The One Who Set The Standard

The One Who Set The Standard

God is doing such amazing things in my life, there are nights when I can hardly sleep.  There are times I wake up talking to God, when I was deeply submerged in a dream.  There are times when so many exciting things are going on I'm about to absolutely explode with excitement and wonder.

We're all on a journey.

Everything that happens to us is part of our story, the testimony we get to give to others.  The story of how we were going through hell and God came and rescued us.

The beautiful thing about testimony is you tell your story and others hear it and this small voice inside them that says "Damn, they've been through it," then it begins telling them maybe they can make it afterall, begins to say if God will do that for her surely He'll do it for me and before it's over with it's screaming "I'm not going to let this beat me!"

I love giving my testimony!  They said I wasn't leaving unless it was in a body bag!  They said I'd be back!  

Jokes on them, because here I am baby!

If I could change a single thing that ever happened to me, I wouldn't.  Why should I want to change who I used to be, because that girl brought me to who I am and without her I would be so much less of a woman.  

Sparky is tough, she doesn't care what you think about her, she doesn't pull any punches, there's no shame in her game and if you don't like it, well that's pretty much just your problem and if it makes you feel better you can kiss her tattooed @$$.  :)

Good old Sparky.  She saved my life many many times.  Good old Sparky Madness, man I love that girl!  I tell you, she's something else!

My own best friend has said to me, "Darlene I love you, but that damned Sparky, I hate that bitch."  Apparently there is a huge difference and she's not the first person to point out the difference, but I needed her, I didn't care she wasn't nice, I didn't need her to be nice, I needed her to protect Darlene and that's exactly what she did.

There are three things about me God has never let the world touch and ruin.  The first two are my sense of hope and great expectancy.  I always always always hope for and expect something wonderful to happen and even when it doesn't happen the way I thought it would look I still rejoice.  

The third is my sense of naivety.  The definition of naive is natural and unaffected, innocent.

My own child has looked at me and said, "Mama are you stupid or something?"

I am natural, unaffected and innocent, imagine that!

Wow just wow.

Back in the day, when I was still in the streets a man came along who would change the course of my life.  His name is Randy.

Randy is an academic.

I didn't even know what an academic was until I met him.

Without going into all kinds of stuff we don't understand and never could, you should know an academic is smarter than an intellectual, smarter than the world at large, so smart in fact, simple tasks are next to impossible.  Like setting up a facebook account.

Randy used to be the computer professor at Georgia Tech, his ex wife works for the CDC, his children are just as smart and his intelligence soars somewhere in the universe in a place none of us will ever see and NASA will never reach.

Randy loves the trap and the people in it.

At the time I met him he was running a recovery house out of his house and Lolita was the standard.

Many of you will know her as Toni Reynolds on facebook, but she is and will always be my Lolita and I just can't call her Toni.

Lolita is the standard.

Lolita is from Jurassic Park, a trap I know nothing about because I'm from the Flatlands and the FIB (I'm from two different traps, a crack head over achiever at the time), but Lolita was the example, the one to beat, or atleast do what she had done.

Set Free.

The rapper TI gave his testimony at Set Free on Memorial Drive before they moved it.

Set Free. 

Man oh man, it was the hardest most worthwhile thing I ever did in my life!

I met my worst enemy who became my best friend at Set Free the first day I was there!. 

I met Jesus as Set Free and didn't even know He was going to be there!

Beans and rice and Jesus Christ.

JT said that for a month before I left and I had no idea what he was talking about but he laughed and laughed every time he said it.  He always said it when I was eating everything in the refrigerator and feeding Randy's dog Buddy, hot dogs.

That's Set Free.

They feed you beans and rice twice a day and you learn about Jesus the rest of it.

I learned to be a prayer warrior at Set Free.

I learned to sit still at Set Free.

I left the streets to go to Set Free and it was all Lolita's fault!

She was the pioneer, the standard, she'd already done it!

In order to stay at Randy's you had to do no less than thirty days at Set Free.

I didn't want to go but I didn't want to be in the street another winter and it was coming.  Someone had come along and helped my son and I didn't want to stay in the street without him, because he was my road dawg and I wanted to Murphy's wife (we all know how that worked out), but God used those things.

I'm going to be totally honest.

I didn't like Lolita.

She stole my friend Tyrone.

She was the holy grail of sobriety.

She was the person to beat and when you are from the streets it's just in you to beat anyone and everyone you can and I couldn't beat her!  She did it before me, she was always going to be the standard!

Did I mention I was a total dumb ass?

Yeah, I was a total dumb ass.

In case you are wondering this is totally not the case today and will never be the case again.

I FREAKIN LOVE HER!

SHE'S AMAZING!

THANK GOD FOR HER STANDARD!

PRAISE GOD FOR MY LOLITA!!!!!

Guess what Lolita does?

She runs a recovery house!!!!!!!!

Guess what else?

I'm going to her, to give my testimony for the women who are there!

You know why?

Favor ain't fair!

I love Lolita!

We are family!

Be sure to encourage my friend on facebook whose name is Toni Reynolds, because she's doing this thing and she's so important to me!

I LOVE YOU LOLITA!