My NY Story...Genesis

And now back to our regularly scheduled program, which was so rudely interrupted by my subconscious bowel movement. *Sigh*

So in Part I, I introduced you to this hilarious article about grown azz college grads migrating to Mecca-hattan, NY, and living in real live dorms at real life premium apt rents. The shit hit really close to home...but where exactly is home? I've been pondering that question for a few years now.

Perhaps home is simply where you lay ya head, or places you've been. In that case, that explains why every other line of the article transported me to a very vivid, suddenly specific space in time, my time here in New York. I'm gonna break down the article...below is a small snippet. Each link in the story represents a personal anecdote of my own. Click on them and get glimpses of my personal NY Story...

::squiggly flashback lines...squiggly flashback lines::

>>Excerpt from the Article...

Ms. Cook, age 24 and from Ohio, at first could afford only a rented room in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y., for $650 a month. Then she embarked on the archetypal, hair-raising New Yo.rk City apartment search: feckless would-be roommates, outlandish financial demands, an offer of a room in a building with a bullet-pocked lobby.

Brown Baggin It

We interrupt the series already in progress to bring you a Special Report...

Last night I had a recurring dream about shitting in a plastic bag.

Like, not even a plastic Wal.mart bag, but a sandwich bag, sans the zip.loc.

What IS that???

Big City of Dreams

I can remember very distinctly the flutter that used to develop in my stomach every single time the Ghettohound bus would emerge from the Linc.oln Tunnel and stumble into the west edge of midtown Manhattan.

No...matter fact, it was BEFORE you even got out of Jersey alive, when the bus pulled up to the tunnel, along that windy, downward roadway, and traffic seemed endless and you wished you could just walk out and sprint the rest of the way.

First thing you see is actually the smell of The City...burnt rubber, the nasty river, the constant commerce, crack, hotdog water, roasted nuts...toilets, just like the one in the Rosa Parks section of the bus. And the impossibly scattered skyscrapers and high rises. The BMW dealership. That big old church. Flashes of yellow..."driven" madly by English as a 2nd language folk. Apartments you can see into from street-level..and wonder how much them fools pay for rent.

I LOVE New York City...we've been together for such a long time that I can't even remember the last time I even looked at another city. Sure I've been with lots of others, but I always come back to NYC. He don't always show it, but he love me.

I know sometimes he black my eye, but that's because I ain't work hard enough, or I came home drunk every night last week, or I missed the M7 bus and had to walk the 3 blocks from the train station. (see, I deserve it, I'm effing lazy!)

But he always opens his doors to me...and not to just me but to my friends and family and mad people I'll pass on the streets without ever caring to know.

I love NY...but I gotta go. The flutter in my six-pack* is long gone. Now when I enter the city...the first thing I see is a way back out. *sigh*

Saw this NYT.imes article from last month and reading it was like I was on "This is Your Life." Brought up mad old shit...

...made me double over laughing...

...made me recall times I still insist on pretending never happened...

...brought on the temptation to google (or worse yet, myspace...is that an official verb yet? If no, I'm declaring it so now.) people I used to starve with...

The article gave me those giddy, schoolgirl, antsy dancing feet...the kind that always accompanied my rush to pop an Al.toid, wet wipe my face, lotion my knuckles, bend my brim, and retrieve my bag from under my seat...

...trying to be the first one off that Ghettohound soon as it pulled into Port Auth.ority.

The article is a mirror. And it reminded me of why I decided to throw old boy the peace sign...at least temporarily.

So the article is below...it's really funny...it's about how Harlem is turning into a college campus...figuratively... complete with dorms, RAs...literally.

It's longish (what's new)...but in the coming days as times permits...I'm gonna do my best CL Smooth impersonation, and tell my NY Story...inspired by excerpts from the article.

I leave, but I always return.
*gross misrepresentation for poetic license's sake... Aint no packs in my stomach. Nota one. And I got "inny".
==========

By JS
Published: Jul 13, '06

Kelly Fra.nces Cook is an editorial assistant, Ivy League graduate, aspiring writer — the kind of new arrival who has long been important to the life of New York City. Young, educated and hailing from elsewhere, newcomers like Ms. Cook have historically stoked the city’s intellectual and creative fires. But, these days, how do they afford a place to live?

Ms. Cook, age 24 and from Ohio, at first could afford only a rented room in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y., for $650 a month. Then she embarked on the archetypal, hair-raising New Yo.rk City apartment search: feckless would-be roommates, outlandish financial demands, an offer of a room in a building with a bullet-pocked lobby.

Then she saw an ad on Craig.slist for space in a 60-unit building in Harl.em described as full of young professionals. The price was right; the woman on the phone was friendly. Back in Ohio, Ms. Cook’s mother had begun to think like a New Yorker: “Yeah, right, Kelly. She’s probably some mass murderer. I don’t trust her. She’s too nice.”

This month, Ms. Cook is moving in. The woman on the phone, Kar.en Fal.con (not a mass murderer), calls the building “a dorm for adults.” It is a community of the overeducated and underpaid.

There is nothing new about having roommates in New Yo.rk City. What Ms. Fal.con has invented is a full-service dorm, full of strangers she has brought together to share big apartments as a way to keep housing costs down. Her approach is a homegrown response to the soaring rents bedeviling desirable cities like New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Ms. Fal.con, an informal agent for the building’s owner, says she has placed nearly 150 young people there and in two other buildings in the neighborhood in recent years. A gregarious Californian with rainbow-colored braids, she pieces together roommate groups like puzzles. Each tenant ends up paying $700 to $1,200 a month.

Ms. Falcon says she screens for a combination of good credit ratings and “sweetness,” looking for people who are respectful, considerate and easygoing (and perhaps have a co-signer).

She mixes genders; all-female groups bring too much high drama, all-male groups make too much of a mess. She has matched Ph.D.’s with Ph.D.’s. If the combination is a disaster, she will arrange for a swap. Anyone can leave before the lease is up as long as Ms. Falcon can find a replacement.

She says the tenants she has placed in the three buildings have included chefs, actors, writers, people in publishing, a woman in public relations, a production manager, an accountant, a paralegal, a program officer for a foundation. There have also been plenty of graduate students and students from abroad.

“Our neighborhood is one of the last neighborhoods left in New York where you have these big old Bea.ux-Arts buildings, built for wealthy families,” Ms. Fal.con said, referring to the stretch of Harlem from 145th to 155th Streets near the Hudson River. She said groups of adults, each contributing, pay rents that families cannot or choose not to pay.

New Yo.rk City has long been a magnet for the young, well educated and ambitious. According to a report published by the Census Bur.eau in 2003, nearly 132,500 young, single, college-educated people poured into the New York metropolitan area between 1995 and 2000, more than into any other metropolitan area in the United States.

“Sometimes we underestimate how important that is in generating the city’s creativity,” said Frank Braconi, chief economist for the city comptroller’s office. “To the degree that housing costs become a barrier to that group, it can in the long run sap us of that creative potential that we would otherwise have.”

Brad La.nder, director of the Pratt Center for Comm.unity Development, a nonprofit group, said young professionals get less attention than other financially struggling groups because they are more mobile and have options. Though they, too, are wrestling with the city’s shortage of lower-cost housing, they are seen as harbingers of gentrification.

Mr. Lan.der said a well-known strategy among landlords of buildings with rents regulated by the city is to seek out tenants who they imagine will not stay long, because they can often increase the rent when a tenant leaves. “Students as well as professionals,” he said. “Plenty of landlords find this group an attractive set of folks to rent to, believing they’ll be out in a couple of years.”

Mari.eke Bianchi, 23, a junior account executive at a public relations firm in the Flatiron district, moved to New York from St. Louis last year after graduating from college. She started out on a friend’s couch, then sublet for six weeks in Hell’s Kitchen, where she had to move a giant exercise bike to get into bed.

“I can’t believe it, a grown woman in a trundle bed,” she said with humorous disgust.

Ms. Bian.chi, earning $25,000 a year at the time, found one of Ms. Fal.con’s ads. Now she lives in a large room in a four-bedroom duplex apartment in a brownstone in Har.lem. Her roommates are a bartender, a woman in information technology, an art historian, two dogs and two cats. Her rent is $900 a month.

Adult dorm living is not without its complexities.

Ms. Bian.chi feels she should check first before inviting friends into the backyard, since they have to pass through another roommate’s space. And when one of her roommates brings anyone home for the night, Ms. Bian.chi invariably knows. “It’s that level of intimacy from Day 1,” she said.

Like Ms. Bian.chi, others ponder their next move.

Wil Fe.nn, a 29-year-old program officer for a foundation, has been trying since college to save money to buy a home. He lived in Westchester County for six years, in order to pay less rent. Then, last year, he became bored and decided to move into Manhattan. He, too, happened upon one of Ms. Falcon’s ads.

Now Mr. Fen.n pays $850 a month for a large room in a four-bedroom apartment in what he describes as a beautiful building with exposed brick walls, mosaic tiles in the lobby and a garden on the roof. His roommates include a New York City teaching fellow, a chef and a German student studying in the United States on a Fulbright scholarship.

Ms. Fal.con first placed Mr. Fe.nn in a two-bedroom apartment with a woman who he said worked for a large bond firm. One night, Mr. Fe.nn said, she had a fit after he left his mail on top of the microwave oven. It was downhill from there. So, at his request, Ms. Fa.lcon moved him down to the four-bedroom apartment on the second floor.

“Everyone talks about free-market solutions,” he said, speaking of the city’s shortage of lower-priced housing. “But the solution now is the rich get richer and for everyone else it’s the equivalent of being a sharecropper in the city. I’ve been working five or six years now, trying to save up and buy something. Every time I get closer, the goal moves farther away.”

Asked how adult-dorm life differed from college-dorm life, Mr. Fe.nn said: “You’re not really at the same place where you were psychologically. Now, for me, I’m kind of wondering: When does this end? When do I get to be able to buy a place and settle down?”

"Dutty Wine"...The Universal Language

Let's just say...

If I won 2 tickets to Montego Bay...tho I love them dearly, I wouldn't take ANY of my family members...nota one a them.

I'd take this kid.

Tho I'm fairly certain given the opportunity it'd be some fresh faced lil Columbian boy named Papo that he'd take.

I missed y'all!

...Naw, I truly didn't.

Which is great news. Means I'm not desperate for cyber attention after all.

Awww, but I am happy to be back.

What'd I miss? ;)

What y'all break up in here?

Who ate the last fudgesicle??

Where my slippers? I left them right by the computer!

Who been fcuking on my office chair?

Can't leave y'all for one week without shit going haywire! :)

Welcome to Jamrock

The blog you have reached is temporarily out of the country.

10 days. A much needed exodus. But also got some family business... We're all going down for an early celebration of my dad's bday (RIP) and a ceremony to erect his tombstone (apparently this is a cultural tradition in JA).

Life is currently moving at warp speed. Got lots to share upon my return.

But please feel free to talk amongst yourselves...here's a topic...

You have 2 tickets to Montego Bay...who do you take?

Are you certain that person would take you?

Or would you sell the tickets to cover the rent? :)

There's just something about sun, sangria and sex that makes lifelong friends out of otherwise perfect strangers. See yall out on the beach one day...Uncle Slishy, can't you organize a trip or sumthin. :)

You're All I NEED: Wise Hits The Tittie Bar

A convo with this dude I know...

Dude I Know: ".....yadda, yadda, yadda...some bullshit about wo/men...followed by some obvious/valid points, then some ole bullshit...women are the needy gender anyway."

Wise: "That's a fact?"

Dude I Know: "Come on, don't gimme a hard time. That's understood. That's common knowledge. Conventional wisdom."

Wise: "Guess it's time to re-analyze the convention."

I wasn't yet drunk enough to not wonder how my azz looked in my jeans. It was mild for July, humid for after midnight. Oddly loose at the waist. Snug in the thighs.

Shoulders out. Signature newsboy cap. Slightly incognegro, mostly quarantined.

Usually when there are this many dudes standing outside a spot it's either a night out for free drinks at Gay Bartender's job, some exclusive 'you-need-to-be-accompanied-by-pussy' party, or worse. Tonight was shapinig up to be the latter. The worst.

My blackhand side is cattle stamped and I proceed inside, the only chick in my crew. Stepping across the threshold, under the scope of tacky purple strobes, into the rhythm of nursery rhyme "skip hop," I quickly assess that I am one of a few chicks in the whole joint.

I grab my fictional dick, nod at the topless hostess who welcomes us to the establishment, and walk straight to the bar as if I got the fattest azz there. That's how you gotta be when you're in the House of Azz, when that's the money shot, if you will. I felt hella out of place, yet never one to be outshined, I'm determined to fit the hell in somehow.

This is not my first time at a titty bar. It's just never as good a time as advertised.

See, I had this convo recently with some dudes I know, dudes my age and older, and I was intrigued/appalled/amused by the fact that it seems the older guys get, the more obsessed with strippers they become. For some obviously uninformed reason, I thought this was something dudes grew out of, you know, like skid marks.

Not so, I'm told. In fact, as I'm walking thru I see with my own two Guccified eyes that this may indeed be a fact.

"I'm hooked, Wise. The nastier the better. I went with my boy from work and he's like a VIP and he put me on. So we come and they show us mad love at the door..."

"I'm in love with like, the laziest stripper there. She dances maybe once a week. Some of those bitches be on it full time. Not mine. She a temp or some shit. But I love her."

"No, they're pretty broke down. The cutest one is bout two cupcakes away from dragging down the damn pole."

So I'm alert, in as analytical a mode as can be expected after a few Goose and pineapples (at home, of course. Only vodka I seen behind the stripper bar is Popov [read: cheeeeeap].) I first scan the crowd for ex-bosses, ex-classmates, suspected lesbos, celebs, white people, and dudes I would normally bone...in that order. I see a few ComicView regulars and some DJs, but that's about it. Coast is clear for me to explore openly.

There's an empty stool near the stage and I plop down, looking around, tapping my rings on my glass. In my mind this is a clear show of interest in the music and disinterest in the performer. She was largely unremarkable, as is her audience. I'm saying, she was swinging and swaying and twirling accordingly, but dudes acted like she was the opening act or something. Like she was Little Brother at a SummerJam show. Crickets. But as the night wears on I notice that this is how it always is. A few bucks thrown here and there...but mostly the stage dudes are broke.

I ease up so as not to be typecast. My boys are huddled near the rear of the place, and when I approach it's as if I'm the only kid on the block with a kick ball and I finally came outside to play.

"Showtime, Weezy." I'm whisked to the back, and I say out loud, "Oh okay, this is where the real nggas be at."

And the real hoes. Big, small, light, dark, Asian-inspired, bilingual, bilateral, everything. Just a rainbow of blue collar cooch. Hard workers, too. Straight up Mexican work ethic in this muhfucka. These back room chicks ain't playing. They keep it moving, they pay attention, show love, make eye contact, remember first names, dispense pet names like Pez, and they carry an air of control. A false air, but convincing nonetheless.

These are the earners no doubt. And before I knew it they were about to earn my respect.

I'm led to a stiff couchy chair, slightly reclined. Relaxed.

My drink is replenished. My boys are watching, fists full of cash. Calling the shots.

I smelled her hair first. Pears. And it wasn't the stringy kinda hair that I compulsively pick off me after a packed train ride. Or the kind that clogs public restroom sinks. It was the black/mixed kind... thick and healthy. Real, I think.

"You're really beautiful. Your jeans fit you so well." Her raspy whisper is a loud bellow to my ego. Before I could thank her, her head slides down the side of my neck, down the front of my shirt, along the length of my waist band and back up to my neck.

I pull my head back, in genuine 'you go girl' deference. My boys egg her on, and watch intently, begging me to finish my drink and play along. Little did they know I had no intentions of cutting the show short. I was about to get schooled. Plus she looked a lot like my girl crush Al!cia Ke.ys. Sue me.

What followed was an impeccable and impressive display of a master of human nature. She said all the right things, wisely catering to my feminine desires for attention and approval. She was aggressive and showy, conquering women's natural competitive spirit. And she hit all the erogenous zones like a metal detector in a piggy bank...

Winding her smooth azz on my lap with varying speeds and pressure.

Rubbing her face in my chest in slow, methodical circles.

Suggestive girl talk that made me giggle like we were pointing out the dudes we'd let hit.

Placing her hands over mine then on her hips as she put on a show for my boys.

Left not a drop of sweat or stuff anywhere near me.

She had me at "beautiful."

I lifted my glass and let her sip the last bit of my drink. She needed it more than me.

When it was all said and done I was thoroughly aroused, impressed and entertained. My boys on the other hand, like most of the men in the boom boom room appeared thoroughly hustled. There was a hint of 'they don't get it' in their eyes. A sense of fantastical unreality in the way they reached out to touch the oasis. Their fingers lingered, longing, looking for a sign that this might be real.

It's the same glazed out look they get around hour 3 in front of a video game.

They strike up conversations. They ask about the chicks' school, sons, shit that have nothing to do with them. Shit that says they're inappropriately invested.

They are rendered absolute azzes around these women. They feel no reservation at the fact that they are not only ruled by an illusion, but that said illusion is community property. They overlook the stench of other nggas' giz and nut sweat. Turn a blind eye to the fingerprints around the brawd's bikini top and bottom. Where other muhfuckas already paid their respect.

This is a transaction...conducted in a trance.

"I'm saying, sometimes you just want a chick to show you some love, no strings attached."

"I love my wife, but the attention is mad necessary. And after that I go home to her."

"I know she do this for a living, and I don't mind funding her shoe fetish cuz she fulfills my azz fetish."

Dudes talk all day about how they just want to have sex with different women, without any commitments, they want it all the time, they go to drastic measures for a mere dick suck.

Men want intimate contact, want to be fulfilled, want to feel sexually accomplished, constantly.

And we're the needy ones??

A Dream Best Left Deferred...Some Ole Snoopy Bullshit

PS...This version actually has an ending. Effing Blogger...


Today, for the first time in all my almost 30 years...I loaded the ice...

...firmly held down the, umm, poker, thingy...

...and cranked the hell out of the, um, cranker doodah.

And shit was no easy Peanuts my friends, but trust, Wise is living proof that it is never too late to fulfill your dreams.

And today I was indoctrinated into the world of an American iconoclast...





I FINALLY fcuked with a Snoopy Snow Cone machine!

What in the hell IS that thing?!

Once again, my parents were soooo on the money.

When I was little, I was led to believe that among other heartless limitations, little Jamaican kids don't play with toys...cuz I didn't have none. For birthdays, I got socks. For Christmas, I got draws. And every week we hauled azz to Joann Fabric and every week my mom made me a fly azz dress for church on her Singer.

Not only were sleepovers mostly disallowed unless under extreme circumstances (namely, the case of relatives, or if my mom knew the other kid's mom somehow. I'll never forget that I was one of the only kids not at SC's sleepover in 4th grade, when they watched Top Gun. To this day I've never seen that shit. I'm a grudge-holding hater, yes.)

Wow, that digression was mildly painful.

Anywho...me and my brothers? We didn't get Nintendo until all after the fact. I'm fairly certain Atari skipped over us completely. Ok, we did have Monopoly and Sorry, but we always lost the pieces or the dice after like half a day. And whatever, all I ever really wanted was Operation, anyway!

Cabbage Patch Kids. Forget it.

Barbie spent most of her short bid at our house headless.

And in 2nd grade when I BEGGED for a jheri curl, a wet and wild one like Kiwanda and Juma and dem's, my mother didn't even bother to laugh. I doubt she even dignified my request with any response...except perhaps an all-day Saturday trip to the shop for a press and curl.

Easy Bake Oven...are you effing crazy? "Den we nuh already hah oven???" [translation: we're still paying shit azz Sears for the oven we got!]

We weren't even that broke! At least I don't think we were. I mean, we aint have no snow blower or dish washer or riding lawn more or nothing (I'm pretty sure that's why they had my brothers). But I never saw food stamps until, well, until I was old enough to trick the system into giving me some...

we ain't wear no hand me downs or nothing (until a freak of nature reverse growth spurt found my older brother and I wearing almost the same shoe size. I was so fly in his old Jordans)...

and we brought our lunch to school, we aint get no free breakfast or reduced lunch like the broke kids. [Hold up, that's what Oprah said broke folks need to do, pack lunch. Shit yall, I think we mighta been broke!]

Well for whatever reason, my parents just were not feeling investing in American nonsense. I resented it and them, and had a list of shit that I vowed I'd buy as an adult.

But I gotta tell you, I think they were on to something when they vetoed the snow cone negotiation.

First of all...why did it feel like I was doing reps on the arm lift machine at Lucille Roberts, and not even on the cranker thing, but just on trying to hold down the damn Snoopy face red crusher thing?

And you do all of this for Snoopy to vomit out a spit's worth of slush?? That's it?? This is what I spent hours in my room crying crocodile tears over?? [that last line was not in the original text...but I like it] It so was not even worth the Bacardi Razz I had planned to pour in.

Ok, whatever...I still poured it in and it was good, but Bacardi's good with REGULAR ice...and doesnt require upperbody strength.

This is not what I dreamed of. Lord knows I've spent enough of my adulthood chasing these "when I get old enough" fantasies, but this one should have perhaps just stayed in the annals of my childhood agony.

In all of their anti-American, self-superior, unrelenting West Indianness...my parents were so right.

I was fine without the Snoopy Blow Cone machine. And I'm just fine with just my Bacardi.

Locs Down

Well, this is in fact old news, but for some reason I can't shake the feeling it gives me. [nostalgia sometimes make me nauseous]

So this guy is a young journalist and he's doing a summer internship at Black Enterprise magazine. Before the internship he let them know he has locs and they say that's cool.

Then he gets to the job and starts getting shade that, from what I've read, is both subtle and overt. He is subsequently asked to go clean cut.

He says, No Prob, and now sports a cute brush cut.

No harm no foul, he was cool wit it, he keeps the job, all is well that ends well. And to be sure, I wish to foster neither a dialogue nor debate about whether he should or should not have cut it. That's his grown man prerogative, and he did what he had to do.

But still, the whole thing just feels, well...icky.

Before you attempt to half-pipe down my throat, I am well-versed in the corporate American culture. I get it. Well, I get that it exists, but it's the subtext that I'm not feeling. And particularly so from this particular company.

[And now for a personal anecdote from the vaults of Wise's private historiography]

My first job out of college was at a TV network in NYC. It was magical walking into that newsroom on my first day...well, night. I started off working on the overnight news programs. So it's just before my 9pm start time and I walk in, and...um, am I in the right place??? Why there so many, brothas...and sistas up in here?! I was under the impression (and experience) that I'd be one of a palm full at most.

It was like Soul Plane up in there. I was stunned. So when I was promoted to dayside, I realized just how isolating the overnight really is...namely that that's where they store the black folks for safe keeping...cuz dayside wasn't having them. FINALLY I was back to being a token. Whew!

Yet there's a twist... there are also a few tokens in key positions. Assignment editors and such. And to be sure, they are of the fiercely loyal variety. And they are also decidedly, and as I had come to expect, of the citrus complected variety. [No offense to my light skinnded contingency. I'm a chocolate sis, but got no issues in that regard...however, my bosses REALLY did. That's another hellish story for another day]

As usual, I digress...

So the thing about working overnights is that for all the free time that you have during the daylight hours, it doesn't really translate into free personal time. No meeting your friends for 1/2-off appetizer dinners in midtown, no scheduled TV time (I was dying! Barely had time to set the damn VCR to tape shit!)

No time to do my hair, even.

But I lived in Brooklyn, and I had a more convenient personal option. One day right after work I jumped on the BK-bound Q train, woke up in time to hop off at Dean St and heard music to my ears...

"Haaahh brrrraydee, Meez?"

[translation... "Hey sis, I can tell you out here hustling just like me...but your shit is tired. Come let the Africans hook you up wit some braids. We got bout 7 chicks ready to braid you all at once. You'll be done in an hour."]

Why, yes. Thank you.

So I'm on dayside now, and I got braids right, and I'm actually making it to work on time every morning bec there is no curling iron to contend with (sue me, I'm a perm girl). And I look real fly too, cuz the braids are the same length as my natural hair, and very well groomed and beautiful. Well worth the 7 hours in that God forsaken chair listening to the girls cuss me out in Wolof and broken French for not washing my hair beforehand.

So one day the exec producer of the evening news requests a sit down with me. We hit it off immediately. He's a very tough, very fair man, who called me a "Pistol"...which I surmised was Baby Boomer white-speak for what today's corporate climbing black girl would be called "sassy" or "energetic." He liked me.

When word got back to one of the Light Bright Assignment Editors about our meeting, she dismissed it as the boss just "needing to figure out the girl with the braids."

I was stunned. Clearly she was hating...she had never made any effort to be supportive, accessible or even cordial to me or any of the other 'Of Colors' there. She may as well have been grey.

But clearly, there was also probably some truth to it. She had been there a while. I'm sure she'd seen many like me come and go. And obviously she played the game well enough to climb to where she sat comfortably (or so she thought. She got reassigned shortly thereafter).

I pondered what that meant. Was it possible for my hair to eclipse my performance? Was that all they saw ...my impossibly sharp parts brandishing my impossibly clean scalp, and not my consistently improving output and work ethic? I didn't put it past them. That's what they're taught...myopic, asinine manners of categorizing and judging black folks. Hell these were the same people who hired only gay black men, in an effort I imagine, to keep the fast tail black girls still.

I expected that from them.

I expect something different from Black Enterprise, but should I?

What the articles don't point out is that this young man, who I've met on several occasions, is an officer in the organization that reps his fellow black journos. His behavior and reputation is intrinsically linked to that position. He's also from Atlanta, so had he been sent packing that woulda been tough I'm sure on his housing, his summer dough, not to mention school credit perhaps.

I think those things are relevant to note, but at the end of the day he valued the job more than the aesthetic. [I could see if his shit was a mess, but damn!]

He chose his battles closely.

But should BE even have put up the dukes under these pretenses? I think THAT'S what's bugging me. Should a young man, an INTERN no less, be forced to make this decision? Is it fair to assume that an internship is fertile ground for growth and understanding what you do and don't want out of a career?

And while BE appears to side with Hampton Univ, which also bans its Business School students from wearing locs...in an attempt to align more closely with the "realities" of Corporate America...is it actually perpetuating the same short-sighted culture blockers as the white boys?? (And why is a messy perm with ends doing a full split, and new growth piled high to heaven ok on the job???)

I dunno. It's complex. There are lots of black pros who wear locs and are accepted as such with no problems.

Then there are others who insist that you shouldn't give white people a reason not to hire you. To me, if that's the *reason* then for all I know the reason I got hired could be nothing more than a free pass for the boss to jack off to the sight of my azz swaying daily.

I tend to agree with Susan Taylor and Essence who suggest perhaps bringing in image consultants to our black biz schools and train on personal grooming. Lawd knows, us perm girls could use the help, too.

Bottom line...as a subscriber to Black Enterprise, I'm a bit disappointed. I mean, I think it's bizarre...a black publication forces a kid make that kind of decision and all, but he's an adult. He doesn't need a pat on the back for choosing to stay on the books. [hmmm, can you collect unemployment if you get fired from a paid internship??]

But as I open up this month's issue as I do every month, I believe I have found the true root of my unease with this whole thing...

HAVE YOU SEEN THE HAIR ON EAR.L GRAVES, SR. (BE Publisher) ??? [tried to post it but blogger be trippin]

YO, in the July issue my man has on a ski helmet and his super-burly side burns are clamoring for attention even underneath the ear straps! Good Lawd!

THIS muhfucka has the audacity to tell somebody about grooming?? GTFOH!

And before you say, "Mr. Graves has earned his right to wear his face fur in any manner that he sees fit. He has sustained a respectable career and is a pioneer in this industry"...

I don't give a good gotdam. He has sustained a respectable career and is a pioneer in this industry, and he has been a black man even longer than that...he oughta know better!

Perhaps he just likes to remind his staffers they always have a long way to grow before they reach his "status."

Like a Fat Kid Loves Cake*

While I would normally find no greater joy than to rip this guy a new one, he's cool, and his dilemma's really not that bad at all. :)

Why then the venom? Cuz I'm back, nggaz.

Now. So a very charming, overwhelmingly self confident young man...let's call him "Cake"... sent me the following email:


"So I really ...really ....really like this girl. She has everything that any man would want in a wife, but settling down isn't for me right now but in like a few months...after I cut some things off (u know what I mean... [editor's note... he means he's got other pussy on his radar] ) I think i'll probably ask her to be my girlfriend... am I a bad person?"

At first I couldn't understand why Cake would feel like a bad person for coming to this admission. So I probed and got to the bottom of his issue...

1. He isnt sure that the whole one-woman-man role is for him.
2. He's made it very clear to this girl that he's single and mingling.
3. He wants to buy some time in order to chase cat before he commits to this particular girl

Where to begin...

First let me shout out the honorable Epsilonicus (and I hope he's not shy), who captured my attention and my genuine sympathy when he stated on his blog...

"I found a person I would like to spend the rest of my life with, I just dont want the rest of my life to start now." [ps...he's not "Cake"]

That's some real shit right there. He's young, but he's wise. But young. :(

Despite the youthful glean in my eyes and my overall annoying underage appeal, I'm not feeling so young these days. 30 is a stone's throw away. And I've been the girl in Cake's situation.

Yup that's me...Wise, The Dream Girl. The woman that any man...yadda yadda yadda. That's what My Dream Boy told me the day we met. That's what he told me the day he killed it...and then the day we reconnected and then the day I put a knife in it for good.

Thing is, he was that guy for me too...the guy I could see myself riding out with. Yadda, yadda, yadda...

So to me, when he came with that, "I still love you," shit, it is was just shit...bec it was followed by a "BUT."

Basically, Cake is saying, 'I want her...BUT I want her to wait while my dick simmers in a steamy stew of other brawds.'

I told Cake that this was actually one of the more sophisticated hustles you dudes have going. Any old muhfucker can't pull this one off. And to be sure, the Wonder Woman you sell it to must be of a particular breed as well.

Dude has to at least appear sincere. Perhaps it's bec he's not trying to bone me, but as talented and down to earth as he is, Cake has never appeared to me like anything more than in proud and constant pursuit of panties. A normal guy. So it took me a second to validate his claims.

However, the woman in question was far less perplexing. It is well documented that she is the proverbial "Fat Kid" in this scenario...she loves her some Cake.

Is Cake a bad guy? Hell naw, I don't think so.

But when he asked me what's so wrong with having his cake and eating it too, he became suspect.

This is the hustle. And it's almost foolproof...except I'm Wise, ngga! Can't fool me.

This goes quite well with the whole nice guy tactic, you know the one, offer the allusion of honesty (is it really honest if it's only 1/2 the truth?) and you will be exempt from any further explanation, responsibility and accountability.

If you tell her you're single, she has no choice but to allow you to plow thru piles of puss.

Tell her you really like her, but aren't ready to settle down...and you can stroke conscience-free, while she's somewhere emotionally distraught, mad that this is the consequence of having half of you. Never on her terms. Yours always.

Cake knows that he's leading her on, but he's got an alibi. The kicker though, is that he "really ...really ....really likes this girl."

So I'm not sure what to make of this. I'm not naive enough to believe that my own personal rationalization is sufficient. If I really ...really ....really like someone, I'm not concerned with the cock crosstown. That's just me.

Don't know what to tell him...cuz I know that too much cake sends me to the crapper.

*shoot me dead if I quote a gorilla with a speech impediment ever again.

How Many of Us Have Them

I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t want any more friends.

Wait, I take that back, I have recently re-opened enrollment for new ones, but realize that the friends I got are an effing handful. In a good way.

My best friend Wiz and her husband were in town the other day. We always manage to miss each other on these weekend visits, and we almost did this time, but we managed to slide in a few margaritas after her midnight flight in, before my 7am flight out.

She and I took this photo (which I been trying to post, but blogger be trippin) in 1986, at the Air and Space museum in Ottawa. [Raise your hand if you didn’t peg me for a black girl with a white best friend?] The remarkable thing about it is that neither one of us looks much older today than we do in this pic. And I think we both knew that 20 years later we would still be as close as two grade schoolers in a mock space shuttle.

Fast fwd to last weekend. 4th of July. Houston. I went under the guise of the Essence fest, when in essence I barely made a cameo at the damn event. Sure I had some clients in town and all that, but really, I went for rehab purposes.

My college buddy Entourage has a corporate crib down there and was nice enough to let me crash while he lived it up with his boys in Vegas for the weekend.

You remember your last few weeks of undergrad when you found yourself getting drunk with mad white kids (ok…unless you went to say, Grambling) and other nameless folks you never spoke to in four years? Well, we had a habit of nicknaming, and it was mad nostalgic for Entourage and I to spend our last night of college in the bar looking around at “Soccer Boy,” “Fresh Face,” “Dick Still in Her” and the like. So imagine our surprise when “Porn Star” comes over to us and says, “Dude, I just have to tell you guys, you two are the cutest couple on campus. And that’s what we’ve been calling you for four years…”Cutest Couple on Campus.”

We didn’t have the heart to tell him we weren’t boning. EVER.

So I stayed in Houston an extra day after he got back to town from Vegas, just so we could hang out. My last night in town, instead of hitting up downtown like we had planned, he and I ended up on his couch watching all three discs of that Denis Leary show on FX “Resc.ue Me.”

Forget that the show is effing brilliant, the company was worth every minute I was laid over traveling back to NY. I would travel around the world for his friendship.

Rewind to before Entourage got back, I met up with my girl Mack from Dallas by way of Little Rock. She’s a relatively new friend, a couple years deep, but a real one nonetheless. I'll never forget the time my ex-biz partner cleared out our biz account a few minutes before I had made it to the ATM that morning. It was rent time, and I was on my way out of town, so needless to say I was distraught. Then after the confrontational phone call, punctuated by threats of a lawsuit, I made a phone call of my own...to Mack...who stayed on the phone with me all night long, because my nerves wouldn't allow me to rest.

She and I have been thru lots, so hanging with her in Houston was right on time. We were under the assumption that Houston would do its best New Orleans impression and host sexy black folks drinking in the streets until dawn. Didn't happen. In fact, not the even the normally generous, hot Texas sun had the decency to show up.

But we made a phone call and got the hook up on the haps for the night. The directions were on point, and when we pulled up and were shut out of the already packed club, me, Mack and Ms. Living Single made do. We navigated through a full azz parking lot, a long azz line, a high azz cover charge, and a heavy azz downpour...and found a our way to tequila.

Then we managed to find a party that was relentless in pumping that NY shit...ya know, Biggie, Jigga, WuTang, Tribe, Busta. Biz on the wheels. And it was at this spot that this boy with one crazy grey eye, came up behind me, holds me by the hips, starts dancing, while trying to subtly unzip my pants. [Had it been a different club in a different city with a different ngga, I mighta been wit it...]

I can honestly say that I feel like I've found a new friend in LS. First of all, she's beautiful, which always makes for a good time out. But the girl can party! She brought the spirit of N.O., her town, to Texas, and I had a ball dipping in and out of clubs with her. But she will be the first to tell you that Houston is on some bullshit packing up the liquor at 2am on the dot.

It's not always easy to find kindred spirits. People who appreciate quality television, quality margaritas, offer quality compassion, and like a quality party!

I don't know about you, but most of the people I've met in the past five years, just been on some other shit. Trying desperately hard to be what they're not. Hating. Having no clear goals beyond retail gratification and tricking. No balance.
I admit that most of my friends were prefabricated. I either grew up with them, or went to grade school alongside them. Lifers. And those friendships have all grown and morphed into entities that reflect the growth and metamorphoses of our lives. I don't talk to them daily, or even weekly in most cases. But when we get together it still feels like home.

To the point where I feel like I don't know how to make new friends. First off, I'm an enigma...people can't figure me out. I'm an anti-social party girl, fluent in Latin and hood, a conservative slut, a liberal celebate, a drunken church girl with a dirty mouth, a generous heart and anger management issues. A writer who'd rather watch reruns than line edits. An ambitious procrastinator. Sincere and sarcastic. A Jamaican who don't smoke.

If I could be my own best friend I would.

I saw Whodini live the other day...they inspired me to emerge however briefly from my blog slump. I could go on forever about my(self) Friends.

Houston...Who Has My Keys?

Anybody else gonna be in Houston for the 4th? I don't know about y'all, but I've been hella bored with this whole blog ish of late.

I'm bout to go get drunk, get laid and get inspired!

*

So anywho...I’m talking to this guy, right, and we hang out with these three other couples. Two of the girls are twins, and one of their dudes is effing nuts. Like certifiably crazy. He’s my fav.

Thing of it is, all the dudes, mine included, are inordinately sexy. Under other circumstances I’d do any one of them. And I have a feeling one of the chicks would do me. Can’t blame her.

So last night we met at one of the twins’ cribs and she suggested a fun activity for us all for next weekend. We’ll all meet back there and hit the bottle and chill. But before we leave the women will all place the keys to our cribs in a basket…

Whichever guy walks away your key is the guy you’ll hook up with for that night. No questions asked, no strings. Just the deed.

From jump the twins are bout it. Oddly, among the guys, only the crazy dude is down. I’m straddling the fence, leaning towards hell naw. But then again…

Help me out crew…would you do it?

PS…this is actually not my life…cuz fun, scandalous ish like this never happens in my sphere. But it is the premise of a book called The Ke.y P.arty.

My nephew is a young hustler and he is selling this book for $7, shipping included. So I decided this should be our first book club selection.

And while you’re at it, below are some other books he’s selling, or that I’m trying to get rid of.

*
Email me to make it happen.

NO.T WI..TH MY S.ON
THUG..S AND THE WOM.EN WH.O LOVE THEM
SUGAR
ADDICTED
THE BRI.DGE
LIKE BO.OGIE O.N TUESDAY
MY FRIE.ND, M.Y LOVER, MY S.TALKER
THE F!SH AINT BIT.ING
PA.P.ER CHASER$
B..TY CALL

SW!NGERS

THE CHO!CES ME.N MAK.E

Prodigal Penis

Chitown showed me no love this weekend. None at all, at all, Joe.

Not the weather.

Not the testosterone.

Not even the retail.

I love visiting Chicago, but this time the city seemed to be on a sabbatical. Not even the hood showed me love. (ok granted I was mostly in the 'burbs. )

Love was actually the reason for my extended jaunt to ChiGritty.

My Uncle Judd, one of my mom's 4 lil bruhs (8 a dem in all), got hitched. He's one of my fav uncles... the cool azz rasta who rocks Dickies shorts, a crispy white tee and matching immaculate white Ups with a swagger meaner than any young knucklehead.

He lives outside Philly, and I don't see that jawn very often at all. Matter of fact, he was at my sister's wedding two years ago, and before that I don't think I had seen him since I was a kid visiting Spanish Town in Jamaica.

So it came as a bit of a shock when a couple months back my cousin called and asked if I would be a bridesmaid in the wedding.

Uh, yeah, sure. Take one for the fam, right?

Lawd Gawd.

Things you will hear at a Jamaican wedding...

..."...take you to be my awfully weddin 'usban."

..."Cohn-Gradu-LA-Shan!"

..."Jessas Chrys, mi cyan find di dyam ring dem!"

..."Is wha time church a keep?"

..."Yuh auntie mek some manish watah. Gwan oatside an get a cup bring fi mi and di baby."

..."Ah op'n, di bar op'n?"

..."No woman no cry!"

...Ladies and genkleman...Daddy him woulda so proud fi see all him pick'ni dem gather togeddah here..."

I was born here, and frankly lots of their back home inside jokes are always way over my head. But you don't need to be fluent in Jamaican patois to translate the love that permeated the weekend.

My Uncle and his wife had their first baby 28 years ago. My Uncle has a couple of other kids from another relationship, the youngest of which is 5 years old.

So basically there was a lot of on again, off again going down in their relationship. 30 years worth, to be exact.

One thing I kept hearing over and over was a saying from back home, "Nobody cyan tek what ah already yours."

While I can't say that I totally co-sign that one, because I think the underlying implication is that women should shut the fcuk up and twiddle their thumbs while their men go out, do their dirt, then grow the hell up...I am definitely feeling the boomerang theme...

"They say if you love something, you've got to let it go.
And if it comes back, then it means so much more.
But if it never does, at least you will know,
That it was something you had to go through to grow."
~"In My Mind" (aka the Millenium Stalker Anthem) by Heather Headley

I'm of the belief that there is always one that got away...could be bad timing, youth, a stupid indiscretion, pure immaturity or just denial that keeps you away from one another. But as they say, if it's meant to be it will be...even if it's 30 years later.

Not exactly encouraging words for me, as I approach 30 years old. I'm impatient, and curious...with a very healthy dose of obsession with marriage. I'm fascinated by people who are divorced and under 40. I got some stories to tell. Got some folks who I wanna have tell their own stories.

What I hear a lot from married folk is that love is only a small part of the equation.

But after being in coldhearted Chitown, warmed by intense family love all weekend, I wonder if love shouldn't count for so much more.

PS...I'm still feeling nostalgic and idealistic after the wedding...It will soon wear off and your regularly scheduled reality-based, cynical/sarcasm-laden programming will return by week's end. I promise.

Are you Effing Kiddinig Me PT IV

Mary Kay LeTourneau might even say WTF..

A sexy grown female model and an 8th grade track star?

Better yet, a grown up female ex-high school hoops legend and her former jr high school basketball coach? Female jr high coach that is.

*Ok that's like if Jameil grew up to be a lesbian and then went back to her jr high school and hooked up with her old band teacher. (telling allll ya biz today girl!) HAHAHA

Both true stories...except the one marked * :)

Are You Effing Kidding Me? Pt III

Since when can friends of friends fuck??

Por exemplo...If I intro Jameil to Slish...and we live for years as one happy extended family...they can't all of a sudden rock!

Happened.

Are You Effing Kidding Me? Pt II

...And who is this guy who keeps calling me 2 months after we danced at a club...out of town no less. Boys, there IS a statute of limitations you know.

Are You Effing Kidding Me? Pt I

So dudes are still asking women if they're ticklish???

Dudes over 16 I'm talking about.

House Rules

So I was at my mom's this weekend, and my siblings are giving me hell for what they call, "some shit they woulda never got away with."

I don't see the big deal.

Ok, so I hung out with him (I know, I know). Spent the evening watching the fight with some friends, and chilling... spent most of the morning on a park bench talking. So around sunrise we head home. As my head hits the pillow, the shots of Patrón, and the glasses of Riesling finally hit me like sudden solutions. I soon surrender into dreamland, when I hear Hi Tek chirpin about The 'Natti (think Ohio, folks) on my cellie. It's a text msg from him saying he's locked out of his mom's crib. Looks like she got her deadbolt game tight before bed.

"Whatchu gonna do?"
"I called the house, called my sister, banged on the damn door."
"You can come here."
"You sure?"
"What am I gonna say, 'Hope you figure something out, B,' and hang up the phone?"
"You're sure it'll be ok with your mom?"
"She's still asleep, but I'll leave her a note. She'll be in church for most the morning, so it's all good."

He gets across town to the So Wise Upstate Estate in record time.

My mom is just getting up for church, so I tell her what's up and she says it's cool. Now I had considered taking him around the block to my brother's crib, but decided against it because, well, my brother doesn't like seeing me with boys. Whatev.

So I bring him up to my room, close the door, turn on SportsCenter, give him some scrubs to put on, and he's straight.

No need to get into the particulars...that's another blog for another day.

But long story short...we fall asleep for a bit, and wake up to the smell of curry chicken. My sister is over, cooking for Father's Day dinner. I go down to the kitchen while he gets dressed to leave, and I tell her what's up. She's like..."Huh?" So before he leaves I re-intro them and he bounces.

Of course she can't wait to tell. As soon as my family starts trickling in for dinner that afternoon she says, "Wise brought a BOY home last night!"

I keep saying..."He got locked out!"

My sister in law is particularly interested in the details ("Why you didnt bring him to my house?")...as are my brothers, who don't say nothing. They just listen.

"And it was THIS MORNING... NOT last NIGHT!"

They ignore the logical details and proceed with gasps and 'oh hell naws.'

I'm struggling to understand the root of this perceived infraction.

Was it inappropriate to have a man in my childhood bedroom with the door closed? [My answer, yes...15 years ago. Today? No...I am grown.

I'm normally pretty old school in this respect, having been raised by traditional West Indian parents who don't play that shit...but I'm finding it hard to understand why the uproar.

Is it really that they are clinging to a glimmer of hope that this man may soon make an honest woman of my no-longer-so-young, unwed black azz?

Are they just mad that they couldn't pull this off in their day?

Are my siblings just haters?

Or am I really as gully as they allege?

Can't call it.

PS ...Y'all so nosy...Naw, I aint hit.

Shout Outs...Paternal Edition

Ya girl So Weazy (or "So Easy" after I've had a few) is packed and ready to hit the road again. Biz and pleasure.

But before I go I wanna leave you with a few vignettes to commemorate the upcoming holiday. As much as I probably don't want to give it much thought, I'd feel terribly left out if I didn't put my two cents in about my daddy...esp since he is on my mind constantly, almost 2 years now after his passing.

Plus, I would be terribly remiss to have created this here 'Keep it Real' zone, and conveniently left out my reality.

So I'm not gonna give it much thought beyond a copy and paste, and whatever else is on my mind, for fear of self-sensoring or emotional cold feet. Not even gonna proofread...ok you know I won't go that far!

Here goes nothing...if only it were.

***

Special shouts go out to:

Guys who secretly wonder if they should be celebrating this Sunday.

Fellas who wrote off that $250 clinic bill as a "medical visit."

All the "Direct Deposit" Dads.

All the single, seedless cats in the market for new friends with weekends off, bec all their boys either have visitation rights, second jobs...or both.

And before you blast me for making light of the state of black fatherhood, let me remind you that last month I also bigged up all my sistas who narrowly missed a gestation period this year.

Daddy's Read, Too

Ahhh...my first book recommendation also commemorates the holiday. It's a really dope book edited by a sista in Chicago; a collection of pieces written by Black daughters about their fathers. It's broken into several sections...some about daddy' lil girls, absentee dads, deceased ones.

It's really well done, really deep personal accounts that are so relatable and touch the heart. Also great for all you education types...there's a new readers guide available for teen girls.

Oh, and I'd definitely give it props even if I wasn't one of the contributors. Great Daddy's Day gift.

Happy Father's Day...The Letter

So I've convinced 3 friends to start therapy since I started going in February. Remember the last tag, where one of the questions was the dumbest thing you've done in the last 5 years? Well therapy is like, the best effing thing I've done in my LIFE. Highly recommend it. I swear it's like, happy hour...with no booze, or dudes...which doesn't sound all that fun at all. But trust me, it's a blast! And I swear to God I'm not being facetious. I lucked up and got a really great therapist, who at this point can do a hilarious Wise impersonation dead on. Good times.

My best friend since 4th grade just finished her clinical psych degree at St. John's and she tells me that lots of people stop therapy bec they hate their doctor. And we all know Black folk got some silly stigma about mental health. No wonder our shit is so messy. ::sigh::

Anywho...I had an assignment one week...write a letter to my dad. Easy enough. Not really. The thing of it is...I'm still in a state of denial, working overtime to avoid feeling the weight of the reality of the death. Yadda yadda yadda. Baby steps.

Wait til I tell her I showed y'all...

====
Dear Daddy,

Brian from across the street got married this weekend. It was such a great ceremony, lots of love, laughs and smiles. I did a lot of crying.

First of all, “Phoenix” from down the street was one of the groomsmen. He was so handsome and striking, and it was impossible not to miss his brother “Penn State”. You remember, the one who died a couple years ago? When we were little I used to think I would marry him.

Then the wedding singer was really good, sang a really heartfelt song. It was hard not to be overwhelmed.

But then I also had very vivid memories from our last family wedding. A lot of the same people who were at (my sister’s) the wedding, showed up at the same church for your funeral, commenting on how happy and healthy you seemed at the wedding just a few weeks earlier.

At Brian’s wedding, when the preacher asked ‘who gives the woman away to this man,’ I couldn’t help but remember how coolly you said it that time…”My wife and me.”

At every wedding I’ve ever been to, I have imagined what my wedding day would be like. The dress, the food, the people, sure, but I’m usually more mesmerized with how I will feel, merging my family with his, feeling my heart beat out of my chest walking down the aisle. How he’ll kiss me. Having you give me away.

Now I envision “Anger Management” and “The Boss of Me” (my brothers) giving me away, having a moment of silence for the father of the bride. Lighting a special candle like the one we light at family dinners now.

Those are all outward shows of remembrance, but I’m sure that when the time does finally come, I’ll be more missing the personal things, the ones that no one else will see. I’ll miss the moments you and I would spend alone together right before we walk down the aisle. I wonder what you would say to me. I’ll miss sitting down on the living room steps, or on the porch telling you that I’m in love. Asking you what you think of him. Watching you scope him out from afar. Waiting to hear from mommy what you REALLY think.

Some times it feels like life has just been on pause since the last time I saw you. I’m really ready for it to start again, but for some reason I can’t seem to give it a boost. I know that’s not the way you would want it, and I know that you wouldn’t understand it. Well I take that back, maybe you would understand, but you surely wouldn’t approve. You were always very hard to figure out in that way. You had this very bilateral personality. You’d be very charismatic and funny to everyone else, yet very withdrawn and disgruntled at home. Oh how I wished I could slip into your world during the “laugh times.” I know that you’d be liberal with the smiles and laughs and maybe even hugs. It was in those times that you’d lovingly recall some mistake of mine, and make me feel not so bad about it (“Wise, Ray Charles could have seen that car you backed into!”) Those times would absolutely erase the times you’d be upset, or quiet or gone to work.

As an adult, I’ve learned to be a critical thinker. I know that there are always things lurking under the surface, just waiting for us to uncover them. So I know that you were not a miserable old man. I know that there were reasons why you showed us the you that you did. And I know that I was almost past the stages where you felt you had to still discipline me, almost old enough to get to know you. But maybe, just maybe you didn’t want me to grow to be that age. Maybe there were things in your own life, mortality perhaps, that made thinking of me as your little girl seem easier. Maybe you felt old thinking of me growing up. Maybe you didn’t know how to let go.

The point is that there was a lot of unfinished business between us, but that never stopped me from thinking the absolute best of you.

I have a lot of growing to do and I need to find a way to do it without you. Yeah, I get the whole, ‘he’s always with you’ thing. I do and I feel it. But it’s nothing like feeling accountable to your authority, seeing you, hearing your silence, knowing your mood.

I’m constantly thinking about the last time I saw you, or the last couple of times, and knowing that there are a lot of things I wish were different. Yet having no regrets. Sort of.

If there is one thing I know, it’s that we always understood each other.

I know that even with that oxygen mask on, the last thing you said to me was, “You didn’t have to come today, Wise.” I know what you meant. You knew I didn’t like being there in the hospital. The day I was leaving to go back to NY, I messed around all day doing nothing, and procrastinated as usual, and almost missed the flight because I waited until the last minute to come say goodbye to you. I knew it was goodbye. Mommy even had to ask me that day, “Aren’t you going to come see your father before you go?” I can’t believe she actually had to ask me that. I can’t believe I wasn’t there all day long. I can’t believe I even got on the plane. When I left, I told mommy I would be back.

I left for two reasons: there was a check waiting for me from a client in Brooklyn, and because I was expecting a guest for the holiday weekend. Convenient excuses that gave me a reason not to be there with you.

I know that you wouldn’t want me there, to be uncomfortable or sad, but did you maybe want me to grow up in that moment? Did you expect me to? Was I maybe supposed to finally stop falling back on the youngest little sister role and be there like the others?

In the moments that I envision being there, I’m laying in the hospital bed with you. Less worried about the tubes and machines, and more wondering if you know it’s me. Just laying there, holding your hands, watching you breathe, watching you die. And in those moments I wonder if you missed me in those last days? Were you sad that you didn’t see me with all the others before you closed your eyes? Were you worried about me? Did it hurt? I mean, on the inside?

This, not having you here is a different kind of heartache. I’ve been in love before, I’ve had my heart broken, and I know that time takes that hurt away. But losing you is with me every single moment of every single day. Some days the hurt is more than others. And sometimes the hurt is more just a melancholy set of memories, kind of like at Brian’s wedding.

Finding a true love is very important to me. I remember hearing a story that when you found out that “Spider” (my niece) had her heart broken by a little boy in her kindergarten class, you told her it was good that she had that experience early so it won’t be so bad if it ever happens again.

Is that what you would tell me right now? Would you tell me that it’s good that I’m getting this grief and this confusion out of the way so that I will be ready when true love comes for real?

As we were leaving Brian’s wedding on Saturday, we said goodbye to his mother. She was sitting at the table with some of their family and she introduces us as her neighbors of over 30 years. And with tears in her eyes, she told them about you. Her exact words were, “Any time I have ever needed anything, these people have been right there for me without a question asked. And when her husband passed away I finally felt like I was able to be there for them in the same way. He was a good man. A good father and a great neighbor. A good, good man. And look at his children, you can see how good he was.”

Those are the things I will be thinking when I get married. That my dad’s not here, but that I’m marrying a good man, just like him.

Book Club

Now having said all that, the book I'm currently reading is a hood "classic"...BMore Care.ful. I first met with the author a few years back at the Starbucks on 125th Street, shortly after its great migration Uptown. The night before, I tracked down a copy of his (then new) book from a friend who dug it out of a mile-high pile submitted to her for shine in her mag. Then I asked my then roommate to read it for me. Done in a few hours, she said it was aight.

Since then he's gone on to be published several times over, secured a very lucrative book deal with Simon and Schu.ster, and has put quite a few other cats on. Though I'm struggling through his, umm, prose...I can stomach his hustle. He's got grown men and women discussing the virtues of his fictional characters and their grimy world surroundings. You remember my book club...and its penchant for selecting this genre...and such an oldie at that (tho I think the chick who picked this month's book just has a lot going on and wanted to pick something she already read).

Well, I made a comment in jest on another blog about starting a blogger book club. Then another blogger emailed me and co-signed. I responded and expressed reasons why I don't think it would work... trying to find a unanimous selection, actually read it on time, and then actively coordinate a discussion. But I really enjoyed the diversity of intelligent opinions on my last post. So I plan to talk more about what I'm reading and encourage y'all to do so too. Who's in?

I also know that there are some bona fide authors already out there in blogland...you've seen some of their comments on this here blog in fact...and I wanna give them some shine too. ::holler at me::

I also need to clear out a lot of books that are severely cramping the Harlem Estate. So be on the lookout...I'ma have me a blog book sale!

Reading Fundamental Trash

When work and blogworld collide...you get a blog entry that's recycled from a recent assignment...


I’m elated that my 16 year old nephew is enthusiastic about reading…but less so when I see that the tome holding his attention is entitled Booty Call.

As a Literary Publicist working in the industry during this current African American book boom, I know all too well that urban fiction is dominating the sales at black bookstores nationwide. While I do believe there is a place for these run and gun tales of drugs, murders, and bling, I don’t believe the place is in the hands of impressionable young people.

Last week at the 2006 Book Expo America – the annual prom of the book-publishing world, this year held in Washington, DC – everyone came dressed to impress. BEA features literally miles of book exhibitors, from small to conglomerate publishing houses, to distributors and media. It is a top-notch affair with all the biggest names present.

So imagine my surprise, and sheer horror of coming face to face with the book that appears to be the crème de la crème of one of the premiere indie urban publishers: WHORE (Triple Crown Publishing, 2006).

The cover features a back shot of a well-built, brown skinned, well, umm… young lady, cloaked in a barely- there, tight, white ensemble, getting into a luxury sedan.

This image, juxtaposed against the surrounding pristine logos of storied and well-respected trademarks like Scholastic and Knopf, was disappointing to say the least. It felt somehow a representation of me, a young, African American reader.

A representation that will soon hit bookstores nationwide, and land perhaps in the hands of thousands of young people with no discernable skills to recognize this as disturbing and inappropriate.

According to the Target Market News, African American consumers spend an annual $325 million on books. First hand accounts from long-time booksellers like Carvelas Sellers in Washington, DC, report that readers are indeed getting younger as the titles and subjects become more risqué and explicit.

Then there are the authors of such titles, who defend their urban genre, sometimes erroneously referred to as “hip hop fiction,” saying that at least they are enhancing literacy among non-traditional, often young readers. “As long as they’re reading,” is the justification.

There must be a better way. J.K. Rowling seems to have found one. But where is our Harry Potter? Is it truly tucked between covers that resemble soft porn? I hope not.

Not only is the content of urban fiction largely inappropriate for young readers, it can also be problematic of readers of any age. Much of it is self-published, and sadly self-edited. So what my nephew and his peers are really exposed to is grammar, syntax and errant punctuation that are as sub-par as some of this country’s failing public schools. They are reading dramatic stories with construction and execution that merits no assessment of standard English or literature for that matter. Reading helps develop critical thinking skills as well as vocabulary. But how is it furthering a young person’s education by having street slang, and underworld politics reinforced via these texts? It is not.

Not all, but some. And if the sales figures are accurate, that “some” is more than enough to further rot the developing minds of students who are feeding on literary junk food, instead of being nourished with more age appropriate work.

It’s great that people are writing, and wonderful to see us reading. But let’s not fool ourselves; young readers of this genre are getting pimped.

Color Blind

See this is what I'm talking about.

Clear the aisles for another clearance sale, folks. I'm not sure yet who's to blame, but we got a problem.

So I'm in the suburbs the other day, down at the Walmart. I'm in the negro hair care aisle, perusing the bright ethnic packaging in search of a pre-emptive strike against the summer frizzies, when I notice I have guests.

It's White Mom and Hot Mess Mixed Daughter. Mom's telling HMMD that she needs something for her hair. Shampoo I guess. HMMD is beside me, looking aimlessly at the vast rainbow of Just For Me products.

White Mom: "That's the one you got last time, honey."

HMMD: ::whining something I can't quite make out::

I'm the type that in public, instead of staring, unless you speak to me I pretend you're not there, because that's the golden rule. But I couldn't resist.

Oh.My.Lawd. The child's HEAD! I gasp inside. Ok, like, you know back in the day when you cut your baby doll's hair and left it with what stylists today call "layers"? Well, HMMD is beyond that. She has a untamed upsweep...a hurricane of a ponytail that appears to have been dropped like Rikers mess hall slop onto a prison tray, ie...the side/top of her head. Straightish stray hairs stretch from said pony, splayed like whore's legs, all across her head. I know there's a rubber band or thin scrunchy buried in there somewhere.

She was a few hours out of the pool, I'm certain of it...just like her wash-and-go white mommy at her age... who would go from diving board to driving home, without a care in the hair care world.
Oh I peeped White Mom's steez too...mid-late 30s, antsy, homely, battling the bulge, auburn haired, smart aleck-know it all, who now, 8 years later wishes she had listened when her parents warned her hot azz about spreading her legs for that colored boy Leon. But White Mom's healing and dating again, and enjoys dropping off her daughter as her Nana's.

Because had the girl's father been around... had he not threatened to kill White Mom if she ever brought the girl around his mother, then poor HMMD would not have been in public looking this way. Black Paternal Big Momma woulda slapped some plaits on the brat and whupped her HMM azz for cutting 'Rachel from Friends' bangs. And mind you, we're not talking Marriah Carey texture here...shorty has India Arie hair.

The entire time I'm standing there I consciously check my body language...unfold my arms from my chest, and replace my 'shut the fcuk up $7 for some gel' scowl with a sunny disposition... a smile even. Couldnt get more non-threatening than me. And yet, White Mom does not acknowledge me.

So White Mom leaves HMMD in the aisle to select her grease or shampoo or whatever. I see her looking bewildered, as if she has never in her life seen a little black girl on a bottle...and God forbid that she could in any way identify with little bottle black girl . So I make my move.

Sweet Sistagirl Wise: "You looking for shampoo, sweetie?"

I felt so proud of myself for conveying such a genuine attempt and intent to rescue and serve. I was really touched by this moment, one I knew she wouldnt soon forget...two generations of black women from different walks of life, bound by a common goal... shopping for grease in the discount retail evil empire. I leaned in, hoping to ease her distress, lending a knowing smile, and a helping hand. Maybe even an eager ear if necessary.

And with that, the lil heffa ran off.

I mean, like Flo Jo, arms pumping, feet in a flurry...out of ethnic hair care aisle.

And with that, I grabbed my Motions leave-in and bounced.

Now before you jump down my throat with personal stories of strong white mothers of strong black daughters, I know plenty of them myself.

Before you say maybe she was rightfully taught not to talk to strangers, hear me when I say she ran like she saw Beloved standing in that aisle.

But if you want to know why Darnell and Becky pushing a stroller into The Children's Place sometimes gives me pause...Scared Shitless Hot Mess Mixed Daughter in Walmart is why.

Speak Brothas, Speak

No one knows Black men better than Black women…or so we’d like to think. But this sista will be intently following the yearlong study by the Washington Post, which began today, about what it means to be a Black Man in America today.

I was one of about ten pretty little, cornrowed black girls in my Kindergarten class of about 25. And you couldn’t tell me nothing. I came in knowing my ABCs, had a mean left hook, and home training enough to know when using it was appropriate.

What I didn’t know then was that statistically, if you grabbed a pen and my class photo, you could cross off about four of us bright eyed, pony tailed princesses. Only the six remaining would ever marry.

Or that so many of my male counterparts would face a rigorous and unparalleled societal obstacle course to the path of success. A road too often making pit stops at prisons and morgues.

But as professional urban women we sure know it now. We have loved, been heartbroken by, mentored and befriended the brothers featured in the first installment by the Post. We are related by blood and experience, walked graduation stages beside them, and even grabbed our designer handbags when they pass us on the street.

As well as we know our brothers, as many of us are raising them, we will never know what it is, really like to be these brothers. It’s time for Black men to have a voice. That is why this sista is all ears.

Shut up Negro, Shut Up!

"I've been involved in three projects pitched to (Oprah), but I've never been asked to participate," the 36-year-old told the magazine in its July issue. "For Barbershop she had Cedric the Entertainer and Eve on, but I wasn't invited. Maybe (Oprah)'s got a problem with hip-hop. "

~Ice Cube...[another legend shitting himself at the prospect of releasing (another) album ("Laugh Now, Cry Later") the same week as some superstar too young to know he was ever a rapper.]

So what's Eve, jackazz...a lil bit country??

Keep it Real... The Epidemic

We cool right?
Been getting to know each other for a few months now.

If we were dating I'd know some things about you by now...and we'd both know by now if we're really feeling each other.

If we were pals...might have even gone thru some shit together. Or maybe I'm just spoiled cuz I grew up with most of my closest friends today.

But our bond is still special, no? We communicate regularly. We're privy to personal details and thoughts and inside blogger jokes. Run in the same (tiny) circles. We're peoples.

So I'm sayin...I wanna know more about you. Take it to the next level, shorty. Let's get real. Eff the electronic pretenses. If we're gonna try to make this thing btwn us work, we gotta lay it all out on the table.

I'm tagging all you muhfuckas...

Doc
KinderCare
TCas
Jameil
ItaliaNelly
Slish
MEasy
Rev
DP
B
Rhinestone
Eps
Young Montez
NSane
Supa Sista
Nikki
Hokai
Blah Blah Blah
My Neil
KZ
Duck
Kutie Stacie
Liq & TV
Cheerio
Eq Opp Crush
Sarcastik
Kween
Trev Holly
Aqua
Living Single...if she ain't in retirement
Karamale
Miss Ahmad (not to be confused with Miss A, who I am also tagging)
Hoopster
Jennaynay
Chris
Anybody with a blog name with "sista," "date," "soul," "divine," Muslim or musical origin

Why the epidemic tag? Bec I feel cheap! I spend way too much time being invested in your lives and thoughts, and vice versa...and what do we really know about one another? :)

So I've come up with some questions I probably would have already asked you if we were cool in real life.

Dont feel left out if I didn't name you. I extend the invitation to you, too.

Keep it Real...

1. If you could be doing what you really want to be doing for a living, what would it be?

I'd be a professor, urban radio producer, a novelist, and a wife...and not necessarily in that order.

2. If you could slap the shit out of any famous person, alive or dead, who would it be?

Tough...cuz there are people that I would just wanna backhand given the opportunity...ya know, people that havent really done anything to me, per se, but that I don't really like. Folks like Kobe. Brandy. The blond Bush daughter. Dame Dash. Lance Armstrong. Rudy Giuliani. Bow Wow. The son on the Sopranos.

But then there are people who maybe really deserve a palm mark to the cheek. Actual offenders. Maybe an Ex or two. That bitch Cicely for stealing my Right On! magazine in 7th grade. My old landlord. SJP for pulling the plug on Sex & the City. Limbaugh. Nancy Grace. Jesse. Jayson Blair. FEMA muhfuckas. MattyD for lying on me in 5th grade talking 'bout I was throwing rocks at the fish at the conservatory and then I got kicked off Safety Patrol and couldn't go to Sea Breeze at the end of the school year. Pat Robertson. The blond Bush's daddy...and uncle for that matter. My literally crazy Brooklyn roommate. Al Quaida dudes. The list could go on... I realize it said "famous people" but some of those were personally famous azzholes. Sorry.

But I'm trying to live a purpose driven life, so I wouldnt actually...whatever...see lists above.


3. What's the dumbest decision you've made in the past 5 years?

Not purchasing the co-opt I lived in when I first moved to NYC after college. It was in Brooklyn in a really residential neighborhood. Great building. GORGEOUS crib. And I blew it off. Just wasnt yet financially savvy. Bad credit (like it's all that now). And was distracted by aforementioned crazy roommate.

4. Give up one for a year: (good) sex or (good) music.

I'm not so sex-obsessed that I get weak when I don't get any...but when I want it I like to have it.

And I also randomly go thru long withdrawals from music. But even if I just listened to the radio I could still be connected to at least some segments of society.

So I'm (reluctantly) giving up the azz.

5. Dudes, would you rather have a big dick or a great sense of humor?

Ladies, nice tits & azz or common sense?

I think I could get some good mileage on T&A and book smarts.


6. So you've been invited to an all expense paid Blogger Prom in The Bahamas. You're sitting at the bar on the beach. Which blogger do you want to join you for hours of good convo?

Depends on my mood, but today it would be Nikki...cuz she's able to make me laugh and think and nod my head in solidarity. Ask me tomorrow or the day after and it might be someone else.

7. Which blogger would you most like to cuddle with on the beach? (and don't defer to your current signif other either. Infidelity won't count against you. Duh.)

My Neil...any day of the week.


8. You're going on a 5 hour road trip...which 5 CDs do you bring?

1. Stevie Wonder... At the Close of the Century, Disc 3 (Sir Duke, Lately, Knocks Me Off My Feet )
2. The Roots...IlladelphHalflife
3. Super Wonder Bread Mix...my fav white songs (Still The One, The Rose, My Immortal, More Than Words)
4. Biggie...Life After Death, Disc 2... no Disc 1!
5. Vivian Green...Love Story

9. Would you rather bury your children young or have your children bury you young?

I know what it's like to lose a parent, and I can't imagine going thru that at a young age. But then I also imagine losing a child is a pain like no other.

On the one hand, you want to be the one to die so that your children live...but then you also don't want them to have to live with the pain of losing you.

Hell if I know. I'm not a parent.


10. What's your biggest insecurity?

I'm afraid of being misunderstood. I really hate being inarticulate or not being able to find words to explain myself...so I get really insecure about people misunderstanding me and then deeming me weird.

But then again I bet I'm too insecure to even try to figure out what my biggest really is.


11.What's the first blog you read every day...or however often you read them? (And I swear to God, don't be saying mine just cuz I'm the one asking...unless of course you really mean it. lol)

I usually start with MEasy...bec it's always short and sweet...and it has a very 'what a way to start your day' tone. He's my Matt Lauer.


12. When's the last time you peed your pants?

Maybe like 5 years ago...I swear I thought I had bladder control issues cuz I would just barely make it to the can. I wasn't even that far from it either...I was in my room.

Oh my goodness, around that time I had a close call out on a shoot on an internship. I was in Wendy's with my photog and out of nowhere I had to go REAL bad...but I made it.


13. Which was better, your first kiss or your first pay check?

The first check was lovely...I must have spent hours figuring out my net, then writing out the total and doing the math in subtracting everything I could buy with it...

But the first kiss was sweet. I still remember sitting at the top of slide at the park...when Kazi King kissed me. Summer before 7th grade. To this day I love the way it feels to daydream about great kisses for days after.

14. Do you have kids? Want kids?

Got none...but want 5. No, I'm serious. I also would like to adopt all 5. Yes, I'm serious.


15. You get dropped off at home after the office holiday party by your bitch azz boss that you can't effing stand...you exit the car and he peels out, runs a red light at your corner and rolls up an unsuspecting midget. The next day the midget watch groups are on TV outraged at the heartless hit and run, and are calling for any witnesses to please come fwd...that half dead midget has a family at home waiting on C-mas presents. Would you take $1000 hush money? $500? $100? A six pack?

Six pack of what, Corona Lights??
For real, for real...I would only dime him/her out if I was next in line for that boss job (even tho KZ says being the boss blows).

16. Live the rest of your life without your eyebrows or your fingernails?

It would hurt like hell to touch just about ANYthing...but eff it, I got a mean arch that I'm keeping. lol

17. What makes you angry?

Happy morons.
Indecisive lovers.
Sprint PCS.
Gossipy dudes.
NYC rent.
Negligent parents.

18. What makes you horny?

Rain.
Eager tongues.
My imagination.
Vodka.
Colin Channer books.
Vacation.

19. What makes you nervous?

15 year olds with nothing to lose.
Moving.
Random phone calls from my mother.
Watching my nephew run at top speed.
Sudden movements on the subway platform.
Hospitals.

20. What makes you smile?

A well-timed phone call from a friend.
Seeing my name in print.
My nephew trying to pronounce my name (he's only 1).
Therapy.
Drink specials/open bar events.
Cards from my mom.
Emails about the blog.

THE END...Wanna share a Newport and cuddle? No? You've gotta get up early tomorrow so you can't stay? Oh ok, no problem, I just thought maybe... ;)