I Asked God To Come and Get Me, But I am Too Uncool

Some of my favorite/worst memories of my childhood was waking up real early on Sunday mornings to go hear Dr. Lance Watson preach in Creighton. I would never have my hair combed by the time we would leave, so my momma would always drag the comb through my hair, almost making my scalp come off. Call it the first ever S-curl accident. Sometimes if we were a little early to get to church, me and my brother would get chicken biscuits from McDonald's. While we sped to church down 95 and across 64, listening to Momma Caesar I would steal my brother's hash browns for the extra saturated fat. There was this girl there at the 10am services, she had cornrows and braces like it was her first day out. She probably already knew how to shoot a stepback jumper, heavily contested. I never spoke to her, but she looks like a Jamillah. Oh, and there were a few kids from my school who went there and I would try to make eye contact but as soon as they looked up, I looked down. I always wondered where I got church shoes from. I felt like they always appeared and I never asked for them. I wish it worked that way for Gameboy Advance Cartridges. While we sat down, my momma would give me a crinkled dollar bill to hand-off to some old dude who smelled of moth balls. What was he chewing all the time? I always held on to the money plate longer than I needed too because it looked like his arthritis was starting to kick in. Whenever the music would play (there was a score for walking into the church to breathing in the church to squirming in the church to passing out in the church) I wanted to dance or any clap my hands. Never understood why I didn't do so, even to this day. It was a continuous struggle to get to church everyday but it was a spectacle when you got there. If I took one of my white friends with us like Adam or Alex, you would have thought we were watching a soap opera. Pastor rapping off bible verses, old ladies passing out, single mom's interpretation of snakes, drinking the blood and eating the flesh off of some dude you haven't seen but apparently is ubiquitous. And there were so many hats. I would be so proud to invite seasoning to their lives. And you swore you left refreshed and anew and accomplished as much as Nelson Mandela himself. You couldn't tell someone anything who just walked out of church, not a got-dern-ting. Saying bible quotes and giggling with your best friend named Brenda you saw twice a week. Once at bible study and another at the line at the Piccadilly's. The one at Southpark. Wait is it shutdown? Sometimes I would pay attention to the pastor to intentionally, like I would  be the next up there. Like Martin Luther or Allen Senior. T.D. Jakes would be my speech coach. Mase would serve as my financial adviser. Everyone from my 3rd grade class, family, and friends would be there. Screaming and hollering righteous and sweet sayings right up there at the pulpit, guiding someone to change their life. To see their mom or their kids again after too many years. God would tell me I was cool and said I had a seat with them at the gates because I was so cool for being patient. Jamillah would be there too.



Then I woke up.

"Unhappy" by Outkast has remained one of the songs played when I am normally, well, happy.