Those conversations usually never amounted to much. But they were something I had to do. These conversations were “something to do.” At the end of the day, my girls and I would compare notes and see how many of us had the same conversations with T-Money, Ace, or Grip. Usually, by the end of the day, we had all been promised a call. Those guys would never call, but we walked the next day, looking slightly sexier than the day before, hoping that someone really would call. Or that someone really would ask for our number. Or that someone really would call the number that we gave them. We just kept tryin’, believin’ that some day we would meet someone who would spend some time and get to know us. We hadn’t considered what we were wearing might be why we just kept having those conversations and gettin’ no calls. Isn’t that how it is with women—we just keep hopin’.
I was settling for all kinds of bad imitations of men. The truth is that most of those guys were the same. They were the sons of unmarried mothers and none of them had daddies. The fathers in their lives had been high or drunk or “uncles” who were not their fathers but the boyfriend of their young mothers. These men that I was choosing from didn’t know how to treat a woman except for what they had seen in the videos. They wanted us if we looked good and they didn’t have to get to know us. They never make videos about getting to know someone. I’m telling you about those times because what I learned from them is simple: The way you dress determines the kind of man you are going to attract. You never really “get” a man looking like that because he is not looking to be gotten. Guys like that are not really looking for a woman. They are lookin’ for hootchie mamas. Remember, hootchie mamas are not real. They are just video stars.
If you are an outrageous hootchie mama, if you go out with your body parts hangin’ out, just know you are leaving nothin’ to the imagination of a man.Everything you have is already out there. There is nothing to dream about or even to call about. If you have enough clothes on, then a man has the chance to see the other parts of you: your inner beauty and your personality. If a man isn’t attracted to you because of those things, you probably shouldn’t want him. The problem with being a hootchie mama is that you’re creating relationships that are based only on your physical appearance. When you gain a few extra pounds or don’t wear a short skirt one day, your man will be able to say, “You don’t look the way you used to,” and then he will eventually leave you to find someone who looks like you used to, because he wanted only one thing—a hootchie mama—which is what you were when you met him.
If a guy chooses you for something inside of you, he wants to be with you long enough to keep finding out who you really are. He cares about your personal characteristics, things like your smile, your sense of humor, the things that you dream about, the things that you want for your life, your children, your family—the things thatmatter. Instead, if you’re behaving and looking like a hootchie mama, he’s just thinking about how to take the rest of your clothes off.
I can’t say that I don’t understand this. I understand because I used to dress like that. Although I had so much more to offer, I wasn’t sure it was enough to get a guy. I had my sweet spirit, my open heart, my generosity, my love of music, my vocal gift, and my special relationship with God. But I still thought I needed to dress sexy to get attention. The attention I was getting was crap. It was a whole bunch of bulls**t. Excuse me for my language, but it just makes me mad that I wasted so much of my time when I was younger trying to find a relationship, and I was goin’ about it all wrong. No one told me—or maybe they did and I didn’t listen (again!).
I remember the exact day that I wanted to stop being a hootchie mama. I was visiting a church with my grandmother and she asked me to please dress right. She said, “I don’t want to see you in those crazy clothes you wear!” Although I knew what she was referring to, I didn’t want to think of myself in those “boring” clothes that my grandmother had asked me to wear. Because my grandmother is a minister, she forgave me for a lot of stuff, but she would never tolerate my wearing hootchie clothes and “being nakit” as she called it. When we walked into the church we were visiting, I noticed several men lookin’ at me. They were lookin’ at me in a way that I didn’t know how to handle. They didn’t have gold teeth or cell phones. They were proper gentlemen. They were church-going men. One of them came over to me and asked if he could help me in the door by carrying my bag. My grandmother seemed used to it. I had never seen a man act like that in my life. I was in shock and I didn’t know how to handle it. I just said yes quietly, not even knowing what I was agreeing to. When we sat down on the front row with all the other ministers and their families, I just sat there realizing that although the man was lookin’ at me, he was lookin’ at me in a way that I had never experienced. It made me
