party over here, party over there
and right down the hall

i've never been one of the party people per se--even when i was in college and it was considered socially irresponsible not to get your groove on whenever and wherever possible. me, my gurls used to have to drag me out to the wednesday night groove parties off-campus or to some jam at the officer's club at ft. eustis.

given a choice of staying in my room and chilling in front of my 13-inch black-and-white tv with my sweats on, or getting dressed up, heating up the curling iron and putting on uncomfortable shoes so that i could look "cute," i' was all for staying in the room.

crazy thing is, once i got to the party--kicking and screaming--i inevitably became the life of it. go figure.

truthfully, after receiving the news of a cousin's death and word that another friend was awaiting the results of a biopsy, i would have liked to have stayed in my room tonight, too. but that was in no way possible.

my production partner and i were hosting a fund-raising reception for our documentary on girls and gangs at the lucy florence coffee house in leimert park and i certainly had to be there. it was a wonderful event that brought out community leaders with deep pockets, a few celebs and some other folks who had been adversely affected by gang violence. we raised a lot of money, folks got their grub on, people responded positively to the screening and best of all my feet held up.

it was a very, very good night.

after the reception my friend jackie and i headed north on crenshaw to attend a "divine 9" party at the kappa house. for those of you who don't know, "divine 9" refers to the nine black greek organizations--alpha kappa alpha, delta sigma theta, zeta phi beta, omega psi phi, kappa alpha psi, alpha phi alpha, phi beta sigma, sigma gamma rho and iota phi beta.

jackie and i kind of knew what to expect when we entered the building because when you get to be our age and live in l.a., you always ring someone already at the party so that you can determine whether it's worth your while--even if it is on your way home. our friend herbert had been there for two hours when jackie called him to check on the scene. he reported that there were a lot of women--akas to be specific.

he was right. there was a room full of women doing the electric slide when we strolled in. the only men i initially saw were some old school kappas behind the bar. but the longer we lingered the more interesting it became. since my boy and his boy were running late jackie and i stepped outside to peruse the patio area.

bingo.

there was tons of eye candy--mostly kappas--and jackie and i didn't even care that most of them looked like the ink on their college degrees was still wet.

well, i didn't care.

my motto has always been: teach a child in the way you would have him go and he'll never depart those ways. but with my boy and his boy on the way, i restrained myself from opening up my very own magnet pre-school.

once my boy and his boy got there my feet and back were on orange alert. it was only a matter of time before i'd self-destruct. so after participating in a few line dances and doin' da butt, i was ready to call it a night.

a funny thing happened, however, once i parked the ragtop in my garage. the woman down the hall from me had left a note on the door inviting the other five occupants in my building to her birthday party. although kate (whose surname i don't know) and i had lived less than 20 feet from each other for nearly two years, the only things i knew about her was her name and that she was an obama supporter.

when i walked into her flat it looked like i was crashing a un meeting in session. there were white people, brown people, black people and some who were a mixture of all three. kate greeted me warmly with a hug--even though we had never said more than "hello" to each other in passing and introduced me to all of her cool friends. i spent the most time with patrick and eric. pat was from nigeria and eric hailed from senegal. both were really engaging and funny.

when she wasn't tied up in some seemingly deep conversation with one of her friends, kate and i had a brief introductory conversation. i found out that she was a school principal, had gone to tufts and harvard and that she was in the process of looking for a house. i also had some pretty enlightening conversations with others about politics, the l.a. dating scene and public education.

it was a very, very cool gathering and i'm so glad i came out of my room tonight. i wasn't the life of any of the three soirees i attended on friday, but i certainly felt very alive.