Peace and Love to you family! Let’s use this pagan holiday known to all as Valentine’s Day to reminisce and talk about the history of Black Love. This beautiful feeling that we call love stems all the way back beyond the time that we can even fathom. We used our love as strength, bonds, stability and much more.

Let’s start with the Motherland. Way before we were taken from our home and sold into slavery, our traditions for courting and marriage was tride and true. There was a process of selection that was done among families to pick a woman who you would call your wife, a dowry that was paid and a village celebration. In slavery, that method was disrespected and our people was forced to stand by and watch as their loved ones were raped, sold and killed. Marriage was hidden and not allowed. But take heed to the heaviness that I’m about to drop in your mind……..

This is how Black Love differs from all the rest…..We made sacrifices for love! Black men stood in between their love and their ‘master’ and was beaten and killed to save the purity of their love. In days of segregation, women worked cleaning jobs and risked being raped and hurt to help their husbands supply for their family. Yes family……..forsaking all others for their family (I had to pause right there because that alone is deep). Black men being hung and images of hurt and scorned women and heart ached children being shown throughout. To late 50’s through the  80’s, woman being the backbone and house wife as the man sacrificed and gave all that he had to make ends meet.

The sacrifice, the strength, the perseverance of Black Love. I can only hope that my marriage encompasses half of the love that our ancestors shared for one another. That is why in this day in time it is more important than anything else to bring back the purity of Black Love and give that other mess back to its owners….Other mess such as infatuation, lust and infidelities, . We need that Black Love back……that was the basis of our communities and the reason for fight. Black Love alone is the mere reason of how we survived.

Today is not Valentine’s Day to me. Today is an ongoing celebration of Black Love. So show it and share it! Happy Black Love Day!