How Not To Bug The Hell Out When Everything Around You Is Falling Apart

I said that one day I would write a book about that title above this text in an effort to help those who feel like all of life's situations are a little too much sometimes because when it rains, it pours.

I've been at the hospital for the past two days trying to be regular in a very irregular situation. The regular part is a put on for my mother who has been thrusted into a very odd, life-altering place by my step dad. He almost died Monday morning. She waited until it was good and damn dark before she called me.

And when it came time to call somebody, she called me specifically. I am not surprised. I never told her what I told friends, the long-ass book title I typed up there but she knows her son. Her mother's intuition told her that I have some sort of otherworldly knowledge in how to remain calm, assess things and use said calm to both handle a situation and quickly come up with a solution without bugging the hell out.

Yeah, I can do that.

But not right now.

But I gotta reach way deep and pull this one out of my ass somehow.

I saw her name on the caller ID and handed my wife the phone. They like to talk and carry on with that girlie-girl mish/mash. Wifey answered it and my mother calmly and coldly asked for her son. And by the time I put the receiver to my ear she was telling me shit that I did not want to hear but what I had to know.

The incident happened Monday morning, but it's now like 8 o'clock in the PM. She's been up all day at his bedside and his vitals aren't improving. She needs sleep and knowing her, she ain't gonna get it. I asked her if she wanted me there and she said no but meant yes. My wife was already getting dressed.

An hour later we were at the ER and was told that the situation was way more complicated than what Mom's was telling. We have a situation that might be greater than it seems on the surface and I need to find someplace to put it along with the cancer trials of an aunt, my up and down relationships with folks, a recent death and getting settled back in Chicago in a non-existent residence. Oh, there is more shit on top of that... But I'm telling you stuff you already know, this is what I know:

I was supposed to come back to Chicago

I am needed more than I (and they) have let on to folks

I now have to take the lead in this family because our matriarch is beyond sick and my mother has been hit hard with the revelation that the situation with her husband is greater than it seems. This and all of my sibs having their own shit to deal with (mortgages, children, work, work related stress, time management, distance, finances) and me not having any of what they have to deal with puts me center stage whether I want it to or not, and I cannot bug the fuck out right now.

I know there's a lot of cussing in these paragraphs but I have to mention God right here..

God has called me to be an intercessor.

When you realize that, you cannot complain, make excuses or run and hide. My family's balance is contingent on me holding steady to do the things and make decisions I've thought about but never wanted to really be a part of executing, but if I don't who will? When I called my little brother and thought that he already knew he was asking ME why he wasn't filled in earlier in the day and spazzed the hell out after getting completely filled in. After he learned the facts, he told me that it was too much information to add to his work-related stress as well as him just walking in the door having not taken the time to asses his own family's status...

No answer at lil sis's home or cell...
Overworking older brother cannot be found.

And now you know why Mother Dear waited twelve hours after working on stabilizing step dad, thought on it and called my ass. She figured out that I somehow is her intercessor. After staring in her eyes last night in a realization that even when her husband gets checked out and goes home that she has to prep herself for what could be the most improbable and unexpected moments in her life... I see that I cannot absolutely without fail bug the fuck out.

The stakes are so high right now.

When you see, feel, understand and acknowledge that right there... You already know how to act and what to say and do.

Realization that you are not in control makes you want to control yourself the best ways possible in order to lead by example is chapter one in: 'How Not To Bug The Hell Out When Everything Around You Is Falling Apart'...

I never knew that living this life would be the text for something greater. Take my words and process them. Learn exactly what an intercessor is so if need be you or someone can follow suit. Also, don't fuck with me right now because there is one hell of a delicate balance gwans' on over here. To upset that will probably revert me back to twenty years ago which was my first week of Army basic training things are that raw right now.

But I love you. Remember that as well.

The Mini-Battle With My Inner-Nigger

It's been hard to come here to my own blog.

The past couple of weeks have been difficult to say the least:

A family member was murdered and buried in less than a week and we have no leads as to who took the life of our beloved.

I was involved in 2 separate 'trucking incidents' that resulted in lost time and mileage. I have to stand in front of an independent investigator this week to see if I pay for the combined $60,000 plus in damages. I claim innocence, nuff said.

I've been stolen from, harassed, betrayed, ridiculed and taken advantage of as well as being sold down the river by a handful of folks I called 'close'.

But know that the good still outweighs the bad immensely.

In times like this something happens to me. I try to maintain my sanity but my inner self doesn't want to hear that shit. My inner-nigger wants to take over and get busy rectifying things. Of course I can't let him because I'm too handsome to go to jail. And I got a round booty.

Not a good thing, trust me. I wouldn't know and I ain't trying to find out, trust me.


I went thru a thing the week I got into my little trucking mishap. I started hearing from folks I wouldn't dig out of a grave if I had the powers of regeneration as well as folks that were smiling in my face and selling me out in the same breath. Shit started getting thick. Vultures always swoop down when you start to wane from life's attempt to kick your ass and then...

Nigger - Let me get at em man

Me - I can't let you out, you do bad shit.

Nigger - I know! I swear, say the word son, I'll go to their house, ring the doorbell and get a nice firm grip on that neck kid!

Me - What about them breathing?

Nigger - They don't need to breathe... People like that aren't worthy of life, son!


I never got why cats get on rap records and used their talent to speak on killing folks they didn't know. I know that sex and violence rules the entertainment game but I didn't know that it's the niggers on this planet that regulated who lives or dies. My inner nigger really wanted to go out and rid the world of folks he felt weren't worthy of inhaling, and that ain't my bag baby.

In the past twenty years, the best way to end shit was to close the deal by applying the expiration date on folks and their operation. Ass whoopins and such became a thing of the past and pride in bruises went the way of the stagecoach. High school kids started bringing guns to schools and tiny little things in the hood went under the bed and got daddy's tech 9 and blasted the kid down the street because he or she was getting teased to the point of humiliation.

In the past couple of months I too was teased, ridiculed and humiliated by those that were close to me. Things were said behind my back that discounted my value and worth to those I endeared myself to. Things both tangible and intangible were stolen from me. I was emasculated and paraded about as the carnival freak and I had enough and attempted to walk away. In me walking away from those that took advantage of me there was frustration I guess and I was betrayed in a manner that I won't even share here in the place I usually tell all my business.

For the first time in my life, I wanted to lash out the way other kids in my environment do currently and in the past. I could not believe that I had an inner nigger. I never thought I would bring home the urge to want to take someone's life. I thought I left that in the military. My inner nigger damn near convinced me to take a hundred steps backward and risk my own life in retaliation over what? Other people's shortcomings and such?

What?

You know me.

Even if you just started coming here to read stuff. I am a proud, intelligent black man with so much to live for. What on earth could put such thoughts in my head?

I am a product of my environment.

When I came back to Chicago months ago, I put myself back in the hood. Now I have volunteered at food pantries, registered folks to vote and gave many a free show on the hip hop and poetry tip. I love my people and I can't stand seeing us live foul for no apparent reason, but I see that in my travels there is still an element in the Black and Latino community that wants to live foul. And its influence is strong as hell. Some of that lives inside of me.

A couple of days ago I was driving thru the hood from the gig, looking for a spot to get some grub. The company car has tinted windows, so I'm in the cut. It was then, me rolling thru the weed spots, hustleman's haven and the infamous 'Carter' (ala new Jack City) that I realized that even though gentrification was at an all time high in spots that used to be straight gully, the hood still exists. Hood mentality still exists. That shit is marketed on BET on the freaking regular, and I don't watch BET (I gave up on TV recently... I'll buy Heroes on DVD in March 08') and again I say, the hood influence to regulate via violence is very, very heavy.

I don't want to leave the hood, but when you have only yourself to fend for and nothing to lose, you do incredible shit. I am a product of the ghetto and I love being right in the middle of it. Something about the projects and the mini-barrio that calls me to stay and be with my own kind.

I want to do incredible things, but I want to do them and live in the reciprocation of the actions and emotions I have and act upon, meaning I need more to live for in order for me to live.

And then, all of a sudden she pops up out of nowhere and offers one reason.

And in a whirlwind of conversation, hanging out and riding an incredible vibration of emotion and realizing the power of intent and purpose I find out that i have much more to live for. More than I have ever given thought to. Simple actions, complex conversation and time spent gives me hope that I won't be overcome with the hood mentality to act without thinking, knee deep in emotion caused by foolishness.

My inner nigger was built on shame and illicit behavior. It has been fed all things illegal and immoral and told that if I was wronged or shamed that I should snuff out said shame by taking that person's life with no remorse.

But what if you create or have created life?

How quick would you be to end someone else's? With the exception of killing to defend you and yours, what kind of influence would you want to have for your own seed? What experiences would you want them to have in growing up in this cold cruel world? What in the hell were all of them student loans for in the first damn place?

What have I learned and what do I want to contribute to this big blue marble other than rhyme or two? How will my legacy be remembered?

I learned that folks that come in peace and leave you in pieces aren't worth you giving them thought further than the time you cried for help and a spiritual bandage while you were in pain. When that subsides... The best revenge is living well.

And creating life beyond your own... And cultivating that. I am a man of distinction, positive influence and of the spirit of the Most High. I need to get back to the essence in order to live as such. I am not the man my thoughts and unprocessed emotions want me to be.

I am who I am. Son of the Great I Am.

As far as my inner thug?

Fuck that nigger.

30 Days... 30 Posts: Day Eighteen

So today I worked the phone in the morning, talking up new job prospects

I stripped myself down to basic essentials, throwing away unneeded stuff

My goal, 1 army duffel bag, 1 large, rolling suitcase, weighing under 75 pounds

I have exactly what I need, laptop, camera PDA/Phone and noise cancelling headphones

Emptied my space here in Chicago

Caught the Michigan - Ohio State game

Put in more phone calls sent a fax or two and had a lunch with an old business associate

Visited a few candidates for temporary housing here in Chicago

Got up on a marvelous vege burrito

Got back to see Cal vs USC

counted my money and plotted out strategy

did this

going to stretch out and get into a handful of asanas

and then write something...

what, you thought I went to bed? Pul-lease... there will be time for sleep when I'm dead.