pity the fool

I would hope that no one ever feels sorry for me, or better yet, that I will never have pity or sorrow for myself. I know things are hard for all not just me, but with perseverance, and the lessons we learn or can learn from our life experiences, I am content that it could be better and more, that some have it worse.

The banter and frolic that is orated in the form of words and phrases as complaints, should have no place in the vocabulary of any one with a roof over their head, food in their stomachs or disposable income to buy more shoes or CDs when they have more than they can listen to or wear.

I keep my blessings in my mind, especially the two young ones that follow my every word and call me poppa. I just want to remind folks even when things seem to go of course, if your money aint like you used too, or you have to have a drop down drag out with a life long friend, or be upset because a movie wasn’t like you thought it would be, get over it. We forget that it is the simple things that matter. That Christmas is about an open heart and the music, the memories from Christmas past. That we are not living in a Cholera epidemic, or walking in shopping malls where folks may have a bomb strapped around their waist. That we can sleep at night peacefully even when in pain without the threat of a warlord or solider coming in to kill our entire family.

So although as I said before, times are rough, don’t worry, have faith. So you don’t know if you will be able to pay that mortgage, or keep your internet on, or pay the car note. What you do and need to know is that you at least had such; that you have the ability and prowess to succeed; that you have worth and value in your heart and smile; that you can love even if you don’t feel love. Used to be a character on TV back in the day called Mr. T. He wore a lot of gold around his neck. Was never mad at him for that, for his reason was because his ancestors had to wear chains not by choice so he would honor him by weaning gold chains as a reminder. Not like rappers who wear chains because they use such to show they have money. Money aint what makes you valuable, no grass hopper, it is your heart, smile and acts there off. And as Mr. T said, “I pity the fool” that thinks his value is in the form of what they own as opposed to accepting their blessings, no matter how small, of being able to breathe to smile and see another day. Happy holiday’s folk and happy birthday to me (dec. 22). so buy my books.

I’m a blessed mf

I aint trying to be sentimental and shit, but I got to get this out of me, although I need to drop this piece I wrote about John McCain and another post on Cubans in Florida. and the US governments history of laying with dictators. You know today, I realized how BLESSED I was. I have been dealing with a lot of shit inclusive of automobile trouble lately, well the last 4 weeks. And as such, it required that I utilize close to 2700$ on a rent-a-car, well really several rentals. Today, I returned the rental and picked up my truck. It still needed a manifold and it sounded like a laboratory run by a mad scientist (I resemble that remark). But it was drivable and that was good enough for me. Lil momma was in the back seat and we were in route to pick up lil daddy.

We got Jones, stopped by the shop for a few and headed to the cut. As soon as folk got on the highway, it stopped, I mean it cut off, sounded to me like the alternator although Jones here aint no auto mechanic. I was just BLESSED that my cousin was behind me. She was dropping off a cell phone for my son since his mom took it away from him because she didn’t like his attitude towards her husband (I think they married). When her husband, the adult was the one who cursed at my son. No I didn’t take it there, but I felt like it. See it does pay off to have brain cells.

I pulled over between the median, right adjacent to Grady Hospital. I was upset but never frustrated. My cousin attempted to give me a boost, but to no avail, I mean everything worked electrically so it wasn’t the battery. I asked her to take my son and daughter to my house and that I would be there. I had no money. No checks in from Morehouse School of Medicine, but mainly because I had not hit the bank and would not be able to. They left and I kept trying. I would have called my folk, but my cell was dead. I know big slim (owner of Do It Right Car wash), or Red (Jet Bail Bonding) or Damon (owner M Bar) or Tony Oh or Smooth or any my folk would have been there but I couldn’t contact them. Then my folk Willie Mitch Drove by, and then Vaughn, we had all gone and graduated from Morehouse College together. We tried but eventually had to push the car to the road. The last person to stop was this State Trooper, Officer Patton (see u at the signing). He was professional and cool to the max. We all talked, folks that we knew blew their horns and it almost turned into a mini Freaknic. I signed a book for the Officer. And Mitch took me to the cut,

I was BLESSED. All of this on a day when Jose, hadn’t done what he said he would, repair my truck, and on a day when I found out my daughters mother, well how can I say…Well put it this way, my mom left me with my granny while she was at Vanderbilt in graduate school. She and my granny told me it was crushing to her to leave me behind. But each break, she would return and spend each and every hour of the day with me until she went back. I was only two. My daughter’s mom says she misses her little princes (i'm sure she does honestly) and that she dislikes her being a daddy’s girl, but I found out she was in Florida, sloshed on the back of some motorcycle during bike week. Now she will say I am bashing her when what I said about my mom, her sentiments, and her selecting the latter (self) ovr child is true. I say the truth will set u free and free your mind and your ass will follow (George Clinton). Any who, my point is, Truck broke down, I found about the aforementioned, cell phone was dead, no loot in my pocket, no job, but I had a shipment of dog food come in, shop coming along fine, my friends were there for me to depend on, my kids were safe, and I never got or felt down at all. In fact I just smiled, just like the sun was doing on this 75-degree day in the ATL. I am BLESSED.

But I figure if it is the truth, it is the truth. I am a BLESSED MF. Not to mention I have no shame in writing what I experience. George Bush even says we bash him for no reason at all regarding the Iraq war when 1] he said it was over 3 years ago on a battle ship and 2] that they had wmd’s. But I’m home now, I got a 40-ounce and kids are loud as fuck. I do regret now going over to Jose’s last Friday with my pistol. Didn’t mean to scare him, cause it got me a fucked up deal, but it was that South Memphis in Jones that just seeped out accidently. But what the fuck, I mean, I’ll just spend more on my truck. So yawl support your folk, just another poor starving writer of the mad scientist variety who acknowledges that there is a thin line between brilliance and insanity…..and them two post coming next week.

he has a Coretta.

I was watching CSPAN when I suspect most folk were looking at the Democratic debates on CNN. I on the other hand was listening to a woman tout how “character counts.” Of a woman who acknowledged that things have occurred under the watch of both democratic and republican presidential administrations. She spoke of her mother in law. Of how she had to be naive and had to be a dreamer, for trying to raise a black male in the 60’s. She admitted her biases, since she confirmed her proud ness to be his wife, his woman. She acknowledged that she would be there for him, that she loved him even if he had nothing, for which she started out with, with him.

She spoke of his beauty and his sacrifice and new that they were blessed, for she saw a person who was willing to give up something for her and others. She said that in her household, “your word is your bond, that you treat people with decency and respect, that nothing was more important than ones commitment to their family and their community.

She said that was why she married him. She said that he was the first African American of the Harvard University Law Review. She said that it was not us, but rather those that keep raising the bar. She said that the only folks that are sacrificing in America now were in Iraq. She said that the rest of us had to shop and that we cant even se our blessings. Yea, folk. She was in Wilmington, Delaware, today and he got him a Coretta. And before I finished this essay, she said. They ask if he is tough enough to deal with the republicans.....she concluded, "look folk, we live in Chicago. 'Cause as she said, "most of us dont know the truth when we see it and most folks aint ready for the truth."

5$ on one

I will take this time to say that I’m happy to be making it to 2008. The other day I went to the gas station, I was waiting to pay for a Gatorade for my daughter and a newspaper. I was behind this dude who gave the lady $20.00. He asked for an assortment of lottery tickets, a task that consumed quite a bit of time since I was standing behind him, but I was patient.

He scratched them all of as I waited. He won nothing and said, let me get five on one. It made me wonder what his definition of depending was. To me, it would have ben more important t put all that loot in the gas tank with gas being $2.83 per gallon but he did not. It was obvious he depended, or at least wanted to win on the lottery tickets for his future. The way he purchased him, it was no logics but rather chance as he picked 15 different one dollar scratch offs. And he did it in such a way that let me know he likely did it in several gas stations he went too.

I don’t buy lottery tickets, in fact I would rather purchase a deuce-deuce with my dollar, but he had faith and depended on them. I can only depend on myself and some of my folks. I mean, I was reading what Mes dux cents said about faux heterosexuals. Se was right. But it a shame that I can depend on my boys before I can depend on any woman to the same level, at least outside of family. I mean, just the other day, I had to put my car in the shop (i'm car-less as we speak).

I asked a person very close to me if she could wake up a few hours earlier (had to be at work at 10:45) if they could meet me there and take me home before they had to go to work. She told me no. Now this is a person who I am always there for, helped them get a car, as well as helped them have a place to lay their head. And she said no, when she would never hesitate to ask me to do a similar act for her. I figured right then I could not depend on her and left it at that. I mean u do all you can for folk and they can depend on you but you cant depend on them. So I caught the bus home in the rain, counted my blessings and realized I could only depend on my boys and myself. So for me, I resolve in the New Year not deal with any folks that don’t treat me like I treat them. I also resolve to make my heart more kind and considerate.


I can’t believe that man, but I recognize his belief in the scratch off lottery tickets were no different in mine in people, expecting them to be there for me because I am there for me. But now I will not settle for less, when I give more or my all. Now I figure all of me or none of me and I feel good. Happy Nappy New Year. Who am I to question him spending five dollars on one and using 15 to get lottery tickets?

4getting what real folk go through

It is not difficult out here in cyberville, to get lost and caught up in the mundane. I know, because I write about the mundane among other things. And I complain also. The question is what is it that I have to complain for? Nothing, for I am blessed and I actually see and welcome my blessings. Over the last three months I have been dismissed from my place of employment, been attacked with a butcher knife and cut with scissors, strapped with the worry of providing for my family, fleshed wounded in the face by my daughters mother with a fork, and had my crab cakes spit in by said daughters mother, just last night (had restraint not to kill her). Add to this my grandmother had congestive heart failure Monday and I have been back and forth to Macon, I still see nothing to frown or complain about. Not to mention had a child hood chum die who I grew up in Memphis with (Shouts out MilkDud) and one of my best friends mothers just died.

I do not ever want to be said that I have forgotten about what real folk go through, race and gender aside. I know there are homeless and that I have a home; that there are foreclosures left and right down here in these parts, but I have no such edict; that people come back from wars diseased, distraught and penniless; that my children are safe and healthy and shown love by me incessantly, and that they are not the victims of drive bys, pedophiles or illiteracy.

Yep its hard, but we can never forget about real folks and what they go through, those that ride the bus every day, work two jobs or make the average annual income of 17,000K a year. Them folks that battle to keep lights on and food on the table, or worse a roof over their family head.

We forget too much, we don’t see our blessings and give the value of those blessing to those responsible for such. Simply put we take what we have, to see, to walk, to fuck, and to have companionship and health for granted. So I guess what im trying to say is that we should appreciate and value that which provides value in our lives unconditionally. We should bestow blessings on those who bless others and us for the sake of value and pray even when we not asking nothing, but just to say hank you.

I do not have rats in my house, and I have my heart. So even if I did, I wont forget that’s what real folk go through. I’m blessed; I have access to cyberville and most folk’s aint.