Black Love 2021: The Okoties
Black Love is Beautiful. PERIODT.
For years, I’ve seen plenty of shows on “Black Love”. From Love Jones to Poetic Justice to The Photograph to the actual series Black Love, “BLACK LOVE” is phenomenal on both, the big screen, the small screen and in reality. Across the nation and in all its forms, Black Love, to me, is a balance between allowing a couple to grow, both together and separately; allowing each to become the best versions of themselves; while allowing each other to never “outshine” the other.
On TV, it’s even harder to see that collective shine “Black Love” brings as we are now living in the age of reality television where constant backstabbing, hate and hardcore infidelity takes precedence over love, trust and commitment. For example, last year we all were witness to the Jada-Will debacle dubbed “The Entanglement”. As heart breaking as that was, that episode of Red Table Talk was considered to be the most watched episode on Facebook and as the world lay witness to the dangerousness of infidelity, internal fighting, and couple separation to one of Black America’s ultimate Black couples, we saw how the term “entanglement” became a verb, noun, and adjective for 2020, followed by a series of memes, music videos and hilarious Black Jokes.
But in 2019, some of us saw a new couple emerged to the media scene, expressing Black Love unlike any other. We welcomed Deonna and Greg, the season 9 couple who decided to stay married on the Lifetime show, Married At First Sight into our lives.
For those who aren’t familiar with the program, Married At First Sight consists of a group of [sometimes] carefully selected participants from the city of the company’s choice by these specialists, that consists of a spiritualist, a relationship coach and a sociologist. They use “scientific matchmaking methods” to determine which couples get married and as these chosen couples first meet on their wedding day, what takes place after the wedding are a series of interestingly documented events of their honeymoon, their happiness, their sadness and any other relatable-married events that parallel the positives and negatives of married life. After a series of weeks, each couple, at the end, must decide whether to remain together or split.
In the case of Deonna and Greg, they stayed together and now they have a Youtube Channel.
After numerous requests from their fans the Okoties have Launched their Youtube Channel
Now, I’ve watched this couple and I’m amazed by their chemistry.
Where some on the show failed at their marriages, they triumphed. Where there was unnecessary drama for some, they found a way to overcome. Rather than quit the idea of love, they chose not to exhaust the possibility of love, but instead look at every “clutch play” possible to make their love survive. And as their experiences were comical and delightful, above it all, they were patient with each other, kind, and took the time to hear each other out in the midst of any drama.
Akpesiri
And now, years later, this lovely couple decided to show us their lives again by moving to Google’s YouTube to see the continuation of their journey and with the arrival of their beautiful “Baby O”, I can’t wait to see what they will contribute to the “Black Love Diaspora”.
As there are only four episodes currently, they’ve described how they survived 2020, created a clothing company, Akpesiri, and unboxed the Mockingbird stroller for Baby “O”. As they continue to embark on their adventure, I hope to see many more comedic moments, love, and a ton of comedy that will bring inspiration to many out there who might need guidance in their love lives and relationships.
Peace and Blessings to this Great Couple.
