Voices Carry

Sound really carries in my neighborhood at night. I don't know if it's an effect of the hills around here or if smoggy air has more sound conducive properties, but I'm constantly overhearing the most random conversations.

I just heard one of my neighbors talking to a guy right underneath my living room window. She and her roommates aren't particular favorites of mine. I readily admit they aren't as bad as Crazy Claudia, the compulsive vacuumer who used to live across the hall. Claudia hated Black people and loved to stomp up and down the stairs as loudly as possible. Nothing can top Claudia's madness.

But, these current neighbors just have that vibe that they're really trust fund brats who run a meth lab out of one of the bedrooms. One of the guys spends a lot of time hanging in front of our building in his wife beater t-shirt. The other guy always looks totally wasted and only grunts when I say, "Hello".

The girl who lives with them is the type that thinks she's hot because ages ago some delusional soul told her she was the stuff. Oh, and her favorite outfit is a pair of cowboy boots with bare legs and a baby doll mini dress. That goes over really well when she walks by my sons.

I imagine she had on one of her baby doll dresses while she was having her little chit-chat right beneath my living room windows. I wasn't 100% paying attention to her inanity about some audition she screwed up and how depressed she was about it. What did catch my ear was that there was a weird pause where they suddenly weren't talking. I hadn't heard footsteps walking away or heard the door to our building slam shut.

Hmm...No one walked away. No one went inside either. No one was talking.

I don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to guess they must have been kissing because the silence was broken when I heard him say, "So can I come in?"

Ladies and gentleman, it was a classic case of a guy trying to charm his way into a woman's apartment so he can get some!

I couldn't help but think, gosh, is that how easy it is? I guess straightforwardly asking works because next thing I knew, I heard her seductively ask,"What about your girlfriend?"

He had the decency to pause before he chuckled and replied, "Well... she's not really my girlfriend anymore."

Whoa! Hold up, neighbor gal! Come back down to earth! He's LYING! If you ever hear a guy say such a thing, you know that his girlfriend is probably sending him unsuspecting text messages like, "Do you want me to pick up some flowers for your mom on my way home from work tomorrow?" That's why his phone is on silent and why he was gone in the bathroom for 10 minutes while y'all were out to dinner. You see, he was talking to his "not really my girlfriend" girlfriend! Besides, if you need to ask about a man's girlfriend, that's a sign you need to repeat three times, "His girlfriend may be crazy, track me down and slash my tires!"

Not scary enough for you? Okay, how about, "His girlfriend might be crazy and try to cut up my face with a razor blade!"

Before you say that sort of stuff only happens in the movies, trust me, I've known people it's happened to. So I'm just saying, it's something to think about. Is 10 minutes of fun worth getting your face scarred up?

Obviously to Tramp-o-La it is. She upped the booty call ante with some more purring. "All you want to do is talk?"

Eww! But that's when I heard her keys jingle. He started giggling like a goof ball and so did she. I heard the downstairs door open and slam shut and then they tramped through our hallway.

I think I might shut my windows and throw on my iPod so I don't have to accidentally hear any other, ahem, noises tonight.

No More Principal Dumping

Today was a day for slicking my hair back into the most staid, school-marmish bun you've ever seen in your entire life. It was fine because I was going to a meeting at my son's school and I wanted to look as serious and severe as possible. Yes, "Operation Get a New Principal" is in full effect! All I need is some little spectacles to complete the whole, "I mean business and I'm going after your ass," look. By the way, if you ever meet me, when I wear a black suit, heels, pearls and I have the bun going on, I'm not playing around.

See, I hate it when school administrators try to act like parents are stupid. Coffee with the principal is not the same as holding a workshop for parents. If your a principal and you're sitting across from me, I'm not going to smile as you whine about how you haven't been able to find anybody to do a newsletter at the school. Saying dumb stuff like that is what makes me say things like, "It sounds like you are having a difficult time motivating your staff to execute your directives." I mean, come on -- seven months into the school year and you can't get a newsletter out the door? We're not even getting into how the school councils haven't seen the budget, parent volunteers are discouraged, there was nothing done for Black History Month, and the beloved math coach was "transferred" under suspicious circumstances. And that's just the tip of the iceberg!

This principal has been an administrator for awhile but she's only been at this school for two years. I've met parents from her prior school and they have described to me how they went through the wringer to get her removed. Joy of joys, she got dumped at our school. It's a huge problem that instead of flat out firing bad principals, the school district just moves them to another school.

The most recent example of this is that of an assistant principal who, although investigated for allegedly molesting a student at Foshay Learning Center AND allegedly pulling a gun on the girl's stepdaddy, got transferred to another school, Markham Middle School in Watts. Can we say lawsuit?

Can you imagine what would go down if this alleged molester was a principal in a wealthier area? There'd be no putting him at a different school and hoping it all blows over. Nope, that principal would be very familiar with the concept of administrative leave!

But, this is all OK when you have children of color, when you have more low-income parents, and when parents are less likely to speak up because they don't always know what their children should be getting. But I know what my kids should be getting and I'm not afraid to demand it.

I can't help but think though about how if we're successful, in our efforts she's just going to get dumped at some other school and then the cycle will start all over again. My wish for the day? No more principal dumping!

Orlando or Silas?

Yesterday afternoon I did something that I've never done before! Want to guess what I did? I'll give you four choices to pick from:

A) I ran five miles.
B) I bought a pair of Manolos with a 4-inch heel.
C) I met another blogger.
D) I watched "Rocky".

They say that in a multiple choice test if you don't know the answer, try to use the process of elimination. And if that doesn't work, all you have to do is pick "C". That way you have at least a 25% chance of getting the answer correct. Besides, the answer really is "C"!

Yes, yesterday I met another blogger! I know, the idea of meeting another blogger can seem a little scary, and rightfully so. The internet provides such a cloak of anonymity that we can come across as being Orlando Bloom:

When in all actuality, we're really Silas:


Uh huh. The worry is that instead of finding that your blogging buddy is the suave and thoughtful person they appear to be on-line, he or she is actually a nefarious killer who wears a hooded cloak and stars in a bad adaptation of a book that wasn't all that great to begin with. Before you know it, you're sitting in a cafe across from this person, wondering how quickly you can sneak to the bathroom to dial 911.

But I wasn't worried about any of this sort of thing because I wasn't going to meet just any blogger. Nope, I met a blogger who I've emailed back and forth with for around a year. She even mailed me a guidebook on France back when I was planning on escaping there sometime this year. So, I wasn't too afraid I'd be chopped into pieces, never to see my family again!

Who is this fab blogger? I got to meet the fabulous Sundry over at Any Given Sundry. We had a nice chat over tea yesterday afternoon and let me tell you, she's so cool and just as interesting in person! I'm glad I met her. But goodness, I hope I didn't scare her to death with how much I can talk! (If I did, sorry!)

What about you? Have you ever met any other bloggers? If you did, did you get along in person? And if you haven't met any other bloggers, would you even want to?

Bobby Brown Saves the Show!

All weekend I meant to post about last Friday's concert and I never got around to it. Let's just say that the weather hitting 90 degrees on both Saturday and Sunday seriously inhibited my ability to type more than five words at a time. I even got a sunburn!

So before I once again boil away in the heat that is March in Southern California, let me tell you about the show.

The Prelude: Do you have the tickets?
The show was at the new Nokia Theater in Downtown LA. I don't know whose bright idea it was to build a concert venue right across from the Staples Center (home of the Lakers and the Clippers) because when something is happening at Staples, the traffic is a nightmare! But we braved it all, paid $25 for parking and were actually half an hour early for the concert. On the walk from the car I said to my husband, "Do you have the tickets?"

He seriously looked at me like I'd grown two heads and he wanted to chop one of them off. "No. I thought you had them. You always bring the tickets!"

So, I flirted/begged the parking guys for the $25 back and headed home! The whole ride home SOMEBODY was being such a whiner. "We're going to miss the beginning of the show! What if I don't get to see Guy?" Oh my goodness, I wanted to smack him! But thankfully, it only took about eight minutes to get home (yes, I was speeding on the 101) and we were back downtown and parked by 8:00, which made the, "I'm not gonna see Teddy Riley," crybaby chill out.

Act 1: After 7
Now I know how my parents felt when they'd go to see the Temptations and then come home and talk about how there was only one original Temptation left. Um, who were these dudes? I think only one of the original group members is left. All in all, they were pretty boring. They did stuff like tell us to snap our fingers like "grown folks". I'm sorry, but when I go to a show, I don't want to sit on my rear, snapping my fingers and act like I'm getting ready for a nap. I was pretty through when the lead guy started serenading these much older ladies in the front row and they in turn started trying to hump on him. Just Eww! When you get to a certain age, you really should know better!

Act 2: Al B. Sure
So Al B. Sure comes out on stage dressed in suit and a fedora. I get all excited because I'm thinking I'm going to hear him sing "Nite and Day" or something else awesome. But noooo, he's just the Master of Ceremonies because he works for Hot 92 Jamz nowadays. How did I miss that small detail? Hmm... I was so annoyed. But he had a lot of jokes about how he 1) is chunky because he's 40 years old and 2) can actually sing now. He definitely told the truth about both of those things. But he swears he's going to Jenny Craig with Queen Latifah and he's going to slim back down by the time he releases his next record this fall. (just kidding about the Jenny Craig part, I think).

So he gets us all hyped up for Tony! Toni! Tone! and I'm going nuts at this point as the guys start to come out on stage...

Act 3: The Fake Raphael Saadiq
I remember there were some issues between the three guys in Tony! Toni! Tone! back in the day and they broke up. It's especially a shame since Dwayne and Raphael are brothers, but I guess I was under the impression that they'd patched things up and gotten back together.

I was WRONG! So for the second time that night, I got that feeling like I was watching the 8th version of the Tempations. The thing that really made me mad though was that there was an effort to trick the audience into believing Raphael Saadiq was on stage. Why else would they have a guy wearing a newspaper boy cap just like Raphael used to? I was all, "Why's Raphael hiding back in the corner with that ugly purple shirt on? And why does his voice sound so weird?"

And then Fake Raphael's master, Dwanye, let him step from behind the keyboard so he could BUTCHER "Anniversary"! This kid takes off the cap, reveals that he's not Raphael, and all the energy got sucked out of the place. Everyone who was on their feet, including yours truly, sat down! I mean, why not come clean and say, "Introducing Blah Blah, the newest member of the group!" Don't try to hoodwink an LA crowd with your fake Raphael Saadiq! Trust me, the crowd will (and did) turn on you! The drunk folks behind me were all, "Unless Raphael's in the corner smokin' crack, they better get his ass out here on the stage!" I was totally feeling them. If I could've thrown rocks, I would've.

But Raphael, wherever he is (still producing Joss Stone?), got his revenge when Dwayne tried to get freaky with a member of the audience whose weave was so long that it got caught in the strings of his guitar! Hah!

Act 4: Johnny Gill
I was SO mad about the fake Raphael that I found myself wondering if they could make a fake Johnny Gill too. But no, he was there. He's another one that needs a little bit of that Kanye Workout Plan. Either that, or just stop wearing clothing that are so tight! I mean, I thought he was gonna bust out of his champagne colored suit! Oh, and the drunk folks were all yelling, "Johnny, where's ya man, Eddie?" and, "Tracey Edmonds hates you!" But whatever, he was alright. He did a nice Gerald Levert tribute and a nice version of "My, My, My".

THEN, Johnny's all, "Hey I got some special friends here!" Shocker of all shockers, Bobby Brown jumped out on stage with fellow New Edition member Ricky Bell!!!

The potentially craptastic nature of the whole night got saved right in that moment! It would be an understatement to say that the place went BANANAS! I mean, Bobby rocked "My Prerogative" like his life depended on it. Thank goodness he left the shirt on this time, unlike the last time I saw him.

Just when we all thought it couldn't get any better...the guys did "Poison"! Yeah, it was fabulous. I think Johnny Gill has to have a pretty low-key ego because he didn't wig out that the crowd got more excited about Bobby Brown than him.

Act 5: Guy
I was so scared I was going to see a fake Teddy Riley a fake Aaron Hall or a fake Damion Hall. But no, all three guys were there! They sounded fantastic and gosh, Aaron Hall ripped off his shirt and showed us that he still has his washboard abs, even at the age of 44. He then went on to get freaky just like he used to do. He was down in the audience prowling around, looking for a woman who could, as he said, "Handle this." I was dying over the older white lady trying to catch his attention by grabbing his crotch! Wowzer, slow down, honey!

And then Bobby Brown, Johnny Gill and Al B. Sure all came out and sang "Teddy's Jam" with Guy. Bobby got SO into rocking the song that Aaron Hall started laughing, shrugged his shoulders and walked off stage!

Epilogue: The Couch
The show let out at midnight and I was so tired that I came home and fell asleep on the couch. Whew, FOUR hours of music is a long show!

All I can say is I'm definitely looking forward to next month's show...Kanye West!

Chai and Concerts in the New Year

Around noon today I'm going to roll over to Starbucks and buy a grande soy chai with a shot of sugar free vanilla. And then I'm going to drink it very slowly.

I know you're probably like, "Why the heck should I care if you go to Starbucks and get a chai at noon? What's the big deal about that?"

No, I'm not trying to do my patriotic duty by trying to help Starbuck's bottom line. Despite the recession, (that may or may not officially be happening depending on who you're talking to) I have a firm belief that Starbucks is still making plenty of moolah. They don't need my sympathy. So the real reason I'm so psyched about this chai in the afternoon scenario is that I'm celebrating the fact that today is Baha'i New Year (Also known as Naw Ruz) and that means it's the end of the Baha'i Fast! Yee-haw!

Yes, for the past 19 days, I haven't been eating or drinking anything between sunrise and sunset. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. No food, no water and no chai all day long. I meant to blog about fasting while I was doing it and I found I just couldn't. Every post started out with, "I'm really hungry. I'd like to eat ____ (insert ANY food) right now." And then I'd start listing out all the stuff I wanted to eat. Really, the best way for me to get through the days was to not think about it at all and to keep myself busy doing/writing about other things.

As the days went by though, it did get easier. Your stomach shrinks a lot so even though you think you're going to eat a ton of food in the morning before sunrise or in the evening after sunset, you quickly realize that you're stuffing yourself and you'll feel like you overate. Plus, it becomes apparent that the Baha'i Fast is not really about food. It's ultimately about sacrifice and spiritual development.

Our society is one where instant gratification is the norm. We can revert to that sort of childish behavior where we think we should have what we want when we want it, no matter what. And then we wonder why we have such huge problems with addictions of all kinds: food, alcohol, drugs, shopping, gossip, political bickering, and on and on. So the Fast (like Ramadan, Lent and Yom Kippur) is a time to step back from all the selfishness we surround ourselves with.

It really is a good thing to ask myself whether I can really resist the temptation of the chocolate my son is waving in front of me. Who's in control of the decisions I make about my life? Am I in control or is fleeting desire for something really in charge?

Yes, those are great questions to ponder, but today, I'll ponder while eating lunch and drinking some chai!

And, to start the Baha'i New Year off right, I'm going to a show tonight!

I'm going to go see Guy, Tony Toni Tone, Al B. Sure!, After 7 and Johnny Gill. Whoo hoo! This concert is going to be RIDICULOUS! There are going to be some folks throwing their backs out trying to get their new jack swing on again! I seriously think my husband might pass out and lose his mind during Guy's performance. As for me, I just want to see if Al B. Sure is still hot, and I am a huge fan of Tony Toni Tone. I really want to hear them perform this one:


Gosh, I love that song. If they don't sing that tonight I might throw something at the stage -- all of which just goes to show that I probably should have prayed and meditated a bit more during the Fast because clearly, I have learned nothing!

Fearless

I had a little crying moment at the park this afternoon.

A couple of weeks ago my sons got their first ever bikes. So far we've only been letting them ride in the gated parking lot in back of our building. But today I let them ride their bikes over to our local park.

They rode around and around on a flat, paved loop, but finally decided they wanted to ride up the sloped dirt trail. Neither are super skilled at getting up slopes yet so it took some pushing to get them to the crest. But once they got there, they were more than ready to cruise to the bottom.

The seven year-old, "O", is a much more cautious rider, so he rode his brakes the whole way down the slope. But his four year-old daredevil brother, "T", screamed, "Rock on, baby!" at the top of his lungs and pumped his fist in the air the whole way down the slope. He rode so fast down the incline that I couldn't catch him even though I ran as fast as I could. (Sigh. My slow running is another issue entirely.) I was so worried because I totally thought he was going to crash.

In contrast, he was absolutely fearless.

It was really something to see my little wild baby refuse to look back even once. It really got me in the gut to see how he's growing up thinking he's absolutely invincible. He's whip smart, he's creative and he's not afraid to take risks.

So what made me cry? Well, it all got me thinking about how I've known so many other black males over the years who have also been smart, creative, outgoing, risk-takers... and they've had to deal with so much. I think about all the black males I've known who had blowout parties on their 25th birthdays because they honestly didn't think they'd live to see that age.

My mom can't even trace her patrilineal DNA because all the males in her family are dead. Her father died well before I was born. My brother is dead. My uncle is dead as well. My great uncles are dead. Sometimes I look at my sons and think about all of those relatives they won't know, men who had to work around not just the systemic lack of opportunity or institutionalized oppression, but also the psychological and emotional weight of racism. And it undeniably affected their health and/or their mental stability.

What's the weight? Marian Wright Edelman sums it up:

"Only 3 out of 100 Black males entering kindergarten will graduate from college. Every 5 seconds during the school day, a Black public school student is suspended. Every 46 seconds during the school day, a Black high school student drops out. Every minute, a Black child is arrested and a Black baby is born to an unmarried mother. Every 3 minutes, a Black child is born into poverty. Every hour, a Black baby dies. Every 4 hours, a Black child or youth under 20 dies from an accident, and every 5 hours, a Black youth is a homicide victim. Every day, a Black young person under 25 dies from HIV infection and a Black child or youth under 20 commits suicide."

And as much as I get up every day and 100% tell myself that my sons are not going to be a part of any of that because I'm making sure it doesn't happen, the reality is that so many other parents of black children have said the exact same thing.

Sometimes that reality gets to me. Sometimes I find myself getting stressed out thinking about how I can't slack at all when I come to my boys. I know I probably add to the pressure by operating with this fear.

With all of the violence going on in this city, these days I think about how I don't want my sons to grow up as teenagers in Los Angeles. I don't want them to be anywhere someone will drive by and shoot them because they're black. I don't want them stopped by the police and harassed. But where in the United States can we go where that sort of reality doesn't have the possibility of taking place?

My son hasn't caught on yet that he's supposed to walk softly and talk softly so he doesn't scare anybody. He doesn't know yet that when he does succeed someone will tell him it's only because he's black. And if he opens his mouth to acknowledge what he's going through, he'll get told he's playing the race card. Now though, if someone does something wrong to him, he expects immediate justice and he's come to believe that justice and fairness are fundamental to his world.

So when I see my son owning a slope like that, knowing he is worthy, capable, wonderful and smart, knowing he is invincible and just as much a rock star as any other child on that playground, I cherish that. I know it's going to hurt to see that start to get chipped away.

Encounters With the Clueless

We got to yesterday's St. Patrick's Day parade a little late so maybe we missed all the super exciting floats. But as far as parades go, I give it a D+.

I mean, hello City of Los Angeles, having a green-painted trash truck drive down the street is not exciting. Not in the least. Have some dancing leprechauns next to it or something. Even my kids were like, "Why is there a trash truck in the parade, mommy?"

I guess I was expecting a Chicago-style St. P's Day celebration and this was not it. If you want to see some photos of what we saw, LAist's photographers were right by where we were sitting and captured both the parade and the subsequent festivities in Pershing Square.

That's not to say we didn't still have a great time. My boys danced a little to the sounds of the folk rock group, Young Dubliners. They also got to pet a gigantic Irish wolfhound, take photos with various fire trucks and harass the police officers in kilts by asking, "Why do you have on a skirt?"

We were also captivated by the dancing horses that came out and did their version of the Irish Jig. I took a little video of it for you:



My sons also tried to jump in the specially dyed green water over in Pershing Square. By that point I was thinking about those old "Calgon, take me away" commercials so I told them they could go in the water if they wanted to but that, "Weirdos come along and go to the bathroom in it too so swim in that if you want." They didn't want to jump in after I said that and instead took to trying to float leaves on it.

While I was sitting there watching them, a guy sitting a couple feet away with his kids asked why I was all tricked out in the shamrocks and green. Not to mention that HE was all tricked out himself, but whatever. I told him that it's fun and besides, I'm half Irish so I have to represent.

His response? Laughter. "Ha-ha! That's a good one! You're one of those Irish for a day types, aren't ya?"

"No. I'm really half Irish."

He sobered up quickly. "Are you for real? Because you sure don't look like you're part Irish."

I've heard this my whole life so my ever so sweet and innocent reply was ready. "Well, what does someone who's part Irish look like?"

"Uh, um, uh." He was stammering like he thought I was going to go all Jeremiah Wright on him. And then he spit out, "I woulda thought you're just a plain ole black person."

Newsflash! All of us plain ole black people (and a lot of you plain ole white people) are mixed with something. Some of us just have it a little closer in our family tree than others. I was pretty through with the conversation by that point but then this moron dropped the ultimate bomb by asking, "What is St. Patrick's Day about anyway?"

Are you for real? You're down at a St. Patrick's Day celebration with your family and you don't even know what you're celebrating. He wasn't the only one though. I got into conversations with no less than FOUR individuals who were all, "I have no idea what St. Patrick's Day is about!"

I'll give them all the benefit of the doubt and assume they got dropped on their heads as children. I should have told them that St. Patrick's Day is the day you have to give $20 to the first person who tells you what the day is really about.

Going Green on St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day to all y'all out there who are Irish or just wish you were! In honor of my own Irish heritage, I'll be rocking a very cute green jacket and some beads I acquired during last year's trip to New Orleans. I'll also be celebrating by taking my sons to the St. Patrick's Day parade in Downtown LA. I've never been to a St. P's Day parade but hopefully it'll be fun.

I will admit that I feel a little bad for going to the parade since this is Holy Week. I know lots of cities had their St. P's celebrations this past Friday or Saturday because, if I understand it correctly, you're historically supposed to abstain from drinking and revelry during Holy Week. I'm not sure how many people still observe in that fashion.

Plus, even though I'm not Catholic, I'm quite aware of the tension between what seems to be the increasing secularization of St. P's Day and those who want to maintain it's roots as the observance of a Catholic feast day. The kids came home from school talking about the 21st century trinity: little people, pots of gold and leprechauns. I had to spend a bit of time teaching my sons about how St. Patrick brought Catholicism to Ireland and chased all the snakes away.

I also know I could barely get into my local grocery store last night without tripping over the ginormous displays of liquor at the entrance. Guinness wants to make St. P's Day a national holiday here -- and of course they won't mind one bit if more people drink and make them wealthier. Yours truly doesn't drink. I don't need a pint of Guinness in order to relax and act crazy. I do that very well all by myself, thank you very much.

I also wish more people in the world didn't drink. Ask any police officer what's the number one factor in domestic violence calls and you'll hear them say, "Alcohol." No alcohol would also mean no more drunk drivers. Wouldn't it be nice to have a world where we didn't need an organization like Mother's Against Drunk Driving? I'll definitely be taking the subway to the parade today, mostly because I don't want to risk being hit by a drunk driver.

Yeah, most of the folks wearing green today have no idea about real Irish history in this country. They may have heard about the potato famine but they probably don't know that there would probably never have been a labor movement in this country without the Irish immigrant. Folks don't even know how the Irish weren't even considered white when they came here and were called white negroes or white ni**ers. Click here to see some of the stereotypical and downright racist newspaper cartoon portrayals of the Irish.

Of course, over time, the Irish successfully become white (read "How the Irish Became White" for more on this) primarily by agreeing to get in on the oppression of black folks in this country. Even though all that is conveniently forgotten, many media portrayals of the Irish still revolve around a bunch of stereotypes. My dad isn't a Guinness-drinking, lazy, fighting type of guy who can't hold a job. He doesn't roll around with a shillelagh, he doesn't have red hair and he's not a police officer or a firefighter.

But, I will admit he does like potatoes and he does have a tam that he wears sometimes...

As for luck, I'm convinced the folks over at Bear Stearns must be 100% Irish. They've gotten the mother of all bailouts from our government. On Friday, the Federal Reserve saved them from going under. I find it interesting that as hard as I looked online I couldn't find a definitive number of how much the Federal Reserve gave them. I know it has to have been millions and millions of dollars. Gosh, who said welfare doesn't exist? Isn't this corporate welfare? Whatever happened to the idea that throwing money at the problem isn't the solution? Then over the weekend, JP Morgan snapped them up for the price of $236 million or a mere $2 a share. It's just shady and you KNOW it's all eventually going to get passed on to taxpayers (also known as you and me). It sounds like we need someone to drive the snakes out of Wall Street.

Yeah, I'm definitely not Irish enough for hookups like that. If I'm broke or having "cash flow problems" the government is not going to step in within 24 hours to save my behind. I suppose I'll just keep on making my own luck. In the meantime, give some good luck kisses to all the beautiful Irish women you know. And for those of you at work, keep it to an air kiss unless you're married to or dating the woman. I really don't want you to get popped in the lip or sued for sexual harassment for attempting something you shouldn't have.

So, however lucky or unlucky you may be, have a fab St. Patrick's Day. Éire go brách!

Premonition or Coincidence?

I try not to think about the paranormal too often. A terrifying incident with a ouija board when I was ten made me forever wary of such things. I refused to touch it but sat in a room while my two friends played. I watched as the pointer moved around while they sat with their hands in their laps, asking questions about me. The board, among other things, spelled out that I'd be murdered when I was 21. Imagine that hanging over your head for the next 11 years.

Last Halloween, I wrote about some of the other things I've experienced that have scared the wits out of me. I'd rather have a life without ghosts, psychic powers, ouija boards, tarot cards, the sixth sense or seeing dead people.

I try to avoid dwelling too much on these things because I know it's far too easy to get wrapped up in superstitious mysticism. I don't want to spend forever speculating on past lives or deciphering the hidden meanings of psychic visions, and end up not fully dealing with the realities of this life.

That said, I know children can often seem to have psychic abilities. I would definitely say my seven year-old son is one of those children who seems to be very "in touch". He's very sensitive and is often described by those who meet him as an "old soul". Out of the blue he'll tell me things about relatives who have passed away, relatives he's never met or only met when he was a small child. Relatives I never talk to him about.

As he was eating his breakfast this morning he asked me, "Mommy, who's Johnnie?"

I got the prickly feeling I always get when he says these sort of things to me, but I calmly told him, "That's the name of your great grandmother." He's never met her because she passed ten years ago. I don't have any pictures of her up in the house, and I never refer to her by her first name.

He was just as calm as he matter-of-factly replied, "Oh. Well she told me I need to be careful crossing the street today."

I asked him where he saw her and he said, "In a dream." Then he cocked his head to the side and said, "She's really beautiful."

I told him he should always be careful crossing the street and that next time he sees her that he should say one of the prayers he knows. And then, because he says this sort of thing all the time, I changed the subject so we could get out the door.

Thirty minutes later we dashed out the door and hustled down the hill. We jogged since he's always worried about being late and he likes to race me in the mornings. Two blocks from school, we stood waiting at an intersection for the walk signal. I quizzed him on his spelling words until the light turned and the walk sign appeared.

I never cross an intersection right when the light changes. I always wait a couple seconds for all the drivers that insist on running red lights. But the coast seemed clear and so my son stepped off the curb and I did as well, a nanosecond behind him. He began spelling "because" for me.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw a black SUV hurtling through the intersection towards us. The driver had blatantly run the light. Cars honked and screeched their brakes to avoid hitting it. Horrified, I managed to reach out and jerk my son backwards just in time. The SUV zoomed past and I glimpsed a woman blissfully yapping on her cell phone, oblivious to the fact that she'd almost hit my son.

Reassured that he was alright, we continued across the street and ran the rest of the way to the school so that he wouldn't be late. As I kissed him goodbye he says to me, "I guess I have to remember to listen to your grandma when I cross the street." And then he turned and ran into the school.

Until that moment I'd managed to forget what he'd told me.

Like I said, I try not be someone who overly occupies myself with the paranormal. Yet sometimes, just sometimes, something like this happens. I don't know what to make of it, but it gives me the chills.

Discarded

This morning, I walked down my hill and, feeling a slight chill, I stuck my hands into my jacket pockets. My fingers brushed against several scraps of paper that I have, over the past week, hurriedly folded into the jacket's dark, forgotten corners.

It's not unheard of for me to find cash forgotten in a pocket, but money has a very distinctive feel to it. I did not feel that texture against my fingers. Still, though, in the hopes that one of these scraps of paper might just somehow prove to be a forgotten twenty dollar bill, I turned out the contents of my pockets to see what was there.

There was no money. Instead, my pockets merely held:

1) A crumpled Barnes & Noble receipt from last Sunday's purchase of Diane Setterfield's "The Thirteenth Tale", three Star Wars books, and a grade school-age appropriate biography of Barack Obama, specially requested by my seven year-old,
2) A grocery list and receipt from last Saturday's grocery shopping at Trader Joe's in the amount of $122.57, and,
3) A business card from someone I recently met but will never contact.

I confess am hopeless when it comes to throwing small pieces of nothing like this away. I suppose I'm always worried I'm going to eventually need whatever it is I've tossed. After all, what if I eventually wish I still had the business card I only accepted as a gesture of politeness?

This morning though, I put such worries aside and determined I was going to toss these bits of nothingness away. I was in luck because it was trash pickup day on my side of the hill and all the blue and black rubber trash bins were sitting out on the curb. I halted for a moment and popped open the lid on one of the bins.

Right on top of the ubiquitous white plastic trash bags, I saw a heap of matted brown fur. It's odd how quickly our minds deduce what it is that we're seeing. Within about three seconds, I went from thinking I was seeing a cast-off fur coat, to realizing I was actually looking at the golden-haired carcass of a dog.

Shocked, I immediately dropped the trash bin lid and backed away. Perhaps 30 seconds ticked away as I stood there, unsure what to do, the receipts, list and business card still in my hand.

I don't remember exactly when I stuffed it all back into my pockets. My mind was too busy wondering what kind of person tosses a dog into the trash. Was this the work of a psychopath? Or was it simply the result of city living? Not everyone has a yard to bury a dog or the money to pay a vet to dispose of the body.

I contemplated whether I should call the police but imagined the snickers on the other side of the phone.

"You want us to come check out a dead dog in one of your neighbor's trash bins? Oh, yeah. Sure. We'll do that in between tracking down murderers, child molesters and drug dealers."

I quickly discarded the idea of phoning LAPD and decided, for once, to not involve myself. I selfishly continued on my way.

The scraps of paper are still in my jacket. I know I'll throw them away eventually. I wonder if it was as hard for someone to throw away their dog.

Politicians and Prostitutes

Oh, Mr. Spitzer, thanks for once more drawing us all into the scandalous mix of prostitution and politics.

Sometimes it seems like prostitution and politicians go hand in hand. Almost 100 years ago we had the courtesan Mata Hari trying to take out the French for the Germans.

Fast forward to the debacle of Marion Barry, the prostitute and a crack pipe. Then we had Bathroom Gate with Larry Craig and his toe tapping escapade.

And now we've got Kristen, the call girl from the Emperor's Club having a hand in the downfall of New York Governor, Eliot Spitzer.

I know you've read ad nauseum about how Spitzer was "Client 9" (which to me sounds sort of like it should be the name of a British electro-pop boy band). But instead, Client 9 is, governor or not, just another skeevy guy who's been catting around on his wife with a prostitute.

He looked so unrepentant as he "apologized" yesterday, the wife he wronged standing next to him looking like she'd just been hit by a semi truck. I really do feel terrible for her. I wanted to take off my earrings and grease my cheeks with Vaseline on her behalf. And she must know that since her husband's a politician, not a ball player, there's no $4 million dollar Kobe Bryant guilt ring coming her way.

Unfortunately, I think we're used to politicians cheating. In the past year, L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa cheated on his wife with a Telemundo reporter. His wife left him, and he subsequently broke up with the reporter. And no one in L.A. is vocally calling for his resignation. In fact, Villaraigosa's been out campaigning for Hillary Clinton.

If we skate up to the Bay Area, we have San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom cheating with his (now former) campaign manager's wife. I think folks up there were a little tougher on Gavin, but he's still in office.

In case you think it's a California thing, let's not forget that the King of Political Infidelity, Bill Clinton, cheated multiple times. Yes, Clinton got impeached, but he finished his term. No one said, "Step down in 48 hours or else."

I really think people are really in an extra tizzy because Spitzer's infidelity is with a hooker. We don't like the idea of anyone paying a woman $4000 for sex.

And can someone tell me what exactly you get when you pay that much money to a prostitute? That must be some gold-plated sex right there.

Actually, don't tell me. I think it's better if I don't know. I'll just content myself with wondering how many of the outraged love the film "Pretty Woman".

Do You Really Want to See Me Naked?

This morning I saw a news story about how our British cousins have made a camera that sees under clothing. So for all you women that never stopped padding your bra with toilet paper and all you guys that are still stuffing socks in your underwear, the gig is finally up.

Sure, the article says that the camera is only going to be used to determine whether someone has a gun, bomb or drugs on their person. But I say, yeah, right. Like we're stupid enough to believe that folks aren't going to be checking out our underwear or seeing what we look like naked.

I fully believe that if we're being told about the technology, it's probably already been secretly used on us for at least two or three years. People acted all shocked about the passing of the Patriot Act but I always thought the government did all of that surveillance anyway. I already figured phone conversations got listened to and bank records got monitored.

Do you remember the movie "Enemy of the State"? If not, it's a 1998 film starring Will Smith and Gene Hackman and it's all about surveillance. It basically predicted everything that would be included in the Patriot Act. I remember being especially weirded out by how the rogue National Security Agency agents track Smith's character via satellite. Next thing you know, we have the option to equip our cars with On-Star technology. Sure, we're told it'll rescue us in a crash, but do I really want someone to know where I'm driving at all times?

Yes, seeing that film was the first time I really thought about how God was no longer the only entity who could know what I was doing at any given time. Now we're all so monitored, we can even be tracked through our cell phones.

I certainly don't feel any safer with all this surveillance. After all, I've never heard about someone saying how they were 1) watching a robbery in progress from a live camera stuck on the side of a building in Downtown L.A. so they, 2) called the cops and 3) the cops showed up 30 seconds later and saved the victim.

In the amount of time someone watching a live camera feed spends on hold with 911, I might already be murdered, raped or robbed by a stick-up kid. All that'll be shown on the 11:00 news is a grainy picture of a suspect. I suppose that's better than nothing, but I'd already be a victim of a violent crime and, alas, my blogging days might forever be silenced. (Feel free to grab your tissues now.)

The fact remains that most cameras don't have someone viewing live footage. The manpower for something like that simply doesn't exist. So if a crime takes place, footage is pulled after the fact so a suspect can hopefully be identified.

Now I have to think about how some government employee is going to be viewing you and me with a camera that sees through our clothing. Can't you just imagine that employee snickering while tallying up a chart with the headings: boxers, briefs, thong, granny panties?

Just think what'll happen if these cameras get installed here in Hollywood. There'll be speculative reports in US Weekly and OK! about which other celebrities besides Britney Spears go out without their underwear.

Then someone from the National Security Agency will get drunk and leave their laptop in a bar. We'll find out that the laptop had thousands of hours of video footage stored on it. Before we know it some nefarious schemer will somehow acquire said footage and a website will pop up promising access to for a fee. How about $49.95 for access to a naked LL Cool J or Orlando Bloom?

If you're saying, "Girl, I wish I could but gas and milk is almost $4 a gallon!" Okay, how about $19.95 for nude access to D list celebrities that "star" on VH1 reality shows?

If that's still too steep of a price point, or you throw up a little in your mouth at the prospect of paying to see either Flavor Flav or Brett Michaels naked, the bargain section of the site will feature footage of everyday people. You and me in the buff for $9.99. And if you're truly broke, just think, there might even be a .99 cent section for images of those of us that aren't that attractive whether we're naked or covered with a gigantic parka.

Of course, the US government will try to shut the site down but it'll turn out that it's being run from some undetermined location in Eastern Europe. Just when the CIA manages to close in, the band of porn peddlers will pack up shop and high-tail it to Afghanistan to hide out in the mountains with someone else we can't find. Then the government will announce that even more surveillance is needed so we can catch the criminals who run websites showing us without our clothing.

After all the hubbub dies down and we're all trained to yawn at the prospect of that one stalkerish neighbor paying to see our naked picture online, a news story will be run on page 36 of the New York Times. It'll tell us about how Drunk Employee who lost the laptop in the first place has just been promoted to head of the Department of Homeland Security.

You think it can't happen? You think I'm crazy to come up with such a scenario? Well, then you must be one of the ones believing that the cameras will only be used to detect guns, drugs and bombs.

Good luck with that line of thinking.

Getting Out Of What You Want Me To Do

Even though I like to think of myself as extroverted, sometimes the weekend comes and I just want to hang out in my house with my family. I don't want to go anywhere. I don't want to see anybody. I don't want to come to your party. I don't want to go see your friend's band. I don't want to do anything.

I become quite anti-social.

Like right now, it's a bit after 2:00 in the afternoon and I don't want to do anything with my Friday night but come home, order some red curry with tofu from Leela Thai, and read a nice thick book. It's been the kind of day where I want to put a movie on for the kids the minute they walk in the house so they won't bug me. And then when that movie's over, I'm going to put them to bed early and start reading my book again.

The hard thing is that people who know me sometimes don't seem to be able to accept that I would love to come over but I really don't feel like it. At all. It's terrible but I've sometimes found myself making up random excuses about why I can't go to a party, show, hang out...whatever.

Why can't I just say, "Thanks but not tonight," and not be harassed with a, "Oh come on. It'll be fun!"

Of course, how nice is it to know that people really want the pleasure of my company. Usually I go. Usually I have a decent time. But there's a part of me that wishes I didn't have to.

Do you ever feel this way too?

Race Isn't An Excuse

One of my fellow bloggers, Hammer, left the following comment for me yesterday in response to my post on racism and voting:

Race isn't an excuse. I went to a poor school with broken toilets, teachers who read the paper, 20 year old text books and no lab equipment. But we had no gangs or drugs and pretty much everyone graduated got a job or went to public college.

Declaring racism as an excuse for violent and criminal behavior when is counter productive.

My whole family was poor and or mexican and we got out of the projects despite most white people hating our guts.

I think just as many blacks are voting racism as whites.

So much came to mind in response to this so I figured I'd just post my thoughts right here. (I was going to write about how Madonna's holding dance auditions four blocks from my house but maybe I'll fill you in on that tomorrow. I know, you're sooo disappointed.)

Anyway, I think Hammer's definitely overcome a whole lot and I wish more people had the ability to do so, but it doesn't always work that way. More often, people end up being stuck in a cycle of generational poverty. And instead of focusing on whether the poor have realistic opportunities to get out of the situations they're in, our society is trained to instead blame those who need our help. I am all for individual accountability but when it involves children, I just want there to be a real solution that allows them to be able to have real choices about their lives.

People excuse racism in this country and behave like it's just people saying mean things to other people. I can deal with name calling. I've been called a zebra, an Oreo, and a crispy, critter, burnt up ni**er.

So, I suppose I could pat myself on the back and say, "Whatever, and now I've got a graduate degree!" I suppose I could also pat myself on the back for not being an addict saying, "I'm addicted to crack because people called me bad names." But it's not about me.

There are plenty of other people I've known over the course of my life who didn't make it. It's not just about one person pulling themselves up. How can I celebrate when others still suffer?

No, race should not be an excuse. But, just because it shouldn't be an excuse doesn't mean that racism isn't alive and well. We like to think it's just name calling, but unfortunately racism involves power. Mortgage lenders can decide whether or not to grant a loan. Landlords can decide whether or not they want black folks renting apartments in their building. My landlord never met me before he rented this apartment to me. All he saw was my nice Irish last name on the application I faxed to him. I know it worked in my favor.

Power means journalists can spin stories a certain way and influence the masses. And before we know it, you and I don't know the truth.

City officials have the power to decide whether or not they're going to let gangs take over a neighborhood. We can "conquer" Iraq but we can't root gangs out of Los Angeles?

Um, yeah. Okay.

Hammer mentions that he didn't have gangs back when he was in school. Well, if only we could be so lucky these days. As you all know very well, here in LA, gangs are no joke. They start recruiting when the kids are in 2nd/3rd grade. The kids with no fathers think the gang members are cool guys that are just trying to protect the neighborhood, even if everyone is terrified of them. Those guys have the cars, the cash, and all the cool tattoos that everyone from ball players to rockers have these days. It's all very appealing to a young mind.

Even for me, in high school I talked to gang members all the time. I thought they were just cool, misunderstood guys. The reality is that they were the guys who didn't know how to read past a 3rd/4th grade level. They were the guys who only knew basic math. And they were the guys who'd never been given leadership opportunities because teachers were so busy labeling them as bad and sending them to the office for random crap.

A few years ago, before rents in my neighborhood went pscyho, two Latino guys with all the requisite tattoos and wife beater shirts started sitting on my front porch. And then this kid that lived next door would be out there with them. Now, where's his mom? She's at work because she's gotta pay her rent and she has no one to watch her son after school. She figures her boy's in 4th grade, he can come home and stay in the house after school. Where's dad? Who knows, but you know, that's only a bad thing if you're poor. Rich people are single parents too and no one's shaking their head at them, even if they should.

One day I came home and these guys are on the porch with this kid, Anthony. I went to get the mail and they told me to get them a glass of water. You'd best believe my ass went to the kitchen and got them a glass of water. I was just as nice and sweet to them as could be. If I called the cops, guess what? They're going to know I called and did I really want to deal with that? Um, nope. Especially since I'd seen some of the other stuff they did to people in our neighborhood.

Anthony ended up getting kicked out of two elementary schools. Two schools, that are about .1% white and almost 100% low income. No one can tell me that the level of ineptitude and lack of academic focus that went on in his schools would be tolerated in a middle-class white neighborhood. And of course, teachers have the power to decide whether they want to believe that the kids they're teaching can really achieve or not.

In my own life, I had guidance counselors tell me I didn't need to take the SAT and I should just consider going to community college. Counselors told me I should take auto shop because I might be a great mechanic. They weren't telling any of the white kids in my Advanced Placement physics class that they should be mechanics too. Nope. Just me. And that's racism.

Now, whether I believe I should be a mechanic or not is another thing, but when you have people who've been systemically told for generations, you're inferior, well, not everyone has the ability to hear what the guidance counselor is saying and know that something in the milk ain't clean.

I've seen teachers sit around and say, "Let's face it, these kids just aren't that smart and at the most, they're going to be flipping burgers or cutting lawns." Why do these teachers say these things? Quite frankly deep down inside, they believe the kids aren't smart because they're not white.

Disagree with me if you will but I have my sister calling me last week telling me how my nephew's math teacher split up the class into a low group and a high group and all the kids in the high group are white and Asian. Guess what color all the kids in the low group are? They're the black kids. There's not one white child in the low group. And my nephew is frickin' gifted, okay? He's one of the smartest kids I've ever seen and I'm not just saying that because he's related to my brilliance!

My sister asked the teacher about this situation and the teacher got mad and did the, "How dare you call me a racist?" thing. Well, what the heck else is it when my nephew is getting an A but gets put in the low group? Just a friendly mistake? I don't think so.

My sister has the social and cultural skills to address the situation. But what happens if people are poor and uneducated and that the child comes home and says they got put in the low group for math? Well, that parent might do what my sister did and talk to the teacher and principal. But if that parent has limited English ability, they may feel incompetent. If that parent hated school and didn't do so well he/she may feel uncomfortable talking to a teacher and may think that the lack of math ability is inherited. That parent may have addiction issues or be abusive and so may not even care. Regardless of the reason, if the child is allowed to remain in the low math group, guess what? He falls behind. I don't care what teachers tell you, as someone who's been a teacher, the low group never catches up to the high group. Never.

So that kid Anthony that used to be in my building? His family ended up moving to a different building a few blocks away and I haven't seen him although I see his tag, "FACTS" all over the neighborhood. I ran into his mom the other day. Anthony's been kicked out of middle school, has been arrested several times, and is in a juvenile detention home -- where he, of course, is probably learning how to be a better criminal. His mom's just trying to hold it together for her younger daughter. She's given up hope on Anthony because, as she said, the gang owns him now.

Should she have moved heaven and earth to make sure her child didn't end up in that gang? Yes. Should Anthony have had some sort of intrinsic motivation that made him, "Just Say No," to those gang members? Some sense of right and wrong that made him say no to that pressure. Absolutely. But sadly enough, fourth graders don't always have the resources to make that decision on their own.

The only other thing I have to say is as far black folks voting racism...well, I know a lot of black people who used to love Hillary Clinton and are now are choosing to not vote for her precisely because of the racial games her campaign has played. She brought that on herself. But people voting for Barack only because he's black? Sure, some people probably are, and even though whites have done it for forever, two wrongs don't make a right. I actually think most black people voting for him are voting for him on issues and because they're inspired by him, just like all the other Obamaniacs of all colors out there.

So Hammer, thank you for sparking all these thoughts. I think about these kinds of things all the time. These issues hit me in a certain place because I look in the eyes of my sons every single day and know what this world has in store for them. I always say that people think my boys are so cute and adorable now, but in about ten years, they're going to be scared of them. I'm going to have to worry about cops pulling them over because they look suspect. I'm going to have to worry about a new generation of teachers telling them they're nothing. And I plan to fight it all tooth and nail.

I wish I didn't have to.

A Vote For Racism

I hear there's a new bestseller out right now. It's called, "The Dummies Guide to Being a Racist in the 21st Century".

And obviously, the book's instructions are working. According to Ohio's Democratic Primary exit polls, 18% of white voters said that race was a factor in the way they voted. And 75% of those voters cast their ballot for the candidate who's white.

I'm not suggesting that everyone who doesn't vote for Barack Obama is a racist. I don't believe that. I genuinely think folks have the right to vote for whoever they want to and if folks really don't like Obama's policies or character, fine.

If they don't like Hillary's policies or character, that's cool too.

McCain's comb over? What can I say? You're either feeling it or you're not.

But the policies, character and comb over have nothing to do with that 18%. I have a real problem with that 18%. "Race being a factor" is basically code language for saying, "Hell no! I'm not voting for that negro!"

I can't say I'm surprised by that. I think that may actually be a low ball number. Despite all the hype talk about how we've transcended race, we can look around us and see that that's not true. We're not burning crosses on each other's lawns every other day but we're not exactly homies unidos either.

It gets me thinking about how we've had just about zero conversations between our presidential candidates about the de facto segregation that takes place in our nation's schools. But here in Los Angeles, according to some reports, up to 60% of black and Latino students do not graduate from high school. They aren't bad kids, but they do get stuck with teachers who will sit at their desk and read the newspaper. They get stuck with the teachers who say, "If you don't want to be in my class, don't come anymore."

I know I can go on a candidates website and check out an education plan but why isn't this a huge issue in the national conversation? To me it's because this drop out rate disproportionately affects people of color and poor white folks. And the last thing the elites in this country really want are more people competing against their own children for a spot at a top college.

And what do uneducated people do? Well, some of them join gangs. Here in LA, we've had a ton of gang violence in the past two weeks and the violence has primarily affected innocent victims. An entire neighborhood was shut down for hours in the aftermath of the shooting of a 36 year-old man and his 2 year-old granddaughter. A seventeen year-old high school senior, Jamiel Shaw, was shot and killed Sunday night. Yesterday a six year-old child got shot in the head while riding in a van with his family.

Oh, but I'm sure that 18% in Ohio could care less, because to them, that's what black folks and "illegal immigrants" deserve. They're going to sit around and think that it won't happen to their children because white children are inherently good and never join gangs or get shot by gang members.

I wonder if that 18% sees Obama's face and thinks of that black boss of theirs that they believe only got the job because of some sort of quotas, special treatment or diversity initiatives.

And the candidate that this thinking benefits doesn't denounce this sort of thing at all.

When I lived in China, the newspapers would mock U.S. criticism of Chinese human rights violations by basically saying, "Look who's talking! Isn't racism a human rights violation?" And truly, it is.

Those 18% weren't voting for someone because of the content of their character. They weren't voting for policies that will make this country a better place for everyone.

No matter how we look at it, they were voting for racism. How shameful.