Some relationships are for a lifetime...and others are just long enough to remind you of the importance you play in each other’s lives. They arrive with perfected timing in what feels like a never-ending exchange of smiles, all in design of your mutual approval and shared principles. Then there’re those other relationships that require just a feeling; it’s a feeling of immediate trust and in need of no greater approval than the exchange of words being spoken. 

This picture is of me and my most glorious and terminally-beautiful Aunt Joan on my first of two visits, as a child, to see her at her home in Seattle, Washington. My Aunt Joan is my momma’s youngest and the last living of their four siblings...and even though we had thousands of miles with many years between visits, some relationships are just right and meant as a reminder of not only their importance, but of how things could have been if those relationships had not actually happened. 

I wanted to respond and bring people up-to-date on some of the cool questions or inquiries that I’ve received over the last few days. Most of the questions were about my post earlier in the week, regarding the afternoon I so happily enjoyed sitting in a chair, telling my story. 

Early on when I was a kid in search of the next great song and or musical artist, I figured out that a majority of the information and learning needed was quite often hidden in the liner notes of the albums I purchased. And it was this revelation and moment of learning that introduced me to enjoy reading for the first time in my life, and completely changed how I would now make the decisions related to the albums of musical artists in which I would now search to learn more about.   

This unplanned education and changed way of making musical purchases also inadvertently opened me up to learning about world history. In taking the time to read why and or who it was that these artists or musical acts considered to be the influencers or foundation of their self-creation, I suddenly found myself immersed with an unforeseen path or book of instruction to global race relations, world history, and the associated politics that most certainly helped to first start the musical conversation now being had in this song.