Life Story

From childhood up to seven years of age is when a child’s life forces are released into fantasy, memory, and learning capacity.  Looking back on the first seven years of my childhood I can now say I’ve learned more from the raw, brittle lifestyles of the streets than during my early preschool and later high school years.

At the tender age of three, up until my seventh birthday, the reality of dope and its debilitating addiction was all around me.  Day in and day out, I was constantly bombarded by the effects of an illicit narcotic that mysteriously found its way into our community after the uprooting of the Panthers movement.

Whenever my mother would send us off to school, every three or four flights down the stairway we had to say, “Excuse me, Mister,” or “Excuse me, Miss,” because the hallway steps would be filled with dope fiends either using or in an unresponsive, head-downward nod, with a bloody needle lodged into his or her arm.  Some mornings I’d actually close my eyes and walk down the stairs to go outside and play.

Even though we were poor and lived in a housing project our mother always showered us with love.  She made sure we were properly clothed, fed, and lived in a clean apartment.  Unlike many of the friends I met during preschool whose mother or father were hooked on dope, I’d never imagined such a drug culture being so pervasive until I was invited to a few of my preschool friends’ houses.

Coming of age during a heroin epidemic.  At three or four years old, I could not see the full impact of dope in my community, although I saw various individuals on it, and knew something about them wasn’t right.  I guess, as a growing child, our brains spare us the ability to comprehend such harsh realities all at once.

But after my seventh birthday I became more aware and susceptible towards the reality of things around me.  My childish fantasies and fairytale imaginations began to fade, and a split between ‘me’ and the environment I found myself born into was fully established, revealing its good, bad, and the oh so prevalent ugly.

One bright sunny afternoon after school had let out, I was walking home and picked up a few small pebbles, tossing them into the sky.  Somehow or another, I became so absorbed in how high I was able to propel the stones upward that I hadn’t noticed a parked vehicle with a man inside who’d just finished emptying a needle full of dope into his arm.  There he lay slumped in a coma, dead to the world.

I tossed the last pebble into the skies, unaware of what would happen next.  On its way downward, the stone suddenly cracked the front windshield, startling the dope addict out of his drug-induced slumber.  I heard a car door slam, and saw a tall man walking towards me, wide-eyed, in a hurrying manner saying, “Come here, son, I got something for you.  Here you go, I got money, for you!”

My childlike innocence led me to believe that a kind person simply wanted to give me something, not knowing I’d just fractured a window and abruptly interfered with someone’s high.  I proceeded to walk towards him and quickly observed a strange rubber cord tightly wrapped around his upper left arm, where blood profusely poured down to his fingertips.

When he saw how fearful I’d become, after seeing blood trickle down his arm, the addict charged at me with a syringe he’d hid in his right hand all the while. I took off screaming, running as fast as I could, but the deranged fiend seemed to gain momentum, getting close enough that I felt his outstretched hand desperately grab at my book bag, saying “I’m a get you, catch you, you gonna die.”  

His threat made me run even faster.  I begged God not to let this man kill me.  Somehow or another, he began to gasp, wheeze and slow down to catch his breath.  I took a glance backward and noticed the man bent over, both hands on his knees, panting as if he yearned for breath.

I was frightened, traumatized, and absolutely puzzled as to why something like this would happen to me.  I was glad he’d stopped chasing me.  But, after catching my breath, after running such a long distance from school and home, it dawned on me that I was lost.  As I walked around aimlessly, trying to find my way home, I heard a loud screeching noise and, to my panic, it was the addict driving directly beside me.

Stopped at a red light, the ill-tempered fidgety, hostile user, rolled down the passenger side window yelling, “As soon as this light turn green, you little bastard.”  I started to cry as a last-ditch effort, seeking sympathy. But all I saw was a lit cigarette stuck to his parched lower lip, a cruel and grim look of disgust staring back at me.

This time I threw my backpack into a shrub and commenced to run opposite the traffic, giving me time to get farther away from this noxious heroin addict.  The cluster of vehicles saved my life. Looking back as I continued to run, I could see his frustration with the stopped traffic.  I hoped the nightmare had come to its end.

Being lost took its toll also, the trauma and confusion of walking for hours and not knowing where you’re going, especially as a child.  But something deep within me wouldn’t allow me to break down, nor give up hope in finding my way home.

Sure enough, I noticed a building located near my house and continued the line of travel until I got closer to our project.  Worried yet anxious to see my family prompted me to jog a little, and to my surprise I spotted my mother from a distance talking to some police officers.  I screamed out, “Mommmm!”  She quickly turned after hearing the voice of her only son, and ran toward me with open arms.  Her eyes said so much: Had someone hurt my son?  He’s not dead, thank God!  Where were you, boy?  Her kind and tense embrace spoke volumes.  In her arms I truly felt safe.

After a moment of silence and tears of joy, fused with a protective hug, Mom gently released me from her bosom, kneeled down and whispered, “I prayed for you, James, and God was with you.”  She then turned to the police, and said, “Officers, it’s my son.”  

They replied, “If you wish to further report anything, Miss, call us.”  

She said, “Okay, sir.”  We then walked home, and I took a shower. She fed me, and we sat on the couch and talked.  When she asked, “James… tell me what happened to you, baby?” I explained everything to her and my two sisters who listened with wide-eyed suspense. You could sense them envisioning themselves in my shoes, wondering how, or what they would’ve done under such circumstances.  After telling the whole story, my oldest sister who watched over us when mom wasn’t there, began to treat me a lot different.  She felt sorry for me and the trauma I suffered at the hands of an emotionally disturbed junkie.  My other sister saw me simply as her brave and courageous little brother.

Mom notified the school principal the next morning to explain what had happened.  They agreed with her decision to keep me from walking to school for at least three days, out of fear the junkie may return and something worse might happen.  I didn’t want to stay home. I loved school so much that I begged to return, but she wasn’t having that, so I had to suck it up.  My desire to get back to school was actually out of love for my teachers and friends who I’d met from different parts of the housing projects.  I was in the 2nd or 3rd grade when that ordeal occurred.  After returning, the teachers gave me a warm welcome, and used my situation as a teachable moment.

My sisters were told to guard over me, before, during, and after school, as a result of what happened.  They obeyed Mom’s orders to a T, like little bodyguards.  I couldn’t go anywhere without their consent.  To be honest, I became somewhat frustrated by their over-protective nature.  But now, looking back, I notice it was out of pure love for my life, safety, and wellbeing.

My sisters possessed a strong and profound love for me, one that transcended just being a baby brother.  They loved me more than I loved myself, I believe. They taught me so much, their loving discipline helping to shape and mold certain elements of my character.  After a month or so, they began to ease up on me a bit, once they saw that I had met a couple of friends who were constantly with me on a regular basis.

Tom and Jerry were two friends I’d hit it off with automatically.  Like kindred spirits, we loved football and basketball on the same intense level.  After school we would play for hours in the back of our housing project.  We had the same taste in rap music, but somewhat different in girls.  Other than that, we were alike.

We’d become inseparable, during school, recess, lunch, my house, you name it.  But what puzzled me most was that I’d never been to their home.  My mother didn’t mind though.  She was just happy I had befriended two companions who’d faithfully pick me up for school.  But then I noticed they would show up earlier than usual, just in time for breakfast.  Mom would then cook for me, Tom, and Jerry before leaving for school.

Tom and Jerry never mentioned their parents around me.  I tried to spark conversation about them, but they wouldn’t give in.  So, one day I thought I’d ask them to take me to see their mom and pop, but this time I wasn’t taking no for an answer.  They hesitated, glanced at one another, and reluctantly said, “Come on, man.” I was happy; they weren’t.

We headed toward a high rise building located at 11th St.  The elevators didn’t work, so we walked the stairs.  Tom (the youngest brother) reached out for Jerry’s hand because the stairways were pitch black.  You could barely see anything; all we had was our voices to guide us through.  Jerry took the lead, followed by Tom and me, “Come on ya’ll,” he yelled.  We began to run up the dark stairs as fast as possible.  “Don’t stop, run, run!” shouted Jerry.

The first flight of stairs we’d run up was littered with cans, broken liquor bottles, bags of trash and garbage tossed on the ground.  Farther upstairs I had to cover my nostrils, because the passageway reeked: a foul mixture of urine, feces, and some other unidentifiable smells that gave me an instant headache.

I heard voices bickering, shouting, cursing at one another, doors slamming, opening, closing, babies crying, televisions and radios blaring, all occurring at the same time, like some sort of chaotic symphony.  Finally, we reached the fifth floor, emerging from a dark, stench-ridden stairwell into a dimly lit hallway.  I became nauseated; it felt like the hallway was spinning slowly.

“Are you okay, James?” asked Tom. I told him I just felt a little woozy… that’s all.  Midway through the hall I spotted sunlight glimmering through a plastic window fitted into a wooden door barely hanging by the hinges.

Jerry moved the door that partitioned the hallway from the breezeway.  As we moved through, a draft of fresh air made me feel better.  I said “hi” to two ladies and a man who rubbed his arms up and down like he had the chills.  Bad.

The three grownups (neither of whom the brothers knew) stopped directly in front of the same apartment door as us.  Jerry knocked three times on the door, before saying “I don’t think anyone’s home ya’ll, let’s go!”  Then Tom, turning the knob, caused the door to open.

Entering the cloudy smoke-filled living room, both brothers hastily flopped down onto a dingy couch, as if they’d done something wrong by bringing me home with them. I hadn’t sat down yet.  From where I stood, the kitchen area was clearly visible.  I couldn’t help but notice a group of six or more people standing and sitting around the table in a hypnotic state.

One man was fastening a thick black leather belt, roughly, around the head of a dark-skinned bald man who sat calmly in a kitchen chair.  Once the belt had been secured tightly, the man who had fastened it took a dope needle and gently pushed it into a vein protruding from the bald man’s head.  Witnessing the tip of the needle go in left me shaken and frozen in time.

The person who stuck the needle into the man’s head slowly pulled it out and began to unbuckle the belt.  Once it had loosened, the dope fiend’s 250-pound body dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes.  There I stood, totally paralyzed, palms sweating, knees shaking, thoughts racing.  Then someone said, “Yo!  Get that damn kid the F-outta here.”

A man came from out of the kitchen, grabbed me, then noticing Tom and Jerry on the couch, yelled, “What the hell?! We told ya’ll about bringing people here!”  He told the brothers to “get up off the couch.”  When they got up, he took and opened the foldaway couch bed, put the three of us inside, and quickly folded it back into a regular couch.

I instantly went into a panic attack. Tom and Jerry were both giggling as if they’d done this before, as a prank or something.  But I’d never been physically encased in a foldout couch, never!  I cried, “Please, mister, please let me outta here. I’m sorry, I won’t bother you again!”  Imagine being a frail seven-year-old kid smashed inside of a couch, a place of complete darkness.  I felt my lungs would suddenly collapse.  I couldn’t move or breathe. 

My mother would call my sisters and me to her bedroom just before our bedtime.  She’d get us all together to pray.  I was very little then, and couldn’t grasp fully the concept of needing God’s help.  But on this day, for the first time, I deeply prayed for God’s intervention.  Jerry stopped laughing, “Be quiet, James.  Somebody’s coming.”  The man who put us in the couch had finally let us out.  “You a cry baby,” he said.  As I wiped my tears, I asked to use the bathroom.

Straightening my shirt and jacket, after being stuffed into the dirty couch, I began walking in the direction of the bathroom, given permission to do so by the man who played the cruel trick on us – or should I say me – because the brothers seemed to think it was funny.

In passing, I briefly glanced into the kitchen area and saw three people kneeling over the body of the man who previously fell from the chair.  Others stood idly by.  While two people pumped his chest, a third individual smacked his face repeatedly.  I didn’t want to believe he was dead, but the person who shoved the dope needle in his head had a serious look on his face, as if he was no longer alive.

Someone took a plastic bag of ice and said, “Rub it between and around his legs, private area, and stomach.”  I didn’t know what to think or feel.  Deeply embarrassed, Jerry said, “Hurry up and use the bathroom so we can go out and play.”  His angry voice shook me out of a state of mental confusion and refocused my attention to using the toilet.

I turned the knob opening the bathroom door and walked in on one of the women I had spoken to before entering Tom and Jerry’s house.  She sat with her buttocks on the border of the porcelain sink, with one foot on the edge of the bathtub.  Her skirt pulled closely up to her stomach, with both legs open she took a shot of heroin into her womb.  I walked in and turned back around.  She said, “I am sorry, go ahead, use the toilet,” and walked past me.

She touched my head and whispered, “I am sorry, honey.”  Her voice was the only sense of humanity I felt throughout the whole shocking ordeal.  No one seemed to care for us.  Their spirits were cold, sort of like zombies, lacking human feeling and emotion.  I believed the sole purpose of those junkies was to shoot dope, in their head, arms, feet, hands, and private parts.

Tom was sitting on the lap of the man who I thought had died.  However, he was revived.  Obviously, I was immediately concerned for Tom, especially after noticing his older brother quietly standing in the doorway, motioning with his hand as a signal for us to leave.  Jerry was a very deep introvert who rarely said much, but in school he was a mathematical genius.

I recall one time he worked out a math equation while the class sat attentive and quiet, eyes glued to him and the chalkboard.  It was a tense moment because the teacher had challenged a student, and that never ever happened in our class.  The teacher was always right.  While Jerry worked on solving the math problem, I spotted four teachers peeking through the blinders at Jerry outdoing our teacher.  He was a whiz in my eyes too. 

I quickly followed Jerry’s lead.  While leaving I looked back for Tom who eventually caught up with us, right before re-entering the filthy stairway.  As we ran back downstairs, I sensed the brothers weren’t themselves.  Neither was I.  Entering the playground was not the same.  Normally we’d run to our special swings laughing, pushing one another.  That day, we were all silent.

Each of us sat on our playground swing emotionally drained.  Jerry, disquieted by his home environment, emitted a melancholy spirit instantly felt by Tom and I.  Not wanting to anger my friends, I said nothing regarding the fact that I hadn’t met their parents.  However, I desired to do so because their sons had shared such caring and giving spirit that I knew their parents had to be just like them.

After hugging the brothers, I headed home. That walk was the longest I’d ever took.  My adolescent mind was further troubled and perplexed as to how I might tell my mother everything that had happened at Tom and Jerry’s, without the risk of losing the first true friends I ever met. But after the previous incident where a dangerous addict chased me, I had to be forthright with my mother about everything I’d experienced this time around.  

She was hanging up clothes when I approached her.  She had the ability to read my face, knowing if I was troubled or not.  “James, what’s the matter?” she asked. We walked into the kitchen and sat down.  

Mom always allowed me the space to express my thoughts.  I revealed everything that occurred at my friends’ house.  She was totally outraged, angry, and immediately wanted to know where they lived and who their parents were.  I explained that I’d never met either parent, while also begging her not to end my friendship with Tom and Jerry.  I also promised, in tears, never to enter their house again.  She fully understood.

My mother foresaw her son’s innocence fading to the level of violent crime, drugs and alcohol, dealing and using, poverty, etc.  So she pulled no punches educating me about street life, the harmful effects of drugs on the mind and body.  She explained that my friends’ house was a “shooting gallery” and most likely their parents were addicts and I should never go inside that house again, ever.

I gave her my word and never went back.  Instead I’d yell up to their fifth-floor apartment window and they would run down to play with me.  Or they’d visit my house instead.

One day after school, Jerry had to stay behind for disciplinary reasons.  He’d gotten mad and smashed two of the classroom windows while fighting another student.  I truly believe he lashed out as a result of his frustrations with living in a drug-ridden environment.  The pressure must have weighed heavy on his mind, body, and soul, even at such a very young age.

Tom and I were left to walk home together without his big brother for the first time.  Tom suggested I go with him to get money from his mother so we could buy candy.  I told him that I couldn’t go up to his house.  He replied, “My mom is at the bar.  She knows I’m coming.”  Taking him at his word, we headed up to Broad Street where he quickly noticed his parents.

“There they go!” said Tom.  The closer we got, I could see his mom and dad both nodding.  His father leaned up against a pole dozing, his head slightly bent, as saliva dribbled down his mouth onto the pavement.  Tom called for his mother who raised her head sluggishly, but slowly, indicating she heard her son’s voice… somewhere.

Tom wasn’t as troubled by his parents’ excessive drug use as his big brother was.  I don’t know, maybe he was young and his love went beyond the obvious.  

While in front of the bar, his mother would snap out of short episodes of nodding, only to utter a few incoherent words that faded back into another sleep-like nod.  “You, my baby,” she muddled.

Her eyes barely opened as she struggled to speak.  Tom asked, “Mom, can I have some money?”  His mother, bent over, slowly straightening her back, began to search for a purse inside of her bra, while shifting through her breast area.  It dawned on me that she was pregnant, over six months.  I felt sad, not only for Tom and Jerry, but for the unborn child.

She pulled out her purse and gave Tom seventy-five cents and boy, was he happy. Back in 1974, three quarters went a long way.  Tom, with his wide, beautiful and joyful smile, said “Hi, Dad.”  I recognized their father now. It was the bald guy who had fallen out of the kitchen chair after having a dope needle injected into his head.  His dad grunted a few words aloud, rubbing his snotty nose, saying “Now go head home, boy. Now!”

A few weeks later, Tom and Jerry’s house was raided by both the housing authorities and police.  They never returned to school.  A rumor spread that the children were hauled off to state orphanages, and their parents were placed in police custody.  I never knew how accurate the rumor was, but I didn’t want to believe it for a long time.  Tom and Jerry were my first true friends.   I looked for them each time I passed their window.  But I never saw them again.

At the age of fourteen, I found myself confounded by all that my eyes were exposed to in the past as a child, both negative and positive.  It is said that from one through seven years of age lie the most crucial stages of a child’s mental development.  So, seven years later, now fourteen, I’d find various previously unknown personality traits that would appear and disappear from the surface of my conscious mind.

There I was, a young black male left to figure out life on the cuff, expected to properly function within a wicked subculture of crime, drug dealing, addiction, violence, and murder. I had no insight into the vicious cycle that revolves around inner-city life.  The Richard Allen Projects at such a young age became my second high school where I experienced another kind of education.

Baring all her raw and gritty realities 24/7, each day she’d faithfully expose the demise of the weak and the rise of the strong.  Like clockwork she became our teacher.  

Me and an elementary school friend named Relly would sit on his steps at the corner of 10th and Brown during 1980 and ‘81. We’d play basketball in front of his house until we were drained.  Then we’d walk to the store called George Taylor’s for something to drink and a honey bun, then head back to Relly’s steps to watch all the action that took place at the corner daily.  Something crazy always happened there.  Junkies, fiends, dealers, prostitute, johns, you name it, they were there 24 hours a day.

Our young minds were exposed to so much drug trafficking, day in and day out.  White people, black people, Hispanics, you name it, they all drove up and down the strip from 11th and Parish, to 10th and Brown in order to cop dope, cocaine, pills, and other drugs.  You’d wonder when the police would even drive around.  That was wishful thinking though, because they were petrified of driving through, let alone going inside Richard Allen Projects during the ‘70s and ‘80s.

We were allowed to sit on the steps in the daytime, but not after the sun went down.  It didn’t matter though, because during the day troublesome things would occur just as violently as they did during the night.  

The first serious drug-related crime we saw was two men who started out with a simple fight. A large crowd hovered around once they began fighting. We could hear them cheering.

“Nig*ah, bet them on Tommy.  Sh*t ni*gah, you ain’t say nothing… Bet it.”  

“Nawww, man!  Hands up – damn punk a*s nig*ah, Ooooooh, watch his upper cut, Tommy.” 

“Okaayyy, that mother fuc*er hit like a bag of bricks, don’t he?” 

Relly and I were two skinny boys that barely got a good glimpse of the action-packed fight, but we did catch one powerful blow Tommy threw that knocked the other fighter towards us.  “Diz-zam!  You see that punch?”  We tried to imitate how Tommy landed his blow, by punching at each other’s faces.  

“Yo, Yo, that ain’t cool, man!”  A light-skinned man in a trench coat had pulled out a gun and walked up behind Tommy as both fighters were throwing down fair and square.

I guess the crowd, including me, and Relly, thought the guy was going to try and hit Tommy over the back of his head.  But the man with the gun gripped Tommy’s shirt and fired three shots into his lower abdomen instead.  Pow! Pow! Pow! Everything stopped.  Tommy’s eyes stared towards the sky as if he saw something above.

I looked up but I saw nothing.  When I turned back to the fight, Tommy was lying on the ground, his cream-colored sweatshirt covered with his dark red blood.  The shooter and the guy Tommy had fought both ran off in the midst of the dispersing crowd.  “That was some rotten crap!  Dem, ni*gah’s petty as hell.”  

Others chimed in “Crazy crap, motherfuc*ers, can’t get a fair fight around here for nuffin!”

As the crowd tapered off, “Good rumble, call the cops.  

“I think somebody did.  Hope he ain’t dead.”  

Me and Relly went inside his house, and no one helped Tommy get up. This young man was a Golden Glove prize-fighter from 1978 to ‘79.  Before he was shot and killed, he was going to fight a professional boxer in two months.

The blood from Tommy’s body left a stain on the concrete right at the foul line of our basketball court, right where he was killed.  It’s strange though, whenever my friends and I would play ball, they would go to the foul line and shoot from the blood-stained spot, as if nothing ever happened there, but my memory always reminded me.

When I’d shoot, I would stand at least five feet away. Out of my respect for Tommy came a wicked jump shot from anywhere outside of that area.  Later, there were rumors that Tommy had fought the guy who’d stolen a drug dealer’s stash of dope hidden underneath a steel trashcan by a tree.

Tommy was given $20, so the story went, to beat the dude up for taking the drugs.  That was the reason given for Tommy’s senseless killing.  But nobody actually knew why he was killed and, to tell you the truth, not many cared.  It was just another day in the Richard Allen Projects.  The dope game did so much damage to an already dilapidated community, destroying the minds and hearts of those who unfortunately had to live there.

It was nothing to enter a project hallway and find a man or woman junkie with one sleeve rolled up, in a deep nod from shooting dope, dead to the world around them. Many individuals used dope to escape the pain, poverty, and social ills that were covertly engineered for that exact effect.

Me and Relly would play pranks on the fiends.  While they were nodding from the dope, we’d open the hallway door real wide, count up to three, then slam it as hard as we could, causing a loud, startling sound that would shock the junkie from his or her stupor.  They’d jump so high, in a panic, then run out the hallway cussing at us as we both ran out of the projects down the street.  Although we had fun times, the reality of crime, drugs, and poverty only worsened year after year.

My mother would buy me and my sisters special outfits for Easter Sunday!  We didn’t attend church much but Easter was the one time we’d all get dressed up.  I recall one Easter Sunday, during service, multiple gunshots rang out directly across from the church we were in.

Hearing gunshots was sort of the norm, but these were the type you’d stop whatever you were doing and drop for cover.  “O’Lord! Everyone hit the floor. Now! In Jesus’s name!”  The reverend screamed from his pulpit.  We all ducked between the pews in silence until the bullets could no longer be heard outside the church.

This was the first time I ever saw the pastor with a look of fear and uncertainty upon his dark-skinned, sweaty face.  I was shocked because the reverend had always exuded power, fearlessness, and full faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and that whatever transpired in this life was in the Lord’s hands.

His dissolving in front of the congregation was a sign that times were changing.  After the police showed up where the shooting took place, the minister told us to bow our heads in prayer.  “Lord, I ask that you bless your children as they leave your house of worship.  They will head out to resume their lives in the midst of such strife and death.  Father, walk with them, protect them, in your name.”  We exited the scene, cars trying to get out of the projects and the police stopping them from leaving.

Having no control over ones immediate environment of poverty, violence, senseless crime and drug wars, I look back at my life and all I’ve been through, and I can honestly say, I know there’s a Just, Orderly, and Merciful Force within, and outside of us All, that maintain, sustain and balances every element of Life on this planet and throughout the Universe.