Shake Your Groove Thang

by Cody Williams

Why didn't Terry McMillan know her Groove Thing's sexuality was questionable?

Everyone else who looked at him did.

Terry, however, had become the poster girl for lovelorn black women everywhere after her phenomenally successful book, "Waiting to Exhale," (WTE) put a voice to the collective frustration felt by millions of sisters going to bed one too many New Year Eve's night alone.

To be single and alone on the last night of the year is a professional black woman's scorn. So in WTE Terry, holding a mirror up to black female America weaved the lives of four sister-girl characters, who refused to breathe until Mr. Black-n-Right came along. Together they sang their 'Shoop, Shoop,' anthem on one New Years Eve night, "we girl-friends, at least have each other."

Terry made a lot of money from the sale of that book.

On any given IRT subway car heading into Harlem, or Brooklyn, at least nine people had their faces buried deep into the WTE hardcover. Millions flocked to see the movie made from the book, for which a sister-girl dealing with her own black man issues, Whitney Houston, sang the theme song, which also became a hit, "Shoop-Shoop."

"Sometimes you'll laugh
Sometimes you'll cry
Life never tells us, the when's or why's
When you've got friends, to wish you well
You'll find your point when
You will exhale"

Terry was successful but she still had no man. So she did what American women (and men) have done since Ernest Hemmingway first fell in love with Cuba. She went south, way south, to the Caribbean island of Jamaica and preyed on the much poorer inhabitants who hustle beads, bobbles and sex on pristine clear water beaches.  My widowed mother and a group of her teacher friends once made yearly pilgrimages to Jamaica. They liked the attention the island's young men paid them for the one week vacation that they were down there. Mom always joked about the old women who actually believed those hustlers really loved them after having only 'known' them while there 'on holiday.' Because tour planes and cruise ships come in weekly, any reasonably built Jamaican man with a full set of teeth can make decent cash tricking between hurricanes during the tourist season.

Jamaican men cultivate Groove and place it around the neck of sex starved American women like Hawaiian lei. Terry it seems, like too many of Mom's friends took what was supposed to be a holiday tryst, with payouts, for something it was never meant to be, everlasting love.

We've all been there.

Then 42 years old, Terry came back to American and told everyone who would listen about the 20-year-old good thing she found. Her 'Groove,' she dubbed him. He brought her back from the brink of abject manlessness many black women dread.

Under a multimillion dollar deadline and contract to do a follow up to Exhale she bunkered down and in less than four weeks penned a long love note to her Jamaican beach hustler, Jonathon, submitted it to her publisher and "How Stella Got Her Groove Back" was published.

The new book presented hope for the single girl - the single black girl. "Groove exists, y'all," Terry shouted from podiums everywhere.

Terry brought her Jamaican boy-toy back to The States. She trotted him around like a prized stallion while any trained eye saw more mare there than steed. But, she was happy and he was living a Cindafella tale of a lifetime. Who was going to tell the Empress of Hope and Love for black women that her Groove was probably not legit, and he looked awfully weak in the wrist?

Mom would've.

Terry married her Groove after living with him for three years and capitalized greatly on their 'love story.'

While 'Stella' sells did not match 'Exhale,' hottie Taye Diggs got to play the Jamaican boy-toy in the Hollywood version. His tight black behind raised more the envy of lonely black women who couldn't afford a plane ticket to Ocho Rios or Kingston, much less pay to keep, train, paper and housebreak their own Groove with a Caribbean lilt.

Paraphrasing rocker Bob Seger in the song 'Night Moves,' "She used him. He used her. Neither one cared."

Eleven years later, now in his 30s, Groove has grown up and has discovered he's really a Groovette. Yes Groove is gay. Not bi-sexual, nor confused about it, he admits to being straight up SGL (Same-Gender-Loving).

Terry, enraged has kicked him out of their 4 million dollar love nest and cut off his expense account. Only marriage to Lorena Bobbit could have been worst. At least Terry allowed him to leave with the Groove that he came to her with.

Terry's messy gay divorce situation comes on the heels of nationwide Down Low hysteria. Popular media has led black women who are lucky enough to have a man to question whether or not that man secretly grooves with other men, on the DL.

Undoubtedly her new book, "The Interruption of Everything," due to be released next month, and already heading for a second 500,000 copy hardcover printing, will make her more millions. I'm sure it will be a good IRT read.

Terry should get over publicly expressing outrage at her gay groove. The proverbial gutter is littered with men whom women have left down and broken hearted.

At least she'll have enough money to afford a whole new Groove.

Shoop, Shoop.

© 2005 codywilliams.com

Cody Williams is a writer/photographer/lecturer living and working out of New York City. He is currently completing a book about the unique experiences of black men in the American workplace. His website is codywilliams.com.

Comments

[malapert]

Stella got her book contract back.

[Tennessee Titans Jerseys]

I really like that. You touched my heart!