I'm just a girl with a lot to say. I've got a ton of stories to share and minds to open. Here I show to you my poetry, stories, and other topics that fill my mind.
A Look Inside My Creative Mind: Unexpected Grief
The Ramblings Inside my Creative Mind: Once You've Seen One Black Sheep ...
Are you there, blog? It's me, Asia. It's been more than a little while and I have no excuses for you. There is no excuse for not keeping up here or with my creativity in general. I do come to you today with another post pulling back the layers of myself.
It gets tiresome to be the forgotten. As you can see that even I, myself, can forget me just as so many others do. That's been my life for as long as I can remember. "Oh, sorry we forgot" could very well be my middle name with as many times as I've heard it. That has had a profound effect on my realtionships, especially when it comes to family. Friends come and go and it's a little easier to go your separate ways than it would be with family. It gets tricky to part ways when you feel like you don't belong, are frequently forgotten about, or abandonded.
Summer has come to an end and fall has been pretty warm so far, but that's not saying much when you're still in the middle of a pandemic. Things have been a little more lax this year and some have gone back to normal and most of us are still a little more cautious. With that been said, on my father's side my family had a family reunion for the 4th of July. I was fortuante enough to find out once the pics were posted to social media after the fact. Whether or not I would have gone is unknown and will never be known since I wasn't even given a chance to accept or decline and invite. I've tried to go ever since my father passed. He died two weeks before the reunion in the year he passed and I really wanted ro go since he had his heart set on that one after missing many the years prior due to his health. I did it that year for him and every year since. This year would've been the first reunion without my uncle who passed last year. He was the one who, in my opinion, kept the family together. Now it could be that I was overlooked. My uncle was usually the main one to organize the reunions so it was new to the family members that set this one up. Or it could be that someone thought "She hasn't come out to anything else this year so she won't show up." Either excuse that it may be hurts either way. It's either that I was completely not thought of at all or someone thought that it wasn't worth the effort. It makes me reflect on why I'm always the forgotten one and how can I change that, whether it be to change a few things within myself or cut loose people who don't want me around anyways.
When it comes to family that answer is easy. Growing up I was always taken to be around my mother's family so I really I didn't really have the opportunity to develop a bond from childhood with my dad's family. I'm the oddball out anytime I'm around that side of my family, but still feel all the love from my aunts and uncles no matter what. When it comes to my mom's side it all boiled down to vanity, in my opinion. I was the nerdy one who kept to herself and liked creative things. I think around a family of mostly women who cared more about beauty over brains nobody knew what to do with me. I'd be left out of things, poked fun at, and ultimately became the strong black sheep that I am today.
I was often jealous, growing up, of my my cousins who had my grandmother's sister as their grandmother because I saw how she interacted with them. She encouraged them and joked with them not AT them. Overall, she seemed easier to love and open up to. That's not to say they weren't riddled with their own issues like everyone else, but I never got the feeling like my cousins felt left out, judged, abandonded, or ridiculed. They had the relationship with her that was what you would see on a family sitcom where at the end of the 30 minutes the grandmother would hug her grandchild, tell them how much she loved them and that she'll always be there when needed. I wanted that, but I wasn't fortunate to feel that loved.
When it comes to being forgotten by friends it boils down to family. My mom's family had a habit of promising activies with my cousins and I and I wait and wait only to later find out that my cousins were taken out and I was left behind waiting. Now this did not happen all of the time, but enough to leave a permanent sting that, to this day, still impacts my current relationships with friends. I have two extremes. If I make plans with a friend I'll either badger them on if they're sure they want to go to whatever we have planned. Just needing that constant reassurance that they won't flake out. The other extreme is I'll cancel because I assume that the other person will. Might as well beat them to the punch.
The methods I have been trying to take in not being forgotten that involve my own changed behavior is I've been attempting to be more engaging, as much as I can since I am still very shy. Meeting new people (as comfortably as I can with Covid and all) and overall be present. The changes I can make outside of myself is to cut out those who add nothing to my life. For example, I had a friend who would have me as, what I like to call, the "trauma friend". I'd only be reached out to, for the most part, if she had something traumatic going on. Parents made her feel shitty, husband wasn't engaging with their son, problems with the in-laws, etc? I was on speed dial/text. Something fun happens like a girls night or a lunch date with friends I'd only see the pics posted on social media. I'd hardly get invited to things like this unless the friends or coworkers of her's we were around were dressed down, but to the outings where everyone was dressed to the nines with their hair and makeup done, I was never included. Then when it cames down to issues I would endure I'd get cut short. That friendship got left in 2020. Other's like it got left behind as well. I'm not someone's part time friend or that's only your friend when it's convenient, especially if we consider each other best friends. Same goes for family. I am not a blood is thicker than water type of person. I cannot let bad behavior slide just because we are related and I damn sure can't stick around if I voice that a certain behavior is toxic and you still continue to do it.
I embrace being the black sheep because in some ways it has made me who I am today. I have the ability to be self aware because of it. I have been able to take that which has hurt me an turn it into tools to learn from so that I do not act with the same behavior. The last thing I would want to do is make someone feel forgotten or unloved. I am human and I know there are times where I screw up as well. The point is to learn from that and to correct it and not make it an ongoing acceptable behavior.
Until next time my fellow black sheep
-Asia Aneka Anderson, 2021 (c)
The Ramblings Inside My Creative Mind: Born or Made Leader
Here we are in another year and in another job that I'm rapidly starting to despise. I hate it here. I started this job in January of 2020 after leaving a retail pharmacy job. Shortly after finishing training the world exploded. The beginning wasn't so bad. I enjoyed the fact that I genuinely enjoyed the company of everyone in my training class. I haven't felt closeness like that in a job setting for more than 10 years. Getting paid more than my previous job and better insurance didn't hurt either, but after close to a year things started to shift. The workload started to get much more than the compensation was worth. We're talking about doing tasks, that any normal job, you'd most likely need a degree or, at least, a certificate for. Then there came the feeling that is my crux at any job I've ever had, which is running into issues that I can fully see, but not be able to do anything about. I can't stand it, even though that is life. I listen to people all the time who talk about how they hate working with our company and all I can do is shrug and apologize because there's not much else I can do. I watch our company cut corners and jobs to save a buck and that's the issue that's getting worse as time goes on. Leaving my coworkers and I wondering if our jobs will be outsourced since new micromanaging policies seem to leave us stuck in a corner staring at possibly firing or pushed to just quit. I will say that I that this job for being just what I needed as Covid took over the world, because at my previous job this pandemic would have put me in a very vulnerable spot.
But this post isn't about my shitty jobs, which I seem to be good at picking. No, this post is about something I just realized about myself recently. That discovery is that I flourish in leadership roles. I was never meant to be in a position where I'm at the bottom of the food chain. The reason I've never realized that and, a lot of times, backed away from the kind of role is because I've been told all of my life that I am a follower. I remember being told that from a very young age by my parents and I believed it. So I stayed in the shadows and followed rules and was comfortable there. It wasn't until I was promoted with the job that I had last year that I thought it was even something that I could do. I enjoyed being a supervisor and advocating for my coworkers the best I could. I pay close attention to detail and have a strong mind for equality and justice. I know those last two have no room in a capitalistic world, but that doesn't stop me from trying. To add to that, as I was finishing up my final semesters at school I had several of my professors tell me that I'd be a great teacher. Being a teacher isn't something I've thought about since I was a kid and people would ask what I wanted to be when I grew up. That isn't necessarily a leadership role, but it does give me a platform and a role to make a difference and that is also something I seek out of life.
I am a creator. Creators are leaders. I hate that I allowed myself to be watered down instead of nurtured into being a person who could create paths versus walk down someone else's. I'm already powerful in my words and strong in my influence. The only next step is to have that all backed by confidence. In recent weeks I've been thinking strongly about going back to school and continuing with my creative writing degree and adding education or lit into the mix. It would be an honor to help people pave their own path. I don't care if that's in a management role, a teacher role, or a businesswoman role, but that's where my heart is and has been all this time.
So excuse me while I try to figure out this next chapter in my journey. The next level of bettering myself and my future. It's never too late to discover new things about yourself. Most importantly it's never too late to tell yourself that you don't have to be in a spot forever. I know we all have bills and other responsibilities, but that doesn't mean that you have to sacrifice happiness and growth. Never do that. I never will.
-Asia Aneka Anderson, 2021(c)
The Ramblings Inside My Creative Mind: Even the Quiet Girl Did It
I write this as I scroll through my secret second Twitter account deleting all of my tweets and RTs advertising promos and enticing men and women alike to check out the content that I had to offer. I present my 40I tits and ass shots from flattering angles. Seems like forever ago when I was in the thick of it, but then again 2020 had a way of making four months feel like four score and seven years ago.
First things first. I honestly joined OnlyFans because someone close to me had joined and it triggered my competitive side. I thought to myself "I can do that and get more subscribers than you", and you know what? I totally did. Once that feeling was fulfilled I stayed because there was an overwhelming feeling of empowerment. I felt that to be a bit strange because I'm so uncomfortable in my body and have horrible body image issues, but somehow taking these pictures and posting them for others to see made me feel beautiful and in total control of my body. To also get that validation from others felt great as well. It did boost the ego. I also felt like OnlyFans opened up a new level of intimacy between me and my man, allowing me to feel a little more comfortable with my sexual side which was something that was (and still slightly is) troublesome before.
Once I got started I had my separate social media accounts set up that would be dedicated to advertising what subscribers would get for subscribing to my account. One of the first things I remember after getting everything set up is seeing a woman I followed on Twitter tweet out tips to newcomers and the one tip that stood out to me was that, to be successful on Onlyfans and to make an incredible amount of money you would have to dedicate up to 12 hours a day to posting, advertising, sexting, live chats, etc. I looked at my boyfriend and we laughed, "Yeah right". People have jobs, families, and, even though we were in the thick of a pandemic, still had other responsibilities to tend to. No one has that kind of time, nor does it take 12 hours to dedicate to this a day. I was wrong. So wrong. One of the very reasons that caused me to throw my hands up with OnlyFans is that it's actually exhausting. You wouldn't think that it would be, but it very well can be. You take a few days in the week to take a ton of pics and/or videos so that you have enough material to post through the next week or two. You have to edit said pics so that you only post the teasers to social media and critically edit for sites like IG who goes into a panic if a woman shows a shoulder let alone cleavage. You spend your days RTing follow for follow threads on Twitter, and helping out together creators whilst trying to grab the attention of their fans as well. You spend an enormous amount of time on Reddit posting in different subreddits while also upvoting other creators who are promoting too that you've formed an alliance with. Then you have to sweet-talk your way around men whose main goal is to try and dehumanize you, and even worse, try to get things for free. The reason you let them down gently is that some you can smooth talk into subscribing once they realize their ploy to get free content has failed. To do all of this and more plus working a full-time job was a lot. So I believe it to be true that to be ultimately successful on OnlyFans to where you're making hundreds or more dollars a week you do have to dedicate at least eight hours a day to it if not more. The promoting alone takes up most of that time.
One of the pieces that I really enjoyed about OnlyFans was to help empower other people. I saw that we were all trying to make it and everyone had their own spin on what they wanted to do, whether it was couples, erotic cosplay, BDSM, etc. It was a judgment-free zone and there was no competition between anyone. I spent my time trying to mostly help the people who I knew were not the main demographic of the consumers of OnlyFans, and that was people of color, men, and trans individuals. That's not to say that us people that fit this description didn't make any money or didn't grab people's attention, it's just that it was in fact a little bit harder.
The big downside to OnlyFans, and I'm sure some will disagree, is that it's not really built for women of color. While advertising on Reddit I did join a private group that consisted of only black women and what we would do is help promo each other. We all had the same difficulties of not getting as many subscribers despite the amount we were posting, some of the disgusting comments we would get regarding "race play" (race play is sort of like role play, but obviously based on race. I never participated in it so I'm not sure what scenarios white men had in mind when they suggested it, but I know that it couldn't have been good), and also being banned from certain subreddits for posting certain content although there were white women in these same threads who posted content that was the exact same. So again it wasn't as though we weren't gaining subscribers, but we did have to work extra hard to get a little bit.
I'll let you in on a dirty secret. When it came to setting up this content I purposefully went after men in my past that had crushes on me, men on my social media accounts that had crushes on me, and exes. This actually worked most of the time. I knew it wouldn't be hard to grab the attention of guys I knew in high school because back in those days I was very quiet and shy while my body suggested otherwise. In high school I had already surpassed DDs and the boys definitely noticed. So I knew many were waiting for fo the chance to get a glimpse and I totally took advantage of that opportunity. The quiet girl from your past showing off her goods. There was no way they could pass that up.
My main reason for making this post is to let everyone know that sex work is work. People like to clown others that do OnlyFans while at the same time jerk off to some of these same people on PornHub. Sex sells. Let's stop pretending that it doesn't. You don't want to pay for it? That's fine. I don't blame you since there is so much out there that is free but at the end of the day the people in the OnlyFans community put in a lot of work. The girl you throw singles at in the strip club puts in a lot of work. So on and so forth. If there wasn't a demand for sex or the illusion of sex it wouldn't exist.
So as I delete my tweets and my posts on Reddit, a part of me is still hanging on. I had so many ideas. I really wanted to go down the route of cosplaying before I got totally burnt out. So instead of closing these accounts entirely, I will leave them there with the hope of maybe one day I can use them to combine my sexy with my creativity. That day may come or these accounts might stay empty. I hope I'll come back to it, because, guys, I really spent a lot on lingerie and costumes. I thought I was about to do my thing and I just couldn't hang anymore. If all else fails I can always use these costumes for my guy. Right now he's my only fan and I'm more than pleased with that.
- Asia Aneka Anderson, 2021 (c)