I Used to Love Her

I'm up making playlists on iTunes and it's bringing up a lot of old memories. Remember high school relationships? 

Most, if not all, high school relationships occurred solely over the telephone. There really wasn't much time in school to do anything that constituted a relationship besides hallway activities that usually ended with you running separate directions at the first sign of a teacher like a bank heist gone bad.

I remember being nervous when I used to call girls, not because I was afraid to talk to them, but because I was afraid their parents would answer. Calling a girl who didn't have her own phone after ten o'clock was a crap shoot. Sometimes the parents wouldn't even answer the phone because once your kid hits the teenage years you just assume the phone isn't ringing for you. But if they did answer you either got the really cool parent who just put you on hold or you got a congressional inquiry. Who is this? Why are you calling my house so late? 

In hindsight, the good parent was the one who asked a million questions. One girl's mother talked to me for an hour before she gave her daughter the phone, but after that she never had a problem with me calling. The worst were the girls who actually had a father. (That didn't come out right.) I never had a father answer the phone who didn't hit me with the Morgan Freeman Lean On Me anger. Why are you calling my house? You smoke crack don't you? It kills your brain cells son, it kills your brain cells! 

I'm gonna be that kind of father.

Whenever you did get to talk to the girl, it was always the same formula. Either you, her or both of you were listening to the radio. Ninety percent of the time The Quiet Storm was playing on the radio and you talked about the most random things. I still can't understand how I spent so many hours of my life in silence on the phone while both of us watched the same TV show together.

You still there?
Yeah baby I'm here.
Okay. I thought you fell asleep.
Naw. I'm not even tired yet.

I don't have a clue what kids do nowadays since they have texting and cell phones. Back then, cordless phones were a luxury most didn't have so you showed your love by staying on the phone while the other person went and ran errands around the house.

I gotta go take out the trash. Hold on.
I gotta use the bathroom. Hold on.
(Black girls) I gotta go wrap my hair. Hold on. 

Remember how every couple had a song? Whatever was playing on the radio at the moment you two formally declared that you were a couple turned into your song. And since most relationships only lasted about two weeks, chances were that the same song was in rotation when you started talking to someone else. K-Ci and Jo Jo's All My Life was my song with four different girls. One girl told me that Tha Crossroads (Bone Thugs N Harmony) was our song.
GHETTO! 

Eventually the love faded, you lost interest or you just moved on. Thus began the period of...calling me and instead of saying something you just put the phone up to your CD player and play me a song. I broke up with a girl once and for the next three days there was a fifty percent chance that when I answered the phone I was gonna hear:

I know you're going. I can't make you stay. I can only let you know I love you anyway. And if the road you take leads to heartbreak somewhere down the line. If someone ever hurts you or treats your heart unkind.
*Click*

I hung up. Of course the next day you'd see black magic marker scribbled over her notebook where she once wrote

Her Name
-N-
Ordale
2 Gether
4 Ever

 

 

It Wasn't Me

I'm getting more and more upset reading the local news online these days. The crime is getting out of hand, or maybe I'm just more aware of it now that I'm an adult with a family and feel as though I have something to lose. Either way, what bothers me most is that I'm running out of counterarguments to the racist comments below the articles.

Some of it is just people hiding behind their online anonymity and saying what they'd never have the courage or public stupidity to say in person. A lot of it, however, comes from pure ignorance and I'm starting to consider that it might not be entirely their fault. The media has a history of influencing public perception through lopsided journalism that focuses on Black perpetrators, but that doesn't appear to be the case these days.

DC isn't as "chocolate" as it used to be, but one thing hasn't changed and that's the highly pronounced socio-economic and racial boundaries. DC simply doesn't have much in the way of a poor White population. Because the city is so small and so much of the land area is federal property, what little remaining private space that remains is highly segregated into an economic dichotomy. Name one ghetto west of Rock Creek Park. Name one pocket of upper-middle class denizens with a primarily White population east of the Anacostia river. There aren't any. To put it simply: Most Black people in this city are poor while most White people in this city aren't. Poor people tend to commit more violent crimes, so you'll see more Black people on the news.

So, how do I defend my race on these websites when nearly every crime reported is committed by a Black person? When the crime isn't shoplifting from a grocery store but killing someone over $200 Jordans, what do I say? There were three armed robberies in my neighborhood in thirty minutes this weekend. Yesterday someone broke into a house, tied up the family and raped the housekeeper. All of this happened within walking distance of my house. In all cases the suspect was a Black male, mid 20's, between 5'6 and 5'10, dark hat and dark coat. I'm becoming more upset at the situation in general because more and more I'm starting to sympathize with the White people who cross the street when they see 5'8" me coming in my black Weatherproof coat and matching Weatherproof hat.

The Baby Whisperer

Typical day in the life:

The Baby (Walking up to me while I'm on the couch): Urrrgh

Me: Okay, come on.

(Both walk to kitchen)

Me: What do you want?

Baby: Chirp

Me: Here you go (Pour dry Cheerios into a bowl)

Baby: (Runs off delighted)

*Three minutes later*

Baby: Dish Won

Me: Okay

(Both walk to fridge, I hand her a bottle of milk)

Baby (Sitting on couch with Cheerios and sippy cup of milk):  CAT! WHY!

Me: Which one? Cat or Why?

Baby: Cat, Why. Why.

Me: Okay. (Turn on SuperWhy from the Tivo)

Baby: (smiles)

Me: I love you. Do you love me?

Baby: Ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra My derie da mor *mumble* day!

Me: Aw, I love you too. My Cherie Amor, lovely as a summer day...

My wife just stares in awe like we have some kind of mutant power. If you spent 24 hours a day 365 days a year with someone, you'd be able to do this too. My daughter is getting better with using words, but she's only a year and a half old. Prior to now she sounded like Li Lu from from The Fifth Element when she tried talking. Do you know how long it takes to figure out what she's saying? I wear it as a badge of honor.

Apple= Apple or Banana or iPad (not sure how she figured that last one out)
Up= Pick me up or I want that thing up there.
Cocoa Cocoa= Sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
Pee Pee= Sing Patty Cake
Pee Pee Pee Pee Pee= I have to use the potty.
P-O-T-T-Y= I want to read Elmo's Potty Book.

It's really quite simple. LOL

We'd make one hell of a team on the 10,000 dollar pyramid.

 

Cheers to the Freakin Weekend

There were a few developments over the weekend that necessitate today's blog post. First off...

That man named his daughter Blue. I'm a big fan of his, own all his albums, spend way too much money going to his concerts, but even I find it a little "different" that they named the girl Blue. He loves his double entendres so he's always playing on words. In this case, his baby's name alludes to Blueprint IV (Get it...Ivy, I-V...Roman numeral four).

Now they can talk about it being their favorite number and how both of them were born on the fourth and how her album is called four and...whatever. I still find it odd that they named their child a color. If it was a boy I wonder if he would've called him Roc. It could have alluded to his record label, the first product he used to sell and that beloved 90s African American sitcom starring Charles S Dutton (who also started in a life of crime and turned his life around) as a garbage collector in the hood trying to make it.

My daughter and I have the same birthday. I should have named her Calendar. And now sports...

I haven't really gotten on the Tebow bandwagon, and, considering my position on religion, I have no doubt that I'd burst into flames if I tried Tebowing, but I have to admit that he sure as hell heck knows how to end a football game. That was a good pass and a great run, but it got me thinking. Tebow has kind of been the athletic face of Christianity this season and I wonder what it'd be like if the church really took it to the next level. He's gotten a lot of people talking, but he's just one man. What if the church pooled its resources and started an expansion team. They could sign Tebow to QB and fill the roster with some equally talented and devoted players.

Now imagine that instead of huddling, they all kneel down to pray before each play. To observers it'd look like they were praying, but they could really be using Biblical scriptures to call plays. Revelations could be a hail mary pass, while Exodus could be a blitz. It sounds crazy but just imagine if you went to a game, saw the whole team pray and then throw a hail mary pass to actually win the game. Tell me that wouldn't make you think. Now imagine that God got in on this and a clap of thunder or something occurred after every bad call by the ref. The pews would fill up.

I'm just saying.

Flashback Fridays: Yooo Joe!

Remember this:



 

That's the most badass intro for a cartoon in the history of badassery and cartoons. By the time the intro went off I was ready to go punch something, do pushups or something. Back in the 80s, kids couldn't wait to go outside and play after watching an action packed cartoon like GI Joe, Thundercats, He-Man, Silverhawks or Transformers.

Then came this:

[caption id="attachment_1643" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="An aerobics gang"][/caption]

This is when cartoons began dying. Everything became a live action show with out of place morals and a damaging lack of realism. First off, compare the two. The Power Rangers took place in the nicest suburb in California. The villains conveniently spare every living soul and every fight takes place in some desert looking setting. There is no military, no coast guard, no police, just six people dressed up like condoms and the toughest guy in the group fought with a flute.

Now I'm not advocating violence or anything, but since we're gonna have a show that involves fighting marketed to kids, why not be a little more realistic in its depiction? Unlike the villains on Power Rangers, Cobra fought wherever they could do the most damage: blowing up a dam, blowing up a hospital or, in the case of the movie intro, blowing up the Statue of Liberty and every innocent person on Liberty Island.

Of course that sounds a bit harsh, but does it not mirror our fears of today? The way I see it, it teaches kids to be mindful of terrorism, but there's another lesson to be learned:

People die

[caption id="attachment_1606" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Even the guy who turns into a gun has a gun"][/caption]




Cartoons in the 80s taught us that guns, bombs and weapons kill people. Optimus Prime got shot and, guess what, Optimus Prime died. Duke got shot, Duke almost died. The next few episodes, Duke was in recovery. Power Rangers taught that you can get stabbed and all that will happen is a bunch of sparks shoot out of your chest, but you'll be fine. Thus began the era of kids becoming lobotomized drones needing a warning label and helping hand to keep them from killing themselves. 

Fast forward to today and I find myself wondering just what today's cartoons have to offer. There's a giant sponge who lives in a pineapple and fights grease with his friend Palmolive. There's a show called Yo Gabba Gabba that teaches kids what it feels like to drop acid. No wonder kids are so screwed up these days. Now I know...



 

I Put On For My City

When it comes to New York, they say that if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere. Well, I'm from DC and if you can make it here then you better leave while you're still ahead. What the hell is wrong with the people in this city?

For eight long years I wallowed in sorrow in North Carolina, constantly complaining about missing home. I get back here and in just three short years I'm ready to snap "Moses" stick off a tree and go Old Testament on this place. What happened? This place is crazy as hell. From the little bad ass kids fighting on the subway to somebody getting shot at the gas station.

Hold up! Who the hell discharges a firearm near combustible liquid?

People are getting shot on the bus. A woman was raped downtown in her car with her one year old son sitting in the backseat.

What kind of sick son of a...forget it.

I grew up here during the 80s and 90s. We were the murder capital, the mayor was on crack and going to the playground was about as dangerous as going to war. I remember one of my teachers in elementary school teaching us about drugs by taking us outside on the playground and walking around pointing at the syringes on the ground saying, "If you come across these, don't ever touch them." Still, I felt safer then than I do now.

I have enough to deal with in DC. Besides being a giant target for anyone with a grudge against America, we also have the bigger threat...Metro. They're like the boogeyman or something. You never know when a Metrobus will turn a corner and take out a couple of pedestrians crossing the street or a wheel will fall off one of the trains. Hell, you'd think the escalators were safe but one of those gave out last year and resulted in about 100 people freefalling down to the ground.

Don't get me wrong, I love my city. I haven't left yet, but maybe that's because we have a What's Love Got to Do With It kind of relationship.

Go straight to hell, Ike.

Where Did Jack Frost Touch You?

They're ice skating in hell right now. It is ungodly cold outside right now. The thermometer on the sign at the bank says 25, but that's just the temperature at which the thing gave up and stopped working. I've been in the house for an hour now and my legs are still cold. If for whatever reason you're reading this before heading out to work, call out sick. I know it's the day after a holiday and a three day weekend, it's cold enough to risk losing your job.

I remember going to Chicago a few years ago and it was like 35 degrees when our plane touched down. We should've known something was up because the lake was frozen solid. The next morning there was ice on the inside of our hotel window. The high that day was two degrees with a wind chill of minus seventeen. I went outside in my BIG coat, hat, gloves, boots and scarf and face mask looking like a Himalayan ninja. I turned the corner and a gust of wind came through and...let's just say that if this was court they'd hand me a doll and ask me to point to where I was violated.

I'd go through that again compared to what it felt like outside this morning. So yeah, call out sick.