyrics like: “If you’re ready to party and you’re ready to jam, scream it out and say ‘I am (I am) somebody (somebody),’ now you know you are.  You go ah, ah, ah-ah, ooh, ooh.”

“Love of My Life Worldwide” by Erykah Badu (featuring Queen Latifah, Bahamadia & Angie Stone)

I used to love “Funk You Up” by Sequence back in the day and Erykah Badu took a good thing and made it even better.   The addition of Queen Latifah, Bahamadia and original member of Sequence, Angie Stone, adds multiple layers to an already smoking song.  If I could break dance to this song, I would.  Alas, I have to settle for wearing my shell-tops and doing a quick Kid ‘N Play step.

“Woo” by Erykah Badu

Erykah Badu was on fire with the Worldwide Underground album.  This song puts me in happy mood, but more like a mellow, funky, happy mood rather than maniacally happy.  I can’t be bouncing off the wall all the time.  Right here I’m tipping my fedora over one eye, sipping a glass of Prosecco or champagne and bopping my head to the beat.

“Good Life” by Kayne West

It samples one of my other Get Happy songs, Michael’s Jackson’s P.Y.T., and it gets me hyped.  Although Kayne’s version of the good life is not the same as mine, still I throw my hands up in the air and scream, “I’m good.”

Today my sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc, was founded in 1908 on the campus of Howard University.   It is the oldest Greek-lettered organization established by African American college women.  I pledged Zeta Alpha chapter at Arizona State University in the 2nd semester of my sophomore and I think it was one of the best things that I have ever done.

Surprised that I am a sorority girl?  I was surprised myself that I wanted to pledge!  I never thought of myself as a “sorority type” because I was artsy and a bit strange, but a friend talked me into going to an information “tea” and I liked what I heard.  Truth be told, the existing members didn’t quite know what to make of me when I entered the room for my interview.  I will never forget: I wore a long black dress, black boots and a black hat.   And there they were…in their pearls and silk dresses.  I was out of place for sure!   But they took a chance on me (I think I had good recommendations) and every one of them eventually came to love my quirky style.

Pledging was rough–I’m not going to lie–but it was not physically harmful in any way.  The most challenging part was trying to do all that was required of a pledge and still study for my classes.   Honestly it is almost impossible to pledge and not have your grades slip a little and mine did; I made it up though and still graduated with honors.   From an outsider (someone who is not Greek), pledging looks stupid and senseless.  While I admit that many of the things that we were asked to do were stupid and senseless, it was all to teach us how to be “one unit” and look out for each other.  Sort of like the military.  And of course once we were in the sorority, we got our chance to mess with the new pledges.  Once my roommate was the dean of pledges and so I had special torture privileges because they came to my room everyday.   Lucky for them I was in my senior year and busy, so I didn’t demand too much, but just to be mean, my Big Sister name was “Chilly As In Ice–Not Nice”.   Ha!   I loved messing with them, but once they were in, I was as sweet as pie.  One of my pledges is a good friend to this day, so she has forgiven me.  :-)

I don’t know if I would have pledged if I had gone to another school or if my experience would have been so great somewhere else, but at ASU I have the best memories.   Having been an only child my whole life, I experienced sisterhood like I had never felt before.  I lived in the sorority dorm with my sisters and every day was so much fun.  My line sister and roommate Sondra became one of my best friends.   After graduation we never again lived in the same place and the chaos of life caused us to not even keep in touch that much, but I saw her recently and it was like old times; we sat in a restaurant for 5 hours talking non-stop.   There is a bond there created by Alpha Kappa Alpha.

I could give you a history lesson about all the community service that the sorority does or how we are dedicated to seeing women succeed in college and beyond, but for me it was all about the sisterhood.    Many of my sorors were in my wedding and one of my favorite memories of that day is when they surrounded me and sang our sorority hymn.   That song still always makes me cry.

*Dictionary Sidebar: “Soror” is what we call each other and “line sister” refers to the people who pledged with us.  Oh, and if you don’t know, “Skee-Wee” is the sound that other AKA’s make to greet each other or just let other people know that we are in the house.  It’s really high-pitched and has been known to break glass.

And talk about having fun!   We threw parties, went to other Greek parties, participated in school-wide Greek functions, took road trips to other colleges and had many late-night pajama parties.   Of course there was friction sometimes–have you ever known a group of women to not have friction?   But in the end it always came down to one thing: we were sisters.

On a road trip to a SDSU step show

At UCLA stepshow

ASU was not a very diverse school, that is to say, the black people were scarce.   And it is also one of the biggest schools in the country, an easy school to feel lost and alone in if you don’t have a crew.   I was far away from my Minnesota home and I only knew one other person on campus before coming to school; joining the sorority gave me an instant family and a place to belong.  And not just in my own sorority.   Because most of the other Black Greek Organizations were relatively small chapters like ours, all of us were one family.   Of course there was friendly rivalry, but with so few of us at the school, there was no room for dissension.

I have many, many fond memories but one of the best is when I got “kid-napped” while pledging.   It is not unusual for fraternities members to try to kidnap a pledge and for that reason pledges were never supposed to be somewhere alone.    However one night I had to study in the library and for whatever reason, I went alone.    When I was done studying I left the library and unlocked my bike to ride back to my dorm room.   Just then two members of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity (our brother fraternity) surrounded me and I had nowhere to run.   Since I was going to be in trouble anyway with my Big Sisters for being kidnapped, I figured that I might as well have fun.   I asked them to take me to Haagen-Dazs for ice cream and they did, but when we got there, they only had 7 cents between them!   They were broke!   I had to buy my own ice cream, can you believe it?  It was so ridiculous that I still have the 7 cents taped in my scrapbook.   Wait–It gets worse.  When they returned me to the library to get my bike, it had been stolen because they whisked me away right after I had unlocked it.  And they were too broke to replace it!  Eventually I shamed them into scrounging up 1/2 of the money for a new bike and good faith between our respective organizations was restored.   And yes, my line sisters and I totally got blasted for my kid-napping.  It’s funny now, but it wasn’t funny then.

Really I could go on and on with all kinds of stories.   It’s funny because many people who have met me after graduate school don’t even know I’m an AKA.  I don’t have a license plate and I rarely wear my letters.   I’m not currently active in a graduate chapter.   I do not feel the need to let people I meet know about this part of my life; more often than not it is my husband who will tell others about my sorority membership.   Yet, my sorority is something very dear to my heart.  I have fantastic memories of my college years and I know it is because of Alpha Kappa Alpha.

Thank you Alpha Kappa Alpha for having a vision more than 100 years ago of sisterhood and service.  This quirky, artsy girl will always proudly wear her pink and green.  Skeeeeeee-Weeeee!

I try not to make assumptions about people because my life experiences have taught me that appearances are not always what they seem.  I can’t count the number of times (unfortunately) that I have admired a couple’s seemingly happy marriage only to hear that they are getting a divorced.  And I have been shocked more than once when a white-bred suburban friend has told me about their love of hip-hop and R&B–and I’m talking back in the day when the world wasn’t as musically integrated as it is now.  Nope, you just can never tell about some people.  Take my young friend Stuart for example: looking at his photo you wouldn’t think that he knows about and celebrates African American culture, but seriously this dude is down in the most colloquial sense of the word.   And just so you don’t get it twisted by his hilarious and life observational Seinfeld-esque tweets, keep following him on Twitter and you will see that he’s a Christian always speaking the truth and standing on God’s word.  Stuart is an inspiration to know.

In this area of faith, my husband and I are an anomaly in our current environment and as such have certain assumptions made about us.  Because of where we live (intown Atlanta, not a suburb) and our kids go to a very progressive school and of course because we both have dreadlocks, it is assumed that we are a reflection of our environment (and hair).  Comments are often made to us or about us that are meant to affirm or agree with what people think our values are.  This is the problem with assumptions and not taking the time to really get to know someone versus who you think they are according to superficial criteria.

Well if you don’t know, now you know.  We are dread-lock wearing, tattoo-having, hip-hop-listening, intown-living, funki-dressing, fun-loving, Bible-believing, God-honoring, Jesus-loving Christians.   *Gasp!*–Yes, it’s true that Christians can look like us and act like us too!  ”Great” you say….until I am in a high school parent meeting with you and I say that my husband and I do not believe that our kids should drink under-age, do drugs (at any age) or have pre-marital sex (although really this is just common sense).  Or when I say that no, I don’t believe that people should get divorced just because they are “unhappy”–they should really try to honor their commitment to God and each other and work it out (again really not a Christian thing, just common sense).  Or any number of statements that I can make that are contradictory to my environment and the world at large.   Right…uh-huh, we are those kind of Christians.  See, now why are you looking at me like I have 3 heads when we were cool just a minute ago?

BUT I’ll tell you what:  If you promise to not make assumptions about me, like all dread heads smoke weed or that all Christians are home-schooling 18 member families (not that there’s anything wrong with that) then I promise not to assume that you can’t dance because you wear Dockers or that you are a heathen going to hell in a hand basket.  Deal?

I just got back from Blogalicious 2009.  This was my first blogging conference so I didn’t quite know what to expect, but I was very impressed by the conference as a whole; the venue was beautiful, the food was fantastic, the sponsors were generous, the swag bags were overflowing, the parties were jamming and the lovely hosts from MamaLaw were gracious and efficient.  The information that I obtained was varied and rich and the women bloggers that I met were interesting and smart.  The keynote speeches from James Andrews (my husband) and Karen Walrond were inspirational, while sessions like Taking Your Blog to the Next Level and Secrets to a Successful Blog provided good answers, but I left the conference also asking myself more questions.  Questions like: Am I blogging with purpose?  Am I passionate?  Am I even doing this right?  And mostly…Why do I blog?

I asked and I answered:

I blog to give information in categories like Techknow Mama, Things I like and Ma-Gyver.

I blog to entertain in Kickin’ It Old School and through many of the silly travel family videos that I post in T as in Tango.

I blog to build a community through posts about myself and my family in What About Me, My Charmed Life or Word From the Mother.  I hope that the more you know about me, the more you will share about yourself; that creates community.

I blog Deep Stuff to foster discussion and conversation.  I’m a thinker and I know you are too.

I blog to save the world from mediocrity.  We’ve got to keep the bar high people.  We’re all fabulous; let’s live it!

Through it all, I blog to tell stories.  As Scott Rosenberg says in his book, Say Everything: How Blogging Began, What It’s Becoming, And Why It Matters, “A [blog] post is a shared memory….And in the end, that’s what we want and need to remember about our lives, and the lives of others: not factual details but meaningful stories.”  Whether I am writing about Disney World, my marriage, Henry Louis Gates or the best cupcakes, I aim to do it with passion, transparency and authenticity in a way that hopefully makes you remember your own stories.

I blog because I have a voice and I have something to say.  And that is reason enough.

I woke up this morning seemingly with all forces against me: it was raining, I didn’t feel well and my daughter was grumpy and moving slow.  Despite these odds I managed to push through what I was feeling and get my morning started on a good note due to my “gospel boogie” playlist on my iPod.   I tweeted about it and my Twitter pal and real life friend @pschwed wanted me to post my playlist; she said it sounds perfect for what her daughter calls a “bloopy” day (I like that word…it describes today perfectly).  As you can see, my playlist is heavy on Kirk Franklin and Canton Jones–2 of my favorite artists who make me wanna get up and boogie.   I know everyone who passed my car today thought I was listening to Hot 97 because I was grooving so much.

So this is for Paula and anyone else out there who needs a lift today:

Message in the Music–Debra Killings

Fix It–Canton Jones

Holla–Canton Jones

Keep On Praisin’–Fred Hammond

Looking For You–Kirk Franklin

Stay Saved–Canton Jones

Better–Kirk Franklin

1-2 Victory Check–Tye Tribbett

Good Time–Canton Jones

Old School–Lisa McClendon

Stomp–Kirk Franklin

Brighter Day–Kirk Franklin

Everybody Dancin’–Canton Jones

Get On The Floor–Canton Jones

ATL–Canton Jones

Heaven–Mary Mary

The Real Party–Mary Mary