Malcolm & Marie
More than the mac and cheese OR When thank you is no longer enough.
“I’m sorry. Thank you” — Malcolm
“You’re welcome” — Marie
It’s cryptic for sure. Many watching might say a little over-the-top even. Exaggerated. An hour forty-six minute tirade with no end in sight. Maybe a murder mystery. But for me, more than anything, there was a glaring reality overshadowed by many of the other artistic aspects.
No one ever says thank you to Black women.
My lens. My filter. Yes. The distillation, no less pure.
We are complex. No doubt about it. We want more than most folks are willing to give. Assuredly. Our partners especially…unfortunately. Because in the midst of our going, doing, being, we make space for everyone around us.Yet, we are consumed. And when we demand that the same care, attention, dare I say love, be paid to us, our desire for recompense is touted as psychopathy. We are crazy. Our trauma broadcast, commodified, exploited. Resting dynamite. Ready to explode at any turn.
Insatiable.
Still, no one ever asks us what we need. How we need to be loved. What touch feels like when it is safe and secure, unbridled from the pressure of trying to sustain the Black male ego, withstand the white gaze and still put a decent meal on the table.
The pressure is on. And I am tired.
Because it’s always been about so much more than the mac and cheese.
For one hour and forty six minutes we wondered what would happen if they just went to sleep. Relieved themselves of the confrontation and seeming drama of blackwomanhood: a refusal to sleep, anymore, on the erasure of our contributions, our life-sustaining force.
Still, the resolution felt a bit too tidy.
I found myself applauding her tenacity, the sheer will to stay awake; the refusal to collapse at the redundant nature of the ordeal. We have been here before. Yet she refused, until she was ready.
And it continues to be about so much more than a thank you.
We no longer accept the pressure of our backs buckling from the weight of being muse and mule.
