06/11/2026
🌄✨ GOOD MORNING MY COUSINS ✨🌄
Indigenous Inspired
Auntie and Bestie
Auntie for Tribal Chairwoman
Part 59
The Lunchroom
The messiest politics in the whole tribal hall…
did not happen at the meeting table.
It happened over somebody’s microwaved plate 😭🤣
And cousin…
that is how I knew this chapter was not about policy.
It was about territory.
Because let me tell you something.
There is a big difference between where people work…
and where they relax enough to tell the truth by accident.
Ayeeeee.
Now listen.
After the waiting chair got exposed…
after the copy room confessed…
after the office door learned how to stay open…
after the room got quietly corrected for wanting applause every time it managed to act normal…
the building had settled some.
Not healed.
Do not play with me.
Settled.
That
ohhh, the Chairwoman is actually paying attention
kind of settled.
Mmmmmm.
And cousin…
that is exactly when the lunchroom started glowing.
Not spiritually pure.
Not beautifully.
Messily.
Because one thing about a tribal hall lunchroom…
that room knows everything.
Who sits where.
Who brings food and who brings opinions.
Who warms up leftovers and who warms up gossip.
Who suddenly gets real quiet when certain people walk in.
Who has “their seat” like the folding table signed a treaty with their attitude in 2007.
Ayeeeee.
That room.
Bestie knew before I did.
Of course she did.
She had the folding chair under one arm, sacred juice in the other, and that look on her face like she had already heard one sentence too many and was now following the spirit of foolishness by smell.
I said,
“What now?”
Bestie said,
“The lunchroom has sections.”
I said,
“It’s a lunchroom.”
Bestie looked at me and said,
“No cousin.
It’s a map.”
Rude 😭🤣
But cousin…
she was right.
Because the minute I walked in, I saw it.
One table had the old guard energy.
You know the one.
Quiet until they’re not.
Tight little smiles.
Coffee cups placed like punctuation.
People who act like they’re “just eating” while clocking every entrance like it’s part of their pension.
Another table had the floaters.
The ones who laugh anywhere, sit anywhere, and somehow survive every administration without ever being fully claimed by any side.
Then there was the little side counter crowd.
The standers.
The drifters.
The ones who don’t sit because sitting would mean choosing, and they still want plausible deniability with their potato salad.
Whew.
And cousin…
the seats told the truth before the people did.
Ayeeeee.
One chair by the window was clearly somebody’s.
Not assigned.
Claimed.
That chair had that feeling on it.
That
if somebody else sits here, this whole room is about to start acting like courtesy is under attack
kind of feeling 😭🤣
Bestie saw me looking and whispered,
“Ohhh.
That one’s political.”
I said,
“It’s a chair.”
Bestie said,
“No.
It’s a border dispute.”
Rude.
But exactly right.
Now listen.
I did not come in there to police lunches.
Do not start.
I came in because the hallway cousin had already taught me this:
if you want to know how a building really feels about change, do not only watch the meetings.
Watch what happens when people think they’re off duty.
Mmmmmm.
That is when truth stops wearing office shoes.
And cousin…
it did.
One person stopped mid-sentence when I walked in.
One smiled too fast.
One suddenly became fascinated with stirring noodles like they were trying to dissolve a whole opinion before it reached their face.
Ayeeeee.
And then Bestie did the rudest, holiest thing possible.
She walked straight over and sat in the claimed chair by the window.
Cousin.
I almost left my body 😭🤣
I said,
“Bestie.”
She looked up and said,
“What?”
I said,
“You know that chair means something.”
Bestie said,
“Exactly.
That’s why I’m sitting in it.”
Rude.
Dangerous.
Still rude.
And baby…
the whole lunchroom felt it.
Not loud.
Not dramatic.
But that tiny little room-shift when everybody’s spirit says
ohhh now we’re about to find out how deep this foolishness really goes.
Whew.
One woman at the old-guard table looked over, blinked once, and said,
“Oh.
You’re in Marlene’s seat.”
Now hold on 😭🤣
Because cousin…
that sentence right there tells you everything.
Not
there aren’t enough chairs.
Not
I think she stepped away.
No.
Marlene’s seat.
Like the lunchroom had hereditary seating and a constitution nobody elected.
Ayeeeee.
Bestie smiled and said,
“Well, Marlene must be powerful.”
Silence.
Then she added,
“Good for her.”
I had to turn away.
Immediately.
Because cousin…
Bestie says things so softly sometimes that people miss they just got spiritually tapped on the forehead.
Mmmmmm.
The woman said,
“No, I just mean… that’s where she always sits.”
Bestie nodded.
Then said,
“Mm.
And has the building been improved by that arrangement?”
WHEW.
Cousin.
The room cracked.
Not with laughter yet.
With shock.
Because yes.
That was the question.
Not who always sits where.
Who benefits from everybody acting like little unofficial territories are normal in a room that belongs to everybody.
Ayeeeee.
Now let me tell you something.
Lunchrooms tell the truth about belonging faster than mission statements ever will.
Because if a building says community matters, but the lunchroom still runs on invisible caste systems, claimed corners, and emotional fiefdoms over microwaves and creamer…
then cousin, the building is still copying old power in smaller fonts.
Mmmmmm.
One younger staff person, brave enough because Auntie and Bestie were in the room and the spirit had clearly decided lunch was now a live event, said,
“I always wondered why nobody sat there.”
Whew.
And there it was.
That little truth.
That small one.
The kind that sounds tiny until you realize it holds the whole chapter in it.
Nobody sat there.
Not because the chair was broken.
Because the room had trained itself.
Ayeeeee.
That’s how power survives in ordinary places, cousin.
Not always through policy.
Through habit.
Through vibes.
Through little unspoken arrangements everybody learns and nobody names until one day Auntie and Bestie walk in and sit directly in the middle of the nonsense with a lunch tray and a calling.
Mmmmmm.
Bestie looked around and said,
“Well.
Seems like this chair was running an unauthorized program.”
Rude 😭🤣
But cousin…
that broke the room open.
Now they laughed.
The floaters laughed first.
Then the standers.
Then one of the old-guard table people laughed even though they tried to hide it in their coffee.
Good.
Because laughter is one of the only things strong enough to loosen a room’s death grip on habits it has been calling “just how things are” for years.
Whew.
And cousin…
that’s when Marlene walked in.
Of course she did.
You think Creator was gonna let me write this chapter without Marlene showing up to collect her chair drama personally? Do not play with me 😭🤣
She came in carrying yogurt, a folder, and one eyebrow already halfway up.
She saw Bestie.
Saw the chair.
Saw the whole room trying very hard not to look like it had just been spiritually rearranged over lunch.
And baby…
the face she made.
Not rage.
Not heartbreak.
Administrative surprise.
That
oh?
we have abandoned custom?
face.
Ayeeeee.
Bestie looked up at her and smiled that dangerous little smile.
Then she said,
“You must be Marlene.”
Cousin.
I almost choked on air.
Marlene said,
“…Yes.”
Bestie nodded toward the room and said,
“Congratulations on the legacy seating.”
Rude.
DEVASTATING.
Still rude.
Now listen.
This is where weaker stories would turn it into a fight.
Not this one.
Because the truth was already out.
The room had seen it.
The younger ones had named it.
The laughter had cracked it open.
And Marlene herself now had one choice:
act like a chair was her inheritance…
or sit somewhere else and let the room evolve in public.
Whew.
She looked at me.
Now cousin…
that’s important.
Because some moments are not really about the chair.
They are about whether leadership is going to protect the little old arrangements that taught everybody else to stay smaller than they had to.
I smiled and said,
“There are plenty of seats.”
Silence.
Then Marlene nodded.
Not happy.
Not furious.
Just… aware.
And she sat somewhere else.
Ayeeeee.
Now THAT?
That was the chapter.
Not because a chair changed locations.
Because a room changed shape.
The younger staff person sat down in the old window seat after Bestie stood up.
Just casually.
Like they had been waiting years for permission they did not know was permission.
And cousin…
that hit me.
Because that is what these small moments do.
They do not only correct the old thing.
They make room for the people who had already learned to stay around it.
Mmmmmm.
The older woman appeared in the doorway then.
Of course she did.
Dark shawl.
Calm face.
That expression like she had been listening to the lunchroom all week and was pleased it had finally stopped lying to itself.
She looked around the room and said,
“Good.
A building’s real hierarchy always shows itself where people think they are just being casual.”
Whew.
That line sat all the way down.
Because yes.
Meetings are careful.
Lunchrooms are honest.
Ayeeeee.
Bestie picked up the folding chair, looked around the room, and said,
“Well cousin…”
I said,
“What?”
She nodded toward the tables, the chairs, the claimed little territories, the people now sitting different than they had before we walked in.
Then she said,
“Looks like lunch just desegregated itself.”
Cousin…
I nearly met my ancestors right there by the microwave 😭🤣
But yes.
That was exactly the feeling.
Not because Auntie gave a big speech.
Because one room got shown it no longer had to keep reenacting little old powers over soup and paper plates.
Mmmmmm.
So I looked around that lunchroom and said it plain.
“If this building belongs to the people, then no room inside it gets to keep acting like belonging comes with assigned corners, inherited comfort, or seats reserved for the same old energy.
Not the office.
Not the hallway.
Not the lunchroom.”
Ayeeeee.
The room got quiet.
That good quiet.
That hungry quiet.
That
something small just told the whole truth
quiet.
And cousin…
that is exactly where it needed to land.
Good morning, cousins.
Looks like the messiest politics in the tribal hall…
were sitting in the lunchroom the whole time.
To be continued...
🌄✨🪷💋🧚🏽♂️🫶🏽💖🪶⚡️🍃🌺🌸🔥🏡🌿🌿🌷😁
