March (pt II)

Peace and blessings...

It's been busy on this side of the bandwidth blast. Work, local travel and more work. I've been adjusting to sleeping limited hours, and my body is starting to let me know it doesn't really appreciate the lack of snoozing...


I've set a schedule (somewhat) of preproduction sessions to finalize the recordings that will the make the spoken word joint. I'm trying my best to make sure I got some items to take on the road with me when I hit it next month. I'm still a little afraid of what will happen when I get out there, people have different tastes and I'm sure expectations will be different as well, seeing as I'm not familiar. Whatever. It's either this or real work, and I've had my fill of that.

I've made the decision to travel to Ghana and volunteer my services. I know that I have a project going on and I should be focusing on creating soulful shit, moving units and endearing myself to folks here in the US by utilizing my God given talent, and I am by removing myself from all of the things that I both hold dearly and distance myself from. I am spoiled. I overconsume. I take people, products and things for granted. I am an American. I am not ashamed, but I do need self check.

I need to make myself useful. I do not feel useful or wanted for that matter over here with my own. As much as I've tried to make myself useful either I've been bored to death working in this mindless matrix that is corporate, disappointed in someone or have disappointed someone in either my actions or way of doing things and never truly gelling causing more distance as opposed to getting closer or done things and completed projects that have gone unnoticed, and the work put in never really went appreciated. No one saw it, an I really, really put work in too.

There are so many of us that take all of this shit for granted, and I am one of them. I posted a comment on my Blogger blog a day or so ago :

"Africa, slavery, post civil war struggle, segregation, the black power movement, Reganomics, the crack era and now the digital divide/struggle affects and touches us to the point that we need to cry, shout, worship, love, fight and fuss about it. That comes out in my music because all of that touches me and I can't keep quiet about it."

How in the hell am I supposed to get out, travel and speak on shit I know nothing about? How can I fix my mouth to talk about struggle if I am not a part of it? How can I see struggle if I'm clocking $46,700 (approximate 2006 salary, minus revenue related to mixtapes, poetry CDs, side hustles and any future personal apperances - and I do that for damn near free) a year, living all nice and shit , with my fossil fuel burning German engineered automobile, cable TV, satellite radio, and wardrobe including corporate attire as well as wardrobe items designed for casual affairs and street credibility. Oh yeah, the sporting events too. I am a whore. I've been pimped by comglomorates and companies big and small, and my attention has been turned away from my people here struggling to get what I got and my cousins there, endlessly stripped of the resources that will get them what I have.

This is unacceptable.

I gotta let this shit go.

I know that I might just sell a few CDs, move a few books and grace a stage and actually have people pay to watch me do my thing in the future based on my writing and speaking talents but you must know one thing. At this point I feel that don't deserve that. I need to be humbled and made useful. I need to be in place, experiencing the things I speak before I can speak of them. I do spend a lot of time trying to get at the minds of the youngn's here in Chicago, and it's a hard sell because they can actually tune me out and get by on minium standards (which is okay to many) which is luxury overseas where our cousins suffer.

We ain't suffering over here, trust me. As long as there is a 99 cent menu we can get by. As long as the hustle inspires instead of repelling, we will be aiight. Physically. We are mentally dead as a people and a generation, so I must go to the source and awaken, learn, live and be in the midst of what is real struggle and make myself useful in capacity to combat it, teach and learn. I gotta bring the real hustle back home and write and speak about that so that I (and we) can have a better understanding of how one must truly apply the principles of Ma'at.

That means I'm giving up everything.

Fuck that car...
And the nice digs...
And them new Jordans...
The suits and sweaters...

Fuck. Your. Couch. Nigga. (my shit is seude - fuck that couch!)


I gotta leave this place to find my place. Some of you have already told me loud and clear that my place is not here. I tried to fight and shout that I could be effective here, but my voice went raspy. Y'all could never hear me anydamnway. I may not yet know my true purpose, but I know what my mission is now. I know why things are not the way they're supposed to be, and that's because I have never struggled. I talked a lot of shit about revolution from high off the hill when I never intended to fight. And now I suffer because I have no bounty from battle, so I am rich only in bullshit and the spoils of blood money gained from the hands of the soldiers that died so that I could have the high speed internet access that I use as I type this on this customed-ass Mac. Spoiled me. I have no real purpose and can't give anything to anyone but fodder and can't be heard because my voice means nothing unless I have true purpose and definition.

Redefinition

I plan on doing something about that. I need funds to pay for my travels and stay overseas. I don't know how long I need to be where I need to be, but I betcha I'll figure that shit out real soon. Money saved and kept after billpaying, the CD project and appearances in the near future will finance my travels. I do plan on coming back and giving what I learned. Shame, I gotta leave the hood fo sho' in order to find out what I need to give to it. So many others are doing so much to save us, I just wanna find what I can give that is equal and unique.

This is my purpsose right now to find that.