Where to begin...

Social media breaks, rap feuds, communication journeys, autism wars and more...

Photo by Jakayla Toney on Unsplash

Welcome to Fidgets and Fries!

Mostly free. Somewhat not.

If you’d like to honor my writings with a monetary contribution, thank you. If you already have, thank you. Your support allows me to invest in my writing in a way I hadn’t thought possible as well as pay for my son’s communication lessons. And if you are still an unpaid subscriber, thank you. Cause in a world where everyone wants their eyes on their work, you still chose to put your gaze on mine.

How it works here is: all posts are free to read, but commenting is not.

This newsletter rests at the intersection of the unserious ramblings of a woman full of buttered rice and dad jokes and the somewhat sophisticated stories and essays of someone who knows just enough “smart” words to sound super intelligent and insightful.

What will today’s newsletter be? Hmm…

For the first time in a long time, I don’t know where to start. It’s been radio silence over this way. There’s not much I have been wanting to share on social media and yet there’s so much I want to share. I am taking in so much right now, and every bit of it deserves its own…thing.

Writer’s block?

Is that what this is?

I don’t even know, more like an overload of so many things of interest and importance that I been run down. Honestly, how many paragraphs am I gonna write that basically says the same thing?

That I am stuck as fuck.

Let me try this, I am gonna put everything I want to write about in bullet points and let’s see if they actually get talked about, okay?

Cool.

• why am I actually not sharing on social media and when will I actually be back?

• Kendrick Lamar and Drake, plus rap in general and what it actually means to be a Black woman who appreciates lyricism in a genre that isn’t all that kind to bodies like mine.

• spelling journey with the kid and how I might have to start selling feet pics to pay for it.

• writing new books.

• finding a decent work/life balance that leaves room for me to take care of my own damn self.

• homeschooling.

• guardianship.

• the ever-widening gap between autism parent and autistic adult (I mean, come on…how are we still on this shit?)

• the demand of labor from marginalized creators/activists/etc when it comes to the tragedies of this world…guess we will throw Macklemore up in this one.

Alright now, that’s a whole lot and honestly, I think I could write about way more but…I ain’t. I am actually surprised I sat down at the computer to put this together. Ain’t no order to this, it will be as chaotic as my thoughts are.

Let’s get after it, shall we?

WHY AM I STAYING AWAY FROM SOCIAL MEDIA RIGHT NOW?

This is a question that has many answers. I have been away long enough for my “superfans” to notice I haven’t been around to check on me, but not long enough for everyone else to be like, “where the fuck is Tiffy?”.

To answer the question, I am trying to figure out what is wrong with my son and how to help him, striking a balance between working from home and taking care of home (and myself), writing an adult book that is stealing all my new content because it just sounds better in print and this leaves me with nothing to share but recycled posts and some throwback photos, and I really haven’t recovered from our time on the East Coast, the hospital stays, the drive home, or April in general cause Autism Month will take a whole lot out of you. Or maybe that’s just me?

I don’t know when I will be back posting full time again. Maybe when more folks miss me, lol. Nah, I didn’t even know I would stop posting. I kinda just stopped going on my social media pages. Perhaps, subconsciously I knew it was time for a break and finally this stubborn body of mine, listened.

SPELLING JOURNEY WITH THE KID

Yoooo!

This is some hard ass shit, for real. It’s a fuckin’ CHORE. But it’ll be worth it in the end. And if it’s like that for me, it’s a million times more for my son. He’s giving it his all but it is so draining on him. Do you even know how hard it is for your mind to lack the control necessary to control your own body? How privileged are most of us to not such a disconnect. This is something that I know so much about, but oh so very little. I often feel like I started too late. I feel like a failure many days. I feel like I am working him too hard. Or not enough. I can’t tell how he feels about what we are doing or how I am doing. I can’t tell if he would rather someone else work with him.

Hell, I would rather someone else work with him. Cause this is a lot.

I am working with largely by myself because:

1. there aren’t many practitioners in my area.

2. insurance doesn’t cover spelling lessons so it can be so expensive.

To the first point, I am doing RPM with my son. Well, actually I am doing a combination of RPM (rapid prompting method) and S2C (spelling to communicate) because I really don’t see the advantage in pitting two methodologies against one another when I can pull from both. There are not many practitioners in the state of Texas for either. S2C had a few “lower level” providers and while I liked one, she rubbed me the wrong way on her “mask policy” and we had to move on from her. We worked with Soma, the founder of RPM a few times and would love to work with her as she is only about an hour from us, but she is so busy that we don’t get any consistent visits with her. Once a month, really.

That’s not really acceptable to me. But she is so amazing with my son. I can see the possibilities with him working with her and I can see his freedom as well. I can’t see her so few times though. There are two RPM providers in the Dallas area that are available for more sessions, but one of two things have to happen:

1. I am going to have to find the funds to cover weekly sessions and monthly camps.

2. I am going to have to be okay with driving two hours for 45-minute sessions. The camps are fine cause they are back-to-back to back days and I might just get a hotel at times. Maybe.

Decisions, decisions.

Right now, I use the monthly income from Substack and Patreon to help cover his spelling lessons, but once I make the plunge to do more sessions…money will get tighter, and I will have to find more ways to cover the lessons.

I am sorting it out.

I think.

WRITING MORE BOOKS

Listen, if you have been following me for quite some time then you would know that I have a goal to put out at least 4.5 books. I am two books into that count. I am working on an adult proposal and that one is taking allllllll my new content. I want this book to have more things y’all haven’t read from me than things y’all have. It’s a memoir type of book. Something that was asked of me by not only several followers but a few agents, editors, etc. as well. I can’t tell you that I know what I am doing but hey, I am gonna shoot my shot regardless.

So, I am also working on this in my downtime from social media. If I am not focused on putting out new content, then I can focus on that proposal/book. It’s exciting as fuck but also, scary as shit. I am going to attempt to do some kind of “follow along with me as a put together a book proposal” thing on Patreon (which I have turned into my ‘creative’ outlet), so if you want to follow along all things “Created by Tiffy” over there, please join. I do have a free membership tier.

I thought about diving more into what that book would be about but then I wouldn’t have much to share on Patreon (see how that works? lol). So, head over there for all that stuff.

AUTISM PARENT V. ACTUALLY AUTISTIC

They still at it and it’s a fuckin’ problem.

Honestly, no bullshit, I somehow convinced myself that this was the growing pain of a community that was trying to find its way in the digital age while being relatively “new” compared to other communities and movements.

Nah, I was extending way too much grace, or whatever.

Cause we still haven’t figured out how to be a proper community and we still don’t give community the respect it deserves. I read so many posts last month that talked about how much someone “on the other side” shouldn’t speak about matters that they couldn’t possibly identify with. And on one hand, I get it. And on the other, I was like “we ain’t getting no fucking where.” Just walking in circles slapping each other. The parent can’t speak on Autistic matters. The Autistic adult with no kids can’t speak on children they don’t have.

Round and round we go.

I learn from everyone. I talk to everyone. I like to think my level of discernment is top tier when it comes to who I choose to gain insight from or who I choose to weave into my advocacy. Way too many within the general community wield their identities as a weapon to shut people up and shut down conversations. There’s no desire to work together because they can’t see the “other side” as having something valuable to add. Nuance is lacking and stories that don’t center the dominant perspective are often tossed aside.

I could expand on this a lot further than I have but really, this shit gives me a headache. I will deal with it in detail in subsequent newsletters.

MOVING ON.

GUARDIANSHIP

I am staring that shit down right now.

My son is 17 years old and I am being inundated with content from a community full of childless, late diagnosed adults who want to rail into others that guardianship is THEEEE WORST thing EVAAAAH. Yeah, they use more words than this, but you know they don’t mean anything more than this. Don’t take the whole “childless, late diagnosed adults” thing too hard, sometimes it’s those with children as well…but they have children who are more like myself and my youngest than my oldest. Or they have some amazing support systems. Or more resources. Live in better areas, more resource rich states.

Thing is, we are shaped by our histories, contexts, circumstances, situations, and on and on. And the truth is, the more disconnected one is from another’s story, they less likely they are to understand it, because they don’t have to face what they do. If you don’t have children like my oldest, if you don’t have children at all, if your life didn’t take you down a path similar to ours…you would have a hard time understanding why not taking the necessary steps towards guardianship isn’t an option for us.

It’s happening.

I just need to figure out how best to go about doing it. And making it as painless as possible (though I know the pain involved…and I am speaking more about the emotional side of things). This isn’t something I want to do. This isn’t something I ever thought I would have to do when I was walking around, wide as a house, carrying this beautiful baby boy with a large head like his daddy. I put off doing it for so long.

I cry every single time I think about doing it…and so I stop.

But, I am just going to have to cry my way through it because it must be done.

It has to be fucking done.

HOMESCHOOLING

For the first time since I started homeschooling, I have felt overwhelmed with it. It is kicking my A-star-star.

The boys are in high school. And while my oldest, if he were still in high school, would probably attend all the way to age 22, my youngest would graduate with his class. And his studies are the ones that are giving me some trouble right now.

I don’t know if he wants to go to college, but I am treating his schooling like he is.

Just in case.

In Texas, you don’t have to keep records, but if they attend college, you better keep some records.

And damn good ones.

He will have to take the SAT. He will need some extracurriculars.

I am putting all of this together over the next few weeks. Ain’t no way I have enough free time to be all up on social media getting frustrated with what I am reading and wanting to toss all my devices.

Homeschooling is a beast this year but, just like spelling, it’ll be worth it in the end.

I just hope I am still standing when the end comes.

KENDRICK LAMAR V. DRAKE

Honestly, I have been waiting for this one for years. It’s been a battle that has been brewing for quite some time and I have been tuned in just like the rest of the hip-hop world, and beyond, really. Rap has always had a special place in my heart because I think that lyricists are the greatest thing ever in the entertainment world. The merging of poetry and a beat? Oh, my heart. The way the words bounce over a drum, the way the metaphors just sit right in your spirit…I am all for it. I love the competitive nature of it. I love the smoothness of it. I love it when it’s gritty and rough.

I love rappers who write.

As a writer myself, I love those who write their own raps. I don’t care if they are terrible, horrible, no good, and very bad…as long as they write it. Ghostwriting is a thing. It’s been a thing for some time. Those who write rhymes for others that have their credit known to the world has been a thing for some time as well. Ice Cube writing for NWA. Jay-Z writing for Snoop and Dr. Dre. Way too many people write for Cardi-B.

I have been waiting for lyricism to make its way center stage in rap for many years now. At the top of the game for a bit were mumble rappers. Those who didn’t have deep bars or bars that made no sense whatsoever. Nas, for me, was bringing lyrical rap back to the front. Drake was still at the top of the game, making hits, but he lacked substance, and his last two albums were, in my opinion, trash. Yet, still won awards for said trash.

However, we know Drake is capable of writing, we have literally seen him do so on video. We know he is capable of freestyling. But dude also has a team of ghostwriters (these are individuals who are paid to write for artists with no credit to their name making it appear as though the artist themselves wrote the entire track), and this isn’t a secret. Some of his best hits, to include a diss track against Meek Mill, is highly rumored to have been written by a ghostwriter named Daylyt (who is fucking amazing by the way, and most definitely was writer for Drake).

I found myself surprised I was as invested in this battle as I was. Me and everyone else. Even if they tell you they weren’t paying attention, they heard something about it. I am not going into the specifics behind the beef, I will be here all day, and I am not a music critic. This isn’t my bag. I will say that Kendrick Lamar won this beef by a landslide.

No competition.

Also, I won’t go into the why of it either. I’ll be here all day.

I want to stick my toe into a discussion surrounding Black women and hip-hop. To love the genre as a Black woman is to be in constant conflict with yourself. And I often am. As a whole, rap doesn’t respect us. Full of misogynoir and the degradation of our bodies while simultaneously sexualizing us. We are not protected in its tunes just as we are not protected in these streets. How does a Black woman like myself reconcile loving a genre that doesn’t love her back?

I really don’t know.

I bounce to the beats. I find myself lost in the double, triple, quadruple entendres, the metaphors stir the poet in me…

And the lyrics sometimes disappoint me. They wound me. They cut me open because they represent the mindset of so many within our community. You want to separate the artist from their craft, but it is difficult to do so when their art often mimics their lives. How they feel about Black women they see in our community. Learned behavior they regurgitate over a beat.

I watched two grown men battle it out over tracks in which Black women were used as the focal point of many of their disses towards one another. One claimed the other hit their girl, the other claimed the other was a predator who didn’t respect nor like Black women because he never felt connected to Black culture in the first place.

Ava Duvernay once said, “to be a woman who loves hip hop at times is to be in love with your abuser. Because the music was and is that. And yet the culture is ours.”

I felt every word of that. Rap is ours. Every single one of us, it belongs to. And yet it cares so little about many of us.

THE DEMAND OF LABOR FROM MARGINALIZED INDIVIDUALS WHEN IT COMES TO SPEAKING OUT/LAYING DOWN OUR BODIES FOR EVERY ATROCITY OF THE WORLD…

Whew, that was a long one.

But for real though, I cannot tell you how many times myself or other Black and Brown activists/creators have been told that we needed to do more…

More.

More than so many of us already do? Is that what they require of us?

Especially Black women.

Who are at the heart of damn near every revolution, past and present.

They demand us to be the solution in a world that views us to be the problem. The power we hold limited in reach. Our communities fractured by the very supremacist systems they want us to break apart and rebuild on our own.

Many of us do speak out and up for communities that our outside of our own, that is their right and that is their choice. It never sits right with me to question and/or demand the labor of a Black and Brown advocate who is already putting in work for their own lives and community. It also makes very little sense for me to demand this of us when we aren’t advocates…because every single day of our lives we fighting to survive the systems that would rather see us fail.

This brings me to Macklemore, who I guess put out a song for Palestine that called out his fellow colleagues (rappers) and others for not doing enough. Or doing anything. I don’t know. Admittedly, I haven’t heard the record, only read the praise for it, which largely came from other white folks.

Like I said, it don’t ever rub my spirit the right way to see white people attempt to scold Black folk for not speaking up in a world that is dominated in whiteness that we ourselves are trying to navigate and survive, including the rich among us…including the celebrity among us.

Could they do more? If they wanted, yes.

Could they speak up? If they wanted, yes.

But we all know that our fall is mightier, harder, and more difficult to recover from if people take our actions the wrong way. We also know that our efforts almost always have to be backed by a white presence to enact any kind of change that would push towards meaningful and tangible positive outcomes. The double standards and treatment they give to the privileged among the Black community is noticeable as fuck.

I wouldn’t knock them for using their platform, I would find them to be bold and courageous. But I also ain’t gonna ride them for not doing so.

Because I know what I am doing and I know what I am facing at the moment.

I haven’t ever stopped fighting for the communities I fight for (autism, Black families, nonspeakers, etc). I do so much offline that I am wore the fuck out most days. I parent. I homeschool. I advocate on social media. And I put in the work in these Texas streets. And occasionally I have to deal with someone who feels I am not doing enough for some other cause because they don’t see me talking about it.

I wonder how many others they admonish in this way.

Don’t shame nor attempt to force me into more labor. I move in the way that is supposed to be beneficial to my health, but I really ain’t doing a good job of it because I am giving my fucking all to help others. I am running on fumes and too many want me to kill myself with this.

Do my children not deserve their mama?

My husband his wife?

We do need more to speak out on not only Palestine, but the Congo and others. We collectively need to do more. I put in my work, y’all ain’t gotta see my every move. But know that as a Black American, descendant of enslaved ancestors, granddaughter of Civil Rights fighters, and dealing with the racism I do on a regular basis in wild ass Texas…takes a stance that would result in a Free Palestine. I do act. I do my part. But I am one person who is battling so much. There’s so much I am doing for my kids, parents, and the autism community in general I haven’t even written or shared about.

Some of it I will, a lot of it I probably won’t ever share.

Laying into communities who are victim to the same supremacist systems and mindsets that put these other communities in harm’s way is not a solution. How do y’all come to this conclusion? Rhetorical. Don’t answer.

We can’t be the problem and the solution.

I don’t know.

It’s rough out here and I am just hanging on.