Cocoa Griot- I am bringing that "auntie" wisdom and energy on a weekly basis.

Most of us have encountered situations that challenged us to overcome incredible odds. Amanda America Dickson Toomer's story is riveting and I am sharing it with you tonight! Are you a podcaster looking for potential sponsors? Check out PODGO.CO. 00:00 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, that resident fifty-something who's here to share with you ideas about life love, and a host of other topics. Tonight I want to travel back in time a little and talk about a story that is really fascinating. I don't know about you, but I've had times when the odds were stacked against me, and I felt hopeless in some situations. I feel a little ashamed right now admitting that because I've never had odds stacked against me, like the woman I'm going to talk to you guys about tonight. Can you imagine being forced to deal with a 79 to one situation, but still fighting the battle anyway? This is the story of Amanda American Dickson Toomer. This is one of those stories from history that makes me believe in the power of right. 1:03 Amanda America Dickson was born in November of 1849. Her 40-year-old father was known as the prince of southern farmers. David Dickson was one of the wealthiest planters in Hancock County, Georgia. Amanda's father owned her mother, David impregnated Julia Francis Lewis Dickson when she was just 12 years old, Julia gave birth to Amanda at the age of 13. Amanda's time with her mother was very short because of David's plans for his only child. When Amanda was fully weaned, David took her into his home with every intention of affording his daughter privileges her mother would never have. The primary female influence in Amanda's life was her grandmother, Elizabeth Sholars Dickson. Even though Amanda's father and grandmother loved her dearly by all accounts, they could not emancipate the child based on Georgia laws. 2:02 Reading, writing and piano lessons were part of Amanda's daily life as a child. She spent hours on end in the company of her doting grandmother, Elizabeth. Amanda wore fine clothing, received lessons in social graces, and was referred to as Miss Mandy by everyone on the Dickson plantation. It is mind-blowing to fathom that Julia was her daughter's house servant. Added duties for Julia involved her continuing a "relationship" with David. David married 25- year old Clara Harris when he was 61, but he still carried on his "involvement" with Julia. Some accounts say that Amanda, being prepared to enter white society was frowned upon by many Hancock County residents. The Dicksons just ignored the scandalous talks around the family's decisions regarding Amanda's upbringing and Amanda lived a pretty charmed life until a father died. Well, Amanda declared herself an orphan. Now, this is amazing to me because she clung to her father's lifeless body on February 18, 1885. And it's stunning to think that she was 44 years old at the time, and she declared herself an orphan. Despite the fact, her mother Julia was very much alive, but Amanda's mind was whitewashed. 03:28 David's relatives set out to remind her of her place. David's immediate family assumed they would inherit his vast fortune, but they were wrong. Clara Dickson preceded her husband in death. David Dickson left around $30,000 for his surviving relatives. Amanda received more, much more! More than 15,000 acres in Hancock and Washington counties, 13,000 acres in Texas railroad stock, and rights to the seeds and compound formulas that he used to increase agricultural yields. But before I tell you about the battle royale that happened over all of this wealth let me go ahead and take a moment to recognize tonight's sponsor. 4:26 Tonight's podcast is presented by PODGO.CO PODGO.CO is the easiest way for you to monetize your podcast providing podcasters with a flat rate for airspace so you always know how much you get when you include an ad from PODGO.CO. Apply today to become a member and immediately be...

It took me a long time, but I grew out of sucking my thumb. There are remnants from my childhood I have not been able to let go of and I wonder if I ever will. PODGO.CO is tonight's amazing sponsor! 00:00 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, just a 50 something who is sitting here supercharged and ready to go to share some thoughts with you about life, love, and a plethora of other topics. When I was in deep in thought the other day, well I usually a notion came to me. I realized that I'm sitting here 55 years old, and I still have some of the same fears as when I was a child. I know that sounds really out there, but bear with me. So tonight's topic is why am I still dealing with three of my childhood fears? 1:02 One of the main fears I had, when I was a little girl, was going outside of the lines. Whenever I had a coloring page, I was meticulous about making sure that I took a crayon and lined the edges of the picture, because that was my personal boundary. I don't know what I thought was gonna happen if I crossed over that line, but it must have been something disastrous for sure. It was all about the opinions of adults who would see my work. Today, the lines represent the same fear of not being accepted because I might cross a boundary. I very much care about how I'm perceived by others in my work and my personal life as well. Just being honest with myself. This strikes me as really surprising that I have held on to this same fear for over 50 years. If you have suggestions about how to cross the lines without fear, please let me know. 2:04 When I was a little girl. We went to Six Flags, I wandered away from my family. I was just talking to people and trying to hide the fact that I really didn't know where I was, and that I couldn't find my family members. I was terrified. I stopped to talk to a lady who was selling paper flowers, and she asked me where my parents where. I told her they were lost. The lady got someone from the park to reconnect me to my parents. The entire time I was full of fear, but. I thought about what Mr. Rogers always said, look for the helpers. One of my greatest fears today is losing those I love. I carry this with me, especially after I have lost so many close loved ones. I truly believe the way to overcome this fear is to accept the fact that life does have a stopping point. It's important to pack all the love we can into the time we have with our loved ones. But we cannot stop what is inevitable. My mom used to constantly preface advice with well when I'm not here, I want you to do thus and so, what whatever right. You know I think the problem was I listened but I never wanted to imagine life without her. Now though, I think about many of those pieces of advice she gave me, and I'm glad she had the courage to discuss what I needed to do when she was no longer here. This helps me. If you are fortunate enough to still have your parents, please treasure them. Before I talk about the last fear that I am still harboring, let me go ahead and talk to you about tonight's sponsor. I gotta pay the podcast bills. 3:37 So tonight's podcast is presented by PODGO. PODGOis the easiest way for you to monetize your podcasts providing podcasters with a flat rate for ad space so you always know how much you get when you include an ad from PODGO. Apply today to become a member and immediately be connected with advertisers that fit your audience. That's PODGO. Co P O D, G O. CO. Be sure to mention to add my podcast Cocoa Griot in the how did you hear about PoDGO section of your application. 4:11 Let's go ahead and talk about the last fear that I still have. This kind of connects to the first one I mentioned, but I'm going to go into it on a little deeper level. So the last fear I still have is not being understood by others. I have been different my entire life. When I was a little girl we lived next door to a college English professor. Instead of playing with...

The trauma of sexual assault is devastating. There is no transcript for this episode. Db- https://bit.ly/37cP8YP

The way we frame questions can lead to solution-oriented responses. Tonight's episode Is sponsored by Db! Get 10% off your next purchase! https://bit.ly/37cP8YP 00:03 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Coco green, just that they do something who is seriously delighted that it's Wednesday and the fact that I get to talk to you guys about life, love, and a bevy of other topics. One of my favorite songs by Anita Baker is called Talk to Me. Even though I love the song, I think the lyric that repeats in the song saying what's wrong, what's wrong with you, is a little off the mark when it comes to supporting others doing emotionally charged times. There's a better question that can be asked. Tonight I'm going to share three examples of the power of the right question. 00:40 It is almost a pre-programmed reaction when we see someone crying or someone down to say what's wrong, I get it. We are in a hurry to get to the heart of the matter with the thought that we can maybe help this person feel better, or ease their suffering in some way. I would submit to you that what's wrong, is a deficit-based way of getting into this situation. I think there's another doorway that is much more positive and powerful. When someone is struggling or having a hard time, these simple words can make all the difference in the world. The question that I suggest you try is, how can I support you? How can I support you opens the door to working on a solution instead of focusing on the problem. It makes the individual think about what do I need in the situation to help me elevate from my current mode. Once that person is able to articulate what it is they need from you, you can begin putting something together to help them with that need. 1:35 Working with children can be rewarding, but also challenging. Often you may see striking out or withdrawal when a child is trying to say, "Hey, I'm hurting and I need you, but it really does not come off that is not the issue, because of the big emotions that are on display at the time. I had a situation where I was working with a child who had an enormous outburst. When I say the child had an emotional outburst. I mean, they had an emotional outburst times 10! People were struggling to reach this kiddo, you know, everybody was saying, "Oh, what's wrong, what can I do?" You know the child looked up at them like, okay, let me turn it up a notch so they really get that I'm having a problem. I looked at the child and I said, "Hey, how can I support you right now? The child looked at me with a look that said that nobody's ever asked me that. What this child was feeling was a huge sense of being overwhelmed by an environment, they found overly stimulating. Then they said to me, "Hey, I need to go outside and I need to be somewhere quiet." The whole situation de-escalated. You know, sometimes we just need to change the way we frame our support in order for that support to be valid to the person we're reaching out to. 2:50 Now, this is not a strategy that I just used with young children. I was working with middle school students and a young lady was as difficult as difficult could be. Day in and day out, she would challenge the adults who were just simply doing their best to impart knowledge to her. She would have none of it! Even though I have strong classroom relationship-building skills, this young lady was testing me, along with her other teachers. One day, I told her, Hey, I just want to talk. she thought I was going to write a discipline reform for her, even though I had not written a single one the entire semester for anybody else. She put her head down on the desk as if she was not going to listen to anything I had to say. I shared my thoughts about why I thought she was presenting the challenging behavior. Then I asked her, "How can I support you?" She lifted her head slowly, and a flood of tears rained down from her big brown eyes. This young lady opened up to me and shared...

DNA neither cares nor knows. DNA just is. And we dance to its music.- Richard Dawkins Hello Fresh- https://hellofresh-ca.o5kg.net/c/2544961/791027/7893 00:00 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, just to 50- something who delights in talking to you about life, love, and a host of other topics. Recently I shared episodes about the DNA revelation I experienced. I have very mixed feelings about the situation and I have thousands of questions. It turns out that other people had questions for me as well. I chose three to focus on tonight, and I ranked them in order from least to greatest, in terms of the number of times I've been asked these questions. 00:35 The first question I want to talk about is what would I say to my biological father if I could have had the opportunity to meet him? I did not have the chance of course, but if I did the question I would ask him would be, did you know about me? If he acknowledged the fact that he knew about me, my next question would be why didn't I know about you? This is something I have to come to terms with that I will never know the answer to. People I reached out to tell me they had no idea about the situation. My mom's cousin knew that I was not my dad's, but she didn't know who my biological father was. She just knew it was someone other than the dad who raised me. She said my mom never told her. I know the situation was very complicated. I don't have any bad feelings on my part towards my biological father. I just wonder about how many traits I have that I got from him. 01:28 The next question I get, so this would be counting down from three to one right. The next question is did I tell my siblings or what did I tell my siblings? You know I struggled to talk to my brother and sister about the situation at first. I felt like I had to walk a fine line because this involves our mother, who we all loved and respected. I did not want the situation to seem like I was casting our mom in a negative light. I also didn't want to perpetuate the legacy of lies that had gone on for 55 years. In the end, I decided it was more important for them to know the truth, and they didn't surprise me with their reaction. They were both supportive and encouraged me. I actually cannot ask for a better response than what I received from my siblings. So the number one question that I've gotten since my DNA revelation, will have to wait because I got to pay the bills for this podcast. 02:18 Tonight's episode is brought to you by HelloFresh. HelloFresh, do you feel like you're stuck in a dinner rut? With HelloFresh you get fresh pre-measured ingredients with mouthwatering seasonal recipes delivered right to your door. Skip all those trips to the grocery store, and count on HelloFresh to make home cooking, easy, fun, and affordable. You can now enjoy cooking and get dinner on the table in 30 minutes or less. With over 25 recipes to choose from each week, there is something for everyone to enjoy. Our recipes are designed and tested by professional chefs and nutritional experts to ensure deliciousness and simplicity. The one-pot Mexicali black bean soup is a fiesta for your mouth!!! Go to the link in my show notes to get $80 off, including free shipping on HelloFresh, the number one meal kit. 03:08 Now to that number one question I get. The number one question I receive since my DNA revelation is are you angry with your mother? My answer to that is a resounding no! My parents were separated for a while, prior to me coming into the world. My guess is that during that time, my biological father, my mother met, and the rest was history. My mother was 26 years old when she got pregnant with me. There's an endless list of mistakes I made when I was in my 20s I don't have the right to judge her or anyone else. I'm working hard to do my best to understand what she went through during this time and I'm not mad at her. If anything, I'm just disappointed that when I became an

The only thing constant in life is change. - Heraclitus 0:04 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, just a 50 something who is amped to talk to you dear listeners about life, love, and a hodgepodge of other topics. When you go through your entire life feeling like you are a genetic fluke, it undermines your self-esteem in ways that are hard to describe. I never wanted to take pictures with my family, because it was always a reminder of how I didn't look like my siblings. I didn't like to hear people constantly say that my siblings looked exactly like our dad, and then there was me. This weighs on a child when people are constantly mentioning the fact the child doesn't look like everyone else. So here I am 55 years old before I find out exactly who I'm supposed to be. From this day forward, I live my life, knowing that I wasn't some kind of random, genetic fluke, I look like someone. I look like my biological father. 1:02 Tonight I want to talk about the NPE survival strategy, I've been working on since I talked with you guys last. NPE stands for not parent expected. If you listened to my episode last week: Mama's baby Daddy's maybe. I'm not who I thought I was, you know that Ancestry.com shared a truth with me that my family hid for years. My NPE survival strategy. The truth set me free, but it made me miserable too. The first component of my NPE survival strategy is the family that I have known and loved for years, and my friends. People that I shared this information with really stepped up and let me know they are here for me. My aunt's reiterated that there's nothing different about how they see me, even though this newfound information was shocking. They reminded me that I grew up loved and nothing is different about that. I was grateful for the outpouring of love and avenues that are researched as part of my survival strategy was to join groups of people like myself. These groups helped me immensely. The groups are Togetherness Heals- NPE Only, DNA Surprises Support Group, and NPE Only: After the Discover. The caring people in these groups embraced me and let me know I'm not alone. Several people have walked this journey that I know that I have a sense of connection and community that is indescribably valuable. I even learned about facial recognition DNA testing from someone in the group. So I decided to compare my face with my biological father's face. Let me tell you about the results I received. I have to pay the bills for this podcast. 2:55 Tonight's episode is sponsored by PODGO. PODGO is the easiest way for you to monetize your podcast, providing podcasters with a flat rate for ad space, so you always know how much you get when you include an ad from PODGO. Apply today to become a member and immediately be connected with advertisers that fit your audience. That's PODGO -P-O-D-G-O , and be sure to add Cocoa Griot podcast in the how did you hear about that code section of the application. 3:31 Okay, I know it wasn't cool for me to leave you guys hanging like that. Let's talk about how facial DNA works, then I'll tell you about my results. The simple explanation is that the face of one person is scanned, and the traits from that face are compared to another person's traits. In this case, I had my biological father's face scanned and compared it to my face. The DNA site says that anything over 50% indicates a relative. My match that this man was 77%. I chuckle when I think about how a good friend said, "You wasted your money on that because anyone looking at the two pictures could see you look just like this man". I've heard good and bad stories about how families treat a newfound family member. I want to say this. Children are the innocent ones in situations such as mine. Villainizing a child, just because they are seeking information is immature and unfair. I accept the fact that the truth makes you uncomfortable, but I won't stop telling the truth, to make you...

You can go your whole life believing something is true and all of that can change in an instant. Tonight's show is brought to you by DB. https://bit.ly/37cP8YP 0:07 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, just a 50- something for geeks out when she has the opportunity to talk to you guys about life, love, and a myriad of other topics. Tonight, I'm bringing you guys a newsflash that had me baffled the entire weekend. I don't know how many of you watched the show So Who Do You Think You Are? I always felt that show we've had a comical title, until I was presented with information that made me question who I am. Last week I talked about what a great father I had, and then a few days later I discovered how much more I needed to celebrate him. An encounter on Ancestry.com helped me to discover that my father was not my biological dad. I know what you're thinking right now, how in the world can you be in your 50s and not know who your bio dad is? Well, let me tell you how that happens. Families and secrets just seem to go hand in hand. When I was approached by someone who was related to my bio dad, I was shocked, but not surprised. All my life, I knew I looked different from my siblings. I was given numerous explanations as to why, but I was never told the reason. People can say a lot of things about Ancestry.com, but I have one thing to say. Thank you! Ancestry.com was the gateway to the fact of me knowing that I'm not who I thought I was. I know I am not the only person who discovered they were not who they that they were. There's a whole group dedicated to a parent not expected, and people getting results that they just could not even fathom existed. There are countless stories like this on the internet, but tonight I'm sharing about the one that is up close and personal. My story is developing, as I learn more and more about the details about how I came to be. Well, I'm going to break it down to you in phases here. 2:22 So, for Christmas I received an Ancestry.com cute for my son Cameron. I didn't know that a simple gift would be the gateway to truth and dismantle a lifetime of lies. I was beyond excited to get my test results. I liked the section that showed my African roots because it was intriguing. When I started looking at my DNA matches, I was very confused. My sister came up, but we didn't share enough DNA to be whole sisters. My whole entire life I was told that we had the same mother and father. I started looking for other relatives on my dad's side of the family that I knew had taken the Ancestry test, but none of them were my DNA matches. There was a fly in the buttermilk, as the old country folk used to say, I just didn't know exactly which fly had landed in the buttermilk. Fast forward a little and I started thinking about the people I didn't recognize as my DNA matches. I felt like they had to be the key to unraveling the mystery of my parentage. Luckily for me, someone who took the test reached out and saw that we had a connection. I was her highest ranking first cousin and she was mine. We started talking about how we might be connected. She laid something in my lap that I was not prepared for. But I know it's true. Her uncle is my biological father. I had so many questions, but one of the first things I wanted to see was this picture. When she sent it to me, tears streamed down my cheeks because I saw all of me in him. Then, uh, well before I go on to the next segment of this story, I want to talk about tonight's sponsor. 4:11 Tonight's episode is brought to you by DB, DB is a Scandinavian brand that makes backpacks and bags to help people on the move, stay ready for anything from the streets to the peaks, DB's gear is traveled tested by some of the world's best athletes adventures and creators. Over the past decade, DB has designed and developed released, and refined the best bags on the market. With DB's patented hookup system, you are able to attach smaller products

It is really easy to get bogged down in time when we think about how long someone is in our lives. It might be a better strategy to just appreciate the value of the people we have in our lives. You can leave me a message and let me know how you related to tonight's show by calling ‪(512) 710-6341‬. Get an amazing Chef's Knife from Misen at a great price. https://bit.ly/3mWH8UT-Misen (https://bit.ly/3mWH8UT-Misen) 0:05 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, just a 50 something, who loves sharing ideas about life, love, and an abundance of other topics. Recently I was chatting with one of my neighbors and he mentioned to me that his brother passed away. I immediately launched a series of phrases like I'm so sorry for your loss. He stopped me in the middle of my commentary to let me know it wasn't about the time his brother was here. It wasn't about the value. That hit me really hard because what he was saying was right. I'm always deeply saddened when someone I consider as young passes away, and his brother was only in his mid-50s. From my neighbor's demeanor, I could tell his brother must have lived a full life. The time he spent on this earth was not as important as the value of the time he had here. I can relate to this train of thought on many levels. Tonight I'm going to share three examples from my life that I can honestly say the value outweighed the length of time. The first situation I want to talk about is with my grandmother. 1:13 My grandmother Ethel Meeks, was truly an angel on Earth. When I was a little girl, my favorite place was in my grandmother's kitchen. She always smelled like vanilla, and she was an excellent Baker. I was so fortunate to have my grandmother in my life until I was 26 years old. I will never forget the week before she passed away. I put my little one in the car with every intention of going to the grocery store, but I didn't make it, I headed to my grandma's place. You might not think this not anything special, but it was 70 miles away from my house. I talked with her for hours about all of the fond memories I had with her. I don't know what made me drive to her house that day, but I was so glad I did. When I received the call a week later that she had passed away, I thought about the value my grandmother added to my life. Whenever I'm super stressed, I always smell vanilla and it calms me down. I didn't have her in my life as long as I wanted, but I'm so thankful I had such an amazing grandma. 2:16 I have talked a lot about the women who made me the woman I am today, but I need to acknowledge that my dad was a major influence in my life as well. I remember my dad reading to me at night and me telling him what the words said, even though I could not read. by letting me tell him what was happening based on the pictures, he helped me to build a sense of confidence in myself. He didn't tell me I was wrong. He just reminded me that the words said something different. That also was part of what fostered my love and desire to read. My dad had no problems taking me shopping for girl's stuff when my mom was working. I remember one day we were in the store, and he ran into some guys he worked with. They were teasing him about holding merchandise that was for female cause, you know what I mean. My dad took it all in stride and said hey this is for my baby. I had the biggest smile because at that moment I knew I had the best dad in the world. My dad comforted me when I lost my husband later in life because he knew what it was like to lose a spouse. I could talk to my dad about anything in the world, and I miss my talks with him immensely. I was only 35 when my dad died. Again, I did not have him in my life as long as I wanted, but he added incredible value while he was there. 3:32 Before I move on to talk about the last situation where value was more important than time, I want to introduce tonight's sponsor. Tonight's episode is presented by Misen....

The White Tiger is a prolific film chocked full of social commentary. Please check out Db for your luggage needs! https://bit.ly/37cP8YP (https://bit.ly/37cP8YP) 00:06 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Coco Griot, just a fifty-something who finds pleasure in talking about life, love, and a bevy of other topics. This show is a little different for me because I'm actually going to share something from a movie/book, and these are basically quotes that impacted me. I'm doing this because I feel like this movie was super prolific and impacted me in ways that are difficult to describe. When my brother mentioned that I should see the film The White Tiger, I put it off for a little bit because I just really didn't know what the film had to offer. I sincerely hate that I did that. This movie which is adapted from a book of the same name is riveting The inequities between rich and poor are highlighted on the screen in ways that are difficult to digest. I have some quotes from the book that I'm going to share with you tonight that I feel were incredibly impactful. 1:06 The first quote, I'm going to share with you is the dream of the rich and the dreams of the poor, they never overlap, do they? See the poor dream all their lives of having enough food to eat, and looking like the rich. And what do the rich dream of? Losing weight and looking like the poor. I relate this to something my mom used to always say about how we are never satisfied in life, we can always find things that are unpleasant about our lives, even though we can be incredibly blessed. Now I'm not diminishing the plight of the poor in any way. I'm speaking to the people who have resources and are never satisfied with what they have, Unfortunately, we live in a nation that attacks the poor at every return. There seems to be this notion that poverty is a crime. You can look at decisions made in my local area regarding banning people who are experiencing homelessness, from camping. It was an unpleasant reminder for the people who could do something about it. They didn't want to see people living out in the open, it is a constant reminder of societal failures. 2:14 Another quote from the movie that was striking to me is the story of a poor man's life is written on his body in a sharp pen. The images of people who are malnourished and do not have adequate health care are painful to see. This is the reality that exists in this country. We don't have to look at another continent to see suffering, and people who are experiencing starvation. There are areas in America where people live in abject poverty. Some of the major areas that come to mind are cities in my state, that you might think of as concentrations of fabulous wealth like Houston or Dallas. 19.7% of people in Houston live below the poverty level, 17.5% of people in Dallas, live below the poverty level. Dallas has the most billionaires of any city in Texas. There are 18 in all. Texas has 56 billionaires, I really gained an awareness of how much money that is when I learned about how long it would take to count to 1 billion compared to counting to 1 million. At the rate of one number per second, it would take about 11 days to count to 1 million. On the other hand, counting to a billion could take anywhere from 32 to 60 years. Why is anyone starving in this country when there's so much? Well, the inequity is heartbreaking to witness. Before I move on to the last quote, I want to highlight from the light white tiger, I'm going to share information about tonight's sponsor. 3:48 Tonight's episode is brought to you by Db. Db is a Scandinavian brand that makes backpacks and bags to help people on the move stay ready for anything. From the streets to the peaks, Db's gear is traveled tested by some of the world's best athletes, adventurers, and creators. Over the past decade, Db has designed to develop released, and refined the best bags on the market. With Db's patented hook-up system,...

We live in a society preoccupied with looking good. What is the price of looking good? In this episode, I discuss the phenomenon of Fast Fashion and why it should be avoided. Hello Fresh! https://hellofresh-ca.o5kg.net/c/2544961/791027/7893 Code: HFAFF80 0:08 Good evening and welcome to my humble podcast abode. I am Cocoa Griot, a 50 something who is super amped to talk to you about life, love, and a smattering of other topics. I don't consider myself a fashionista, but I do love clothes. I like to wear nice things that are reasonably priced. I am not the girl who will have a $1,000 handbag or $800 shoes. I am not knocking anyone if that is your jam, but it's just not me. This evening, though I'm not really focusing on the high-dollar retail sector. I want to talk about the phenomenon of fast fashion. It is all around us, and there are some brands that have skyrocketed in sales in the last few years because of YouTube and Instagram influencers promoting their products. I am not going to single out any one brand or influencer, for that matter. I want to talk about this phenomenon as a whole, and how it impacts people and our planet. 1:11 You scroll through a website, and you cannot believe there's an ad for a tie-dye shirt that is $1.99, but it never enters your mind about how a whole article of clothing that had to be assembled could be so cheap. You are focused on what number of these $1 and the 99 cent gems you can add to your wardrobe. That is the allure of Fast Fashion, but your blessing is someone else's curse. Fast Fashion is all the rage right now and for good reason. Great looking clothes and affordable prices are an awesome combination. I'm always looking for great deals on great clothes. The problem is a lot of Fast Fashion is a great deal, but the clothes don't last. People will wear a garment a few times get, bored with it, or just does not hold up to laundering. Then in the trash, it goes. It is estimated that globally we throw away 13 million tons of textile waste each year. One person alone throws about 70 pounds away. The sad part is that about 95% of what we throw away could be recycled. We have doubled the number of clothes we throw away in the last 20 years. You know many of us have a cotton shirt. It is a wardrobe staple for me. What I didn't know is that it takes about 2,700 liters of water to make one cotton shirt. So, when textile waste is up in landfills, it can take up to 200 years for textiles to decompose. Environmental concerns are not my only issue. Fast Fashion's toll on people can be frightening as well. In some areas of the world, women are not able to escape poverty because they're being exploited by major fashion brands that want to keep production costs low. Women are not paid a living wage and toiling for hours on end doesn't make ends meet. The lack of rights of garment workers is despicable. In one instance, factory workers in India requested clean water in a letter sent to management. These workers were beaten and had their clothes torn. This sent the message," You have no right to ask for your rights." 3:35 I don't know if you guys remember the 2013 tragedy of the Rana Plaza building workers pleaded with bosses to not have to enter the building because the danger was visible, huge cracks were a hint the building was not structurally sound, hundreds of lives were lost in necessity tragically senseless tragedy fueled by greed. 3:56 Before going further, please let me share tonight's exciting sponsor with you. Tonight's episode is brought to you by Hello Fresh. Do you feel like you are stuck in a dinner rut with Hello Fresh you get fresh pre-measured ingredients with mouth-watering seasonal recipes delivered right to your door? Skip all those trips to the grocery store, and count on Hello Fresh to make home cooking, easy, fun, and affordable. You can now enjoy cooking and get dinner on the table in 30 minutes or less. With over 25 recipes to choose from, each week,...