I forgot that my birthday was coming.

Not to say that I didn’t know May 24^th was coming. It’s just that it’s May 24, 2019; not May 24, 2020. I turn 30 next year, so I’ve been drafting plans for my celebration. Looking at costs. Figuring out what needs to be done. 30 is a big one.

I don’t even know when it dawned on me, but that attitude is really ungrateful. What about today? Between May 24, 2020 and this day, so much will change–and not all

of the change will be welcomed.

My late brother’s birthday is 10 days away from mine, June 4th. He died when he was 20. Every time I have celebrated a birthday after 20, I thought, “This is another year that I got to see that Dominique did not,” and it’s hard to process because I still feel so young. Yet here I am not celebrating one year like the next one is promised to me.

I remember being in high school, and I was hype to graduate. College was coming down the pipe. I needed that. My brother died during my senior year. I went off to college, but there was no more time to spend with him.

Eventually, the thrill of college wore off. It was time to go. I had done all of the things. Met all of the people, and real adulting was awaiting me. I could not wait to graduate. My grandmother was diagnosed with cancer two months before my graduation. I graduated from college, but there was no more time for a well grandma.

I remember that gap between me and graduate school. I was trying to figure out the next step. Will a job come through? Will I go to school? I thought everything would be alright when I got to the next thing. My grandma died two months before I was supposed to go to graduate school. I went to school. My life took off, but there was no more time to spend with my grandma.

I had to check myself a few days ago because I told someone, “29 is just a weird year. Like, what do you do with it?”

You live in it.

I’m sure I’m not the only one who has been guilty of living life from mountaintop moment to mountaintop moment; taking for granted all of the people, places, and things who even gave me the strength to climb.

We can get so caught up in the next thing that we forget the blessing of the moment we’re in. I live in a place I really, really love. Life could pull me away from here, and I’ll be sitting around telling people how I miss New Orleans. But did I embrace it as much as I could while I’m here, today?

My job is any other work place. It has its highs and lows, but for the most part, I enjoy working with my colleagues. One day, we’ll all be in different places. I’ll be dealing with some oddball in another place, and I’ll wish I had the set of colleagues I have now. But am I learning all I can from them now and enjoying the opportunity to be there, or am I focusing on the things I can’t do anything about?

I have a circle of great people, friends and some family. As we continue to live forward, we will surrender to eternity. Hopefully no time soon, but it will happen. One day, I’ll be saying I miss someone else. But did I love up on them as much as I could today?

My nieces and nephews are all little people. One day, I’ll be like “When did you get grown? I miss you little.” But did I make time to kick it with them on the playground, today?

And if all of that stuff will matter when it’s gone, why do I take it for granted while I have it today?

So I guess what I’m trying to say is, the big things matter a lot, but the little things matter the most.

I’m grateful for today, and I plan to eat the marrow out of 29. (That was country, I know.)

Happy Joshua Johnson Day!

Be Light,

Joshua

I talk to myself when I’m by myself. Sometimes it’s conscious. Sometimes it’s unconscious. I was sitting here working, and I unconsciously said, “People often talk themselves right out of the place that God is trying to bring them into.”

Yesterday, I was sitting at a table of architects and attorneys who partner with my job for architectural best practice initiatives. I was there to unveil the new Learning Management System that they’ll be using with their employees, a system that I administer. As I sat there waiting to present, I kept reminding myself of how accomplished these people are and how much superior their knowledge was to my own. I told myself that I needed to get up there and really flow because I didn’t want to seem ignorant with all of these heavy hitters in the room.

I’m also trying to learn to think about what I’m thinking about, so shortly thereafter I realized just how disparaging I was being to myself. And it’s something that I do often, if I may be honest. I share for these purposes- I realize that anything that any human ever goes through, another does.

When I started interning, I had a lingering, subconscious thought that I wasn’t doing things right. My supervisor picked up on my constant nervousness. When I started working, I was always wondering when I’d be pulled in and reprimanded. I’m not even sure for what. Before I even got promoted, I told my supervisor that there may be someone more qualified than me. She said, “There may be, but you can do it.”

Even in aspects of my personal life as things have began to flow in alignment with my prayers, I’ve often found myself wondering when hell would break loose. Even though it’s exactly what I’d prayed for.

Why do we do that? Why do we ask for what we want and then settle for something lessor and live our lives out of alignment with the unlimited potential of our God?

Like I said, there is nothing I experience that someone else hasn’t. You may or may not remember when God commissioned Moses with a great task:

The Lord said to Moses, “If they do not believe you and are not convinced by the first miraculous sign, they will be convinced by the second sign. And if they don’t believe you or listen to you even after these two signs, then take some water from the Nile River and pour it out on the dry ground. When you do, the water from the Nile will turn to blood on the ground.”

But Moses pleaded with the Lord, “O Lord, I’m not very good with words. I never have been, and I’m not now, even though you have spoken to me. I get tongue-tied, and my words get tangled.”

Then the Lord asked Moses, “Who makes a person’s mouth? Who decides whether people speak or do not speak, hear or do not hear, see or do not see? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go! I will be with you as you speak, and I will instruct you in what to say.” (Exodus 4: 8-12)

You see, it’s ultimately not even about us. Our stories are for God’s glory.

So what are you saying, Joshua? I’m saying that if God has brought you to this moment, He has equipped you to be effective in it. I baked a cake once, and the cake fell. I took it to my great grandma and said, “It didn’t come out good. It fell.”

She ate a piece and said, “Oh my God, if it fell, that’s exactly what it needed. It must’ve made it better.”

I’m not saying you may not be the person you keep telling yourself you are. You may have done some things. There may be some areas in which you feel that you lack. You may actually lack in those areas, but the person you are at the moment that God decides to bless you, that is exactly what is needed in that moment. You are exactly who God needed to articulate that instance of grace. Where you see shame, there is actually a testimony.

Much like that cake, I may not look like what you would expect, but everything inside of me is ready for where I am. To vary on my great grandma’s assessment; If you fell, that’s exactly what you needed. It made you better. Own it.

One of the worst pieces of advice that someone could give a child who is going through something with their parent is, “That’s still your mama” or “That’s still your daddy.” As I’ve come into adulthood, I’ve found through my personal relationships that a lot of people opt to carry emotional baggage inflicted by their parents because they are bound to honor them, usually through religious teachings, even if it means that they incur hurt themselves.

That’s still your daddy.

I could never accept that advice.

I remember when I was in high school, my dad was in what has been one of his many battles against cancer. In the middle of the night, a blunt crash coming from my parents’ room startled me out of my sleep. My dad started wailing. I assumed some ailment related symptom caused this. I was also certain that he’d brought the pain upon himself through what I deemed to be his horrible way of being. With that conscience, I was able to easily roll over and go back to sleep as not just anyone, but my dad, screamed in writhing pain just a few feet away from me. I had school in a few hours. Plus, my mother was in there. He’d be fine. She always made sure that he was fine.

How does a child develop such a disdain for their parent?

My earliest cognizant memories of my dad were of him and my mother being very on again, off again all the time. Through my childlike lens, I only saw that in the good times, my mother’s focus was on him, and in the bad times, he was everything but a child of God. I took that shame on. I was ashamed to be a part of this oft described, “no good daddy” of mine. To further complicate that, he was my biological father and not my 2 brothers’, so when things went wrong, I always felt extra resentful because I came from this man. I came from this awful man, and I didn’t want to be awful.

Some people miss the boat in knowing how to deal in intimate relationships, but they typically find a way to nurture a positive relationship with their kids. That was not the case for us. When I was 5, he was gone again. He stopped by one day. I guess he was ready to come back. He’d brought some puzzles and other toys for me (Not sure what he gave to my siblings. I can’t speak to that.) He’s a fisherman- a great fisherman. In all of the small talk and soon-to-be broken promises he was spewing that day, he said to me, “When you turn 6, I’m gonna take you fishing.” I was excited. I’m not sure how much I expressively conveyed that, but I had an expectation.

I am 26. I have never been fishing a day in my life, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t remember that day.

I remember when I was in early elementary school, I returned from spending the weekend at my great grandma’s. My dad had just come back, again, and he’d gone to church with us a time or two. We had revival that week, and they went. My brother told me almost as soon as I walked in that my dad had gotten saved at church last night. Quick church lesson for those that was lost upon– getting saved means that one essentially repents of ones sins and commits to being a modern disciple of Christ. I said, “Oh, that won’t last.”

It lasted. In as much as we dressed up. We went to church. We sat together. We soothed public perception. We went home, and we lived like a broken clock. Things were only right about twice a day, but that’s not just us, and that’s why I find no shame in the truth. That’s the way things are on the whole. Many people value appearances.

A couple of weeks ago, I graduated with my masters, as those of you who read my previous blog already know. That was followed by about 2 weeks of celebration, including one that took place in my hometown. I had prepared myself for people who would give remarks and lie. Such is the nature of allowing public comment. However, I was a bit taken aback when my dad spoke.

He told the crowd how he was proud of my sister (she graduated, too) and myself. He went on to say that he did some things in the way of parenting that he regretted but in spite of himself, his children managed to make it.

Things have been better, not perfect, but better for us in the last year or two, but when things have unraveled publicly, a part of the fix is acknowledging it to the public. Though it may have seemed small to those assembled, it meant a lot to me.

I had spent years trying to get past the insecurities that I faced as a man because I didn’t know how to change a tire, fix things in the house or one day teach my kids the ins and outs of every sport. These things weren’t taught to me. Eventually, I got past that.

I had spent years trying to reconcile my identity to a paternal family that I knew nothing about. Eventually, I got past that.

I had spent years teaching myself not to take anything my dad said seriously because anything was subject to go another way or fall through. Eventually, I got past that.

There’s but one thing I couldn’t do alone. I couldn’t validate my story, so it made all of my insecurities feel like my responsibility. It didn’t matter who believed that I was justified in feeling the way I felt, it was impossible for me to try to resolve and move forward if my dad would not acknowledge that I wasn’t crazy. I wasn’t just a bad person. There were some things that didn’t go right. I could not get past that.

So where are we now? I’m not sure if I may be honest. We’re not Ward and Beaver Cleaver or Cliff and Theo Huxtable. We are just Calvin and Joshua, and that’s enough for me. Real life doesn’t work out like tv shows. To quote Jane Fonda, “It took me a long, long, time to realize that we were not meant to be perfect. We were meant to be whole.” I hope the mentality of making things LOOK good is universally dismantled. We should be more concerned with making things BE good.

“It took me a long, long, time to realize that we were not meant to be perfect. We were meant to be whole.”

To bring up my initial point, stop making people feel like they’re obligated to relationships that hurt them. Instead, encourage them to fix things, and if they find that their parent is not willing to embrace their truth, pray that they have the strength to be okay without the wholeness of that relationship. Believe it or not, Mother’s Day and/or Father’s Day are not happy days for everyone. Let’s stop using the bible to patch stuff up and put a muzzle on people. People need to be healed, not patched.

And you may feel that this was too much to share. If you find yourself in that head space, I’m willing to bet that something is dying on the inside of you. As it relates to this matter, I am good. We are good, and I know that the people who are supposed to get this in a personal way, will.

Happy Father’s Day to every father, especially my own.

I’m learning to count my blessings and not my problems. Today, I am blessed that though we are not whole, we are healing.

Thanks sir, it was your truth that set me free.

 

I’ve often shared that in January 2013, the month after I returned home from undergrad, a close minister acquaintance of our family told me to begin a journal so that I could always reflect on what I asked God for and what he’s done. Although I’m not the best with keeping up with it consistently, the heaviest moments tend to find their way in there. This entry is from the day after I moved.

I knew that I wanted to go to graduate school. I applied to, and was accepted into, the Howard University School of Divinity for the Fall 2013 semester. There were several factors that halted that move. I could not financially sustain that, and I could not consciously leave home knowing that my terminally ill grandmother needed assistance.

As 2014 settled in, I began thinking about next steps again. My grandmother began to seriously talk about what I needed to do once she transitioned, and although it was a difficult conversation, it was a necessary reality. She did all that she could to make sure that she gave me what I needed to go forward. Unfortunately, that was met with opposition. As she began to enter the final stages of her sickness, she diligently worked on making sure that she left things and those closest to her as she wished. I tried to assure her that no matter the outcome of her efforts, I would be fine.

Fast forward to July 2014. This was it. The woman, the myth, the legend Jessie Mae Rogers Patterson had slipped into extremis. In some ways, I felt as though I had failed her. She remained worried about things that were beyond either of our control, and there was really nothing that could be done. Decline took its natural course, and she ended up at my mother’s house, slowly transitioning in my mother’s bedroom; directly across the hall from mine.

While this is not what I wish to detail, one part of that process that lasted just over a week remains with me in such a poignant way. My grandma would begin to moan in the middle of the night, and just before day one morning, she asked for one of her close friends who is a minister. She continued moaning in pain, and her friend showed up within a few minutes. I listened. The moaning began to fade, and a song was rising up from underneath it. Her friend was singing:

You don’t have to worry, and don’t you be afraid. Joy comes in the morning. Troubles they don’t last always. For there’s a friend in Jesus who will wipe your tears away. And if your heart is broken, just lift your hands and say, “I know that I can make it. I know that I can stand. No matter what may come my way, my life is in Your hands.”

Let’s move this story forward as fast as I can…

I had one more iron in the fire, and I didn’t even know how it would work. I majored in Mass Communication with a concentration in Print Journalism in undergrad. I knew that communications was something that I could do with no worries. Washington, DC offers an abundance of opportunities in that space. I saw that Bowie State University had an Organizational Communications program that was affordable. I applied and had gotten accepted. I had two conversations of assurance with my grandmother as she laid on the bed in which she would die. One of which, I will not detail on this blog, but the first is very much relative. I took the letter into the room, and as one of her best friends sat there talking to her (she would mostly just look at us), I told her that I’d gotten accepted to graduate school and that I was going to go. I didn’t know who, what, when, where, why or how, but I told her what I knew she wanted to know, “I will be okay.”

Fast forward again, my grandma passed away on July 18th. Life felt very odd following that because I’d devoted the entire year and a half prior to being her hands and feet. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how I would get out of Hemingway. Beyond school, I needed a place to stay and I needed finances to sustain me until I could get a financial aid refund.

Eventually, I gave up, and I wouldn’t mention it. I was in a group chat with some friends the week before, and one of them inquired about my pending move. I told her that I didn’t have the finances to go and I would not be going. Another friend asked how much I needed. I’d found a boarding house to live in near the school, and I needed $600 upfront. No further questions asked, although there was initial rebuttal from my ego, he fronted me the money.

A few close folks gave me some sustenance money, and since my mother had totaled my car, she allowed me to use an extra vehicle in the yard to leave. With about 8 or 900 dollars to my name, on September 1, 2014, I drove away to Bowie, MD to begin the next chapter.

There is so much I can share about this period, but I’ve wearied you long enough I’m sure. I’ll summarize as much as possible.

My landlord allowed me to wait on my school refund to pay him for the rent for two months because it did not come until October. At the same time that my refund was about to come, I got a call that some money that was held up from a car accident that I had been in some 3 and a half years prior was about to be released. I got that and paid my friend and landlord back. I had enough money to carry me through the end of 2014.

I applied for jobs here, there and everywhere. I finally got hired at a call center in January 2015 through a temp agency. That would help me to pick up where the refund and settlement money were ending.

I HATED that job, but I knew that I needed income. After training, I found out that I would probably have to quit school in order to work. I came here for two specific reasons, to go to school and to begin my professional career in the communications field. Plus, did I mention that I HATED that job? Long story short, I went to lunch one day, and as far as anyone knows, I’m still at lunch.

That same day, I went home, sat in bed and began to apply for internships. I had never been successful with Indeed jobs, but what the heck? Within two weeks, I received  a response from a healthcare nonprofit agency in Washington, DC. A month from me walking off of the call center job, I was a Communications Intern in DC, making more than I was making at the call center. I was also able to go to school.

I found favor at that place and was allowed to stay through my allotted time as I job hunted. I ended up being hired at a civil rights nonprofit in DC as the Communications Assistant.

I may as well fast forward again because it’s time to wrap this thing up. A few months ago, my senior supervisor resigned. The young lady who manages me moved up, and I found favor again. I was promoted to Communications Coordinator at the organization.

I do this story no favors by skipping pieces although I was trying to keep it short. Everything is not meant for the microwave, so this is the truth of the matter. I was on food stamps when I moved here, and although I’d typically get by, there was a time when I ran out of food. I sat in my bed and thought, “Lord, I have never been hungry. This is different.” One of the ladies boarding in the house knocked on my door.”

“Josh, do you eat Progresso soup? I bought the wrong kind, and I have a few cans.”

You don’t have to worry.

There was also the time when I was running out of gas money. Didn’t know how I was gonna get to school. My aunt randomly called me and said, “Me and your uncle are gonna send you some money.”

And don’t you be afraid.

How about when my prepaid phone was about to be cut off because I didn’t have enough money to renew it? A friend called me on that day and said, “I’m sending you $50.”

Joy comes in the morning.

Also, the house I was initially living in was for all intents and purposes, a trap house. I found it on CraigsList. Drugs were being sold out of it, and the area was dangerous. I remember calling one of my friends one night as I laid on the floor in my room because shots were being fired outside.

Troubles, they don’t last always.

For there’s a friend in Jesus.

I found myself questioning the very nature of God during my most turbulent times, but I could never doubt his existence. I knew that he had been with me in the past, and that he was continuing to be with me.

Who will wipe your tears away.

I had never felt more broken in my entire life than when my grandma died. It was strange. When my brother died, I was in a state of shock and thought I could not find a deeper level of grief. They were equally painful but differently hurtful. Whoopi Goldberg articulated it when speaking on her mother’s death, “It’s like you know, no one will ever love you quite like that again.”

While I’d been close to my great grandma my whole life, I came in later life to understand my grandma in a way that was almost like having a friend 50 years older than me. I came up to school still shattered. If I may be honest, I remember sitting in my car one night in front of my house with beer bottles all over the floor. I had cried just about all one could possibly cry. Something came over me. It was like a clear voice that said, “You’re gonna have to say what’s wrong. You have to say it.”

I said, “My heart hurts.”

Around this time, I’d been laying in bed all day most days. I had to ask my professor to excuse me from class and I had to pull things back together.

Do you know what song would randomly come on every time I was up here and I felt like I was about to quit? “My Life is In Your Hands,” It even came on one day as I was laying aimlessly in my room in my pajamas. If you’ve read thoroughly, you’ve caught the correlation.

And if your heart is broken

Just lift your hands and say, “I know that I can make it. I know that I can stand. No matter what may come my way…”

I do realize this is getting really long. Reeling it in now. I just wanted to testify to the power of God. There have been really good days, and there have been really bad days. Today is a really good day which is why I’m reflecting. In just a few hours, I will receive my Masters of Arts in Communications from Bowie State University. Never one to share my GPA and such, I want to speak well of God here and not of me. He allowed me to finish with a 3.8 while working full time. I am by no means done…

My life is in your hands.