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I Still Love H.E.R.

Almost 15 years ago, Common, then Common Sense came out with “I Used to Love H.E.R.” from his Resurrection album. He talked about his perception of the course of hip hop at the time. This is my perception.

Back in the Day

Along the way, everyone wanted to G.L.O.A.T., competing to be her greatest lover of all times. Growing up, everybody had a group. Everyone was MC so-and-so or DJ such-and-such. We’d rock the yellow buses, subways, trains, and metros. When it came to beats, no object was safe. We turned desks, windows, walls, and mouths (beat boxing) into drum machines. They produced the heartbeats of our ciphers.

Four o’clock, Rap City was on and again at 11 Friday nights. Before that was the Yo MTV Raps era. She lived through pride and prejudice, East/West beef, gang rivalries, crew rivalries, publicity stunts, and drugs. Pimped, strung out, and exploited she's a survivor like Destiny’s Child, and continues to make it, because she's loved by so many.

She’s Everywhere

Hip hop pops up all over the country like a giant whack-a-mole game. New York. Baltimore. Oakland. Compton. Atlanta. Memphis. New Orleans. Chicago. Cincinnati. Seattle. All these cities vying for her attention, each spitting game in their own way. She’s been courted by the very best, and some of the worst.

Don’t Have to Like Her…

“If I don’t like it I don’t like it, that don’t mean that I’m hatin,” says Common on the Like Water for Chocolate album. I don’t like everything that’s out there today, and don’t listen to most of it. I want to say I’ve outgrown it, and that my tastes have changed; but the opposite is true. My tastes haven’t changed. I’m an old soul stuck in some of my ways ahead of my time. I don’t have to like everything she does to love her, though.

…To Love Her

There are some lyrics that hurt us as a people and hurt hip hop as a culture, but I can’t hate the art form. Whether there are bad apples in the industry or I’m just off my rocker, hip hop is as beautiful as she ever was. She’s expression when you’ve got the “weight of the world on your shoulders [and] gotta hold it up,” like Pharaoh Monch. If you’re in a chill mood, Dr. Dre still keeps us bobbin our heads. When you start talking love, freak to romantic, she’s all things to all people.

Do You Love Her?

Mos Def is asked the following question on his album Black on Both Sides: “Where is Hip Hop going?” To this, he replies, “Ask yourself, ‘where am I going?’” This connotation transcends hip hop and music. In anything we do, any activity, its direction is the same as ours as a society. What society wants will happen. With hip hop, what we want is what she’ll do.

What do you do?

"I'm a writer...I write," is what I've learned to say. I used to tell people the technical details about my day-to-day workload, but that wasn't answering their question. They didn't want to know what I did, nor what had I done that day. They were asking what I do as an extension of myself.

"I'm a writer...I write." I stopped fighting my passion to write; of documenting the truth, life, as I see it. Sharing it with others. Even my meeting notes fascinate others by how much I'm able to draw from seemingly menial topics. I walk away from even the most mundane or pointless meetings with pages of notes. Each word to me is a potential springboard into boundless subjects.

Supply chains link to the fences we put up around our minds keeping us from collaborating with other offices or agencies. Logistics for major weapon system acquisitions isn't as far from logistics for a community event. Different price tags, but the idea--get stuff from one place to another in the most economical, efficient, and effective manner, big or small--is the same. These streams of consciousness fill my papers as I play connect the pixels with my words forming bits of code called language. The more I think, the more I write; the more I write the more I think, "I'm a writer...I write."

I've learned that nothing will have the economy of scale--in terms of salary--for me that writing will; especially since I'm going to do it anyway. I'm surgical with a pen, writing in 3-D. My words leap off their pages and embrace you, tapping into your soul with a smooth aftertaste, too.

I'm a writer...I'm writing....now.

Don't Do

I heard on the radio a familiar saying, "Don't do anything for your children that they can do for themselves." As a parent, I understand why this makes sense. We enable our children to become self-determinant and self-sufficient when they see they can do for themselves. That's how they learn to walk, eat, potty, etc. When mommy and daddy (although too often it's one or the other) step out of little Mayah or Selas' way.

I think many parents would agree with that assertion. Again, it makes sense. But why doesn't that same principle apply to adults? Shouldn't adults be held more responsible and more accountable for our actions than children. In theory, yes; but pleas, deals, cop outs, bailouts, and handouts all suggest otherwise. In our society, it's the adults who breed dependency instead of self-reliance. We look to so many others to solve our problems for us, or worse, to take our blame. Parents blame TV for children's actions. I don't agree with everything that's on the air and partially favor censorship, but I know that I'm responsible for what my children watch...period.

Others believe the government should take care of us; as if it's an entity. The "government" is a group of people paving the way for a babysitter mentality. Is that what grown men and women need? Babysitters, handing us pacifiers each time we cry out our needs? Why do we continue reaching for bottles of milk, when we need meat?

We're asking, and in some cases expecting others to do for us what we can do for ourselves. Sometimes it's harder than we planned. Sometimes it's near (notice the emphasis) impossible. But we can do for ourselves, now more so than ever before. Our current president is living proof. Let's shed our excuses and start doing for ourselves what we can do for ourselves.

With Love,
Brendan

Eulogy

I thought it befitting my personality to begin from the end. I've used this concept a few times, first as a school presentation. This is in part a description of who I am, and who I want to be remembered as.

We all have a legacy. Some great. Some simple. Some of us are remembered by many. Others, just a few. Still we all affect the others around us in a butterfly effect. I hope by the time my eulogy is read, my effect has been meaningful and helpful.

Picture this. A cross between science fiction and ridiculous. A man, bursting into the sanctuary, sweat dripping from his brow. Disrupting sobs and the speaker, the man hurried down the aisle. Gasps of astonishment, possibly at his audacity, fill the room with a stream of continuity like "the wave" at sporting events or dominoes tipping over one after the next.

"What's he doing here?" some say. Others, "I thought he was dead."

Picking up the pace, the man trips, slamming into a pew with an echoing "thud!" Standing, he realizes that the entire audience has now turned to him. He adjusts his suit and strides embarrassed, but confident, to the casket. Turning now, facing the crowd, he manages a harried smile before stepping into the casket for eternity.

Late to my own funeral is the last thing they'll see. If first impressions are lasting, what will my last impression be then? No one will know or understand why I was always hurrying along, yet always late. Why I worked so hard, but seemed so lazy in to some.


Keep checking back. Unlike most eulogies, this one...will be continued...