Out of the Madness (17 page)

The main reason this closeness existed between us was that none of us looked for trouble and everyone did everything possible
to avoid it, at least in the Ice House neighborhood. So you knew, when you were called, that fighting was the last alternative.

Vernon was a natural warrior. I was a creative fighter also. We would practice late into the night on ways to, say, disarm
someone with a gun or how to react to gunfire or a knife attack or in a fight in which we were outnumbered. We evaluated,
and criticized each other’s techniques until we were very skilled. But we never became bullies. Instead we used these skills
to guard against the youth who were being pumped up by the hard-core rappers and crack glory. They were getting bolder, ignorant,
and more dangerous each day. They were killing a lot of people we knew.

Besides these activities, some things touched me to the depths of my heart, like singing on the corners. Two or three evenings
a week, we would gather on the corner at the Ice House: Vernon’s uncle, Gregory Taylor*, one of the old heads named Eugene,
Sammy Ray, and his brother Regis, who both were from the struggling group Destiny, right out of south Dallas.

We would buy us several forty-ounces to loosen our cords, form a semicircle, and get the rhythm going. We sung old Stylistics,
Marvin Gaye, Blue Magic, Teddy Pendergrass, Sam Cooke, New Birth, and the Isley Brothers’ music. When we really got hyped,
we would just make up songs right there, and everybody would fall into place, Sammy or the old head on lead, Regis and Greg
doing background, or vice versa. I had what the old head called a fifth, able to hit notes off the scale. We would harmonize
a chorus, each voice falling into place; and when they had blended and were holding a tune, I would throw in that fifth, and
the harmony would melt everybody.

People going into and coming from the store would stop and listen; all the young boys would gather around to request their
special love song. The owner would stick his head outside sometimes, giving his nod of approval. We would go on and on, singing
and laughing, sometimes late into the next morning.

I convinced Vernon, after months of discussion, that the only way we could become successful would be to go into business
for ourselves, create our own job security, work hard, seek a higher education part-time, keep up our reading and private
study. My mother agreed with this, encouraged us, and said to let her know how she could help. Vernon’s uncles, his aunt,
his grandmother, the old heads, all agreed. Everything began to fall together.

Vernon got in touch with his half brother, Shelvin*, who had a friend, Jamie*. Both were in their early twenties. Shelvin,
Jamie, Vernon, and I were at the same crossroads in our lives. We all had worked like dogs on jobs taking us nowhere and had
grown up in west Dallas. They, having earned a contract in the local school district, had started a small disk jockey service.
They were trying to raise money to begin a small record production company. All of us were seeking the same thing, a way to
success without selling dope.

We were hardened, so we all shared similar qualities, such as motivation, endurance, discipline. But we had our distinct qualities,
some a lot stronger than others, and our faults, too. We drew strength from each other.

Shelvin, for example, had a shrewd sense of fundamental business. Short and muscular, he was dedicated and compromising. His
mother had been murdered in west Dallas, and his daddy, his and Vernon’s daddy, was an uncaring man. Shelvin could be discouraged
quickly and depended heavily on us for support. Jamie—who had done several semesters of college before running out of money—was
a whiz at math and management, all natural. He was from the minimum-wage group and sometimes was stubborn, egocentric, and
not a team player.

Vernon was intelligent, wise beyond his years, and fiercely loyal. Yet he stayed frustrated, impatient, far too arrogant and
violent. I had a knack for understanding complexity, strong organizational skills, and an accurate memory. But I could get
too emotional, distracted, and sacrificial. And I preferred isolation. We all read a lot, but I probably read more than they.

In the midst of the madness, we were very serious about forming a business. This was not uncommon. I have said in the past
how most people I knew, all the ones I talked with, had once had the same high ambitions, high goals. Some of them were foolish
enough to try and almost lost their sanity in the process. Others looked at the fools who did try, or sensed enough about
what was in store, and simply refused to try. Better to have some peace of mind than be a bitter, warped, rejected, depressed
person the rest of your life.

Ironically, a week or so after we had begun meeting, Vernon almost knocked my door down at the little lime duplex. I reached
for my pistol until I heard him call my name. I let him in. He jumped around, blurting his words out. He was coming from a
meeting that Jamie had encouraged him to attend—Jamie was learning more about Islam and thinking about becoming a Muslim.

“Man, I just came from this meeting,” Vernon said. “You should have been there, man. We heard some powerful black people speak.
Some of them were Muslims. They had on these long robes. They were dressed so death [impressively]. They had people there
from all kinds of organizations, man. I got the number from this one man, Fahim Minkah. We’re going to go to his meeting this
Friday.”

Vernon was so excited because he had just seen for the first time in his life people whom he thought really cared, could really
do something, who hadn’t gotten out and become Uncle Toms.

On a Friday, we piled into Jamie’s car and drove to an apartment in Oak Cliff. We were going to get advice on our ideas. We
were invited inside by a nice man, who had arranged several chairs in his living room. Several people already sat around.
Outgoing Jamie and Shelvin were mingling real well, while Vernon and I stayed quietly seated. Soon, Fahim Minkah arrived.

Fahim was keen looking, tall and gray-bearded, like a wizard. He smiled broadly, and his eyes gleamed with knowledge. He quickly
took control of everything, stood before us, and spoke.

“My name is Fahim Minkah, formerly Fred Bell. I want to welcome you all here today.”

He talked a very long time. He mentioned an organization he was about to start and how important it was for blacks to become
economically self-reliant. I got the impression he was there to recruit people. I sat there quietly, amazed to know he even
existed. Clearly he was skilled with words and accustomed to speaking. And sincerity sprang from him like sunshine. Toward
the end of the meeting, Fahim angrily stated that we were going to do something about all the crack houses. Afterward he inquired
with us for more information on just how bad things were. He was somewhat detached from the deeper levels of poverty.

Jamie managed to mention our desires to start a small business. Fahim, and the man who lived in the apartment, said to keep
them aware of our progress so that they could help us. They offered no advice at the time. But they both agreed that self-employment
was better than working for white people.

Vernon and the rest of us would all try, as many had done, to defy our poor origins, without sacrificing the community, hold
on before fate sucked us under. We agreed to meet every Tuesday to try to start a business, to get out, get some resources,
bring some life into this dead, sleeping neighborhood. But we all were so fatalistic and overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude
of this undertaking. We would try, though, until it brought us close to despair.

Back at the duplex, I finally had gotten around to getting that girl’s phone number. Her name was Tammie. We had been talking
often on the phone and before she went home after school. We also spent time together in my living room, when I wasn’t with
Vernon or the fellows or writing poetry and essays late into the night while watching for crack-head burglars.

Tammie, sixteen, was an only child and had been raised, mostly, by her grandmother. Her mundane, materialistic mother had
taken over and passed on her values when Tammie was a teenager. Tammie’s personality was sweet yet clever, her mind ready,
her heart inexperienced.

She was a nice girl and really admired me, even though she was from a more fortunate background. Her mom hated me and tried
to stop her from seeing me. But Tammie was a rebellious sixteen-year-old who had been watching her fifteen-year-old cousin,
who lived with Tammie’s grandmother one street over, go to all the parties with all the boys she wanted. Tammie wanted her
teenage life and would do whatever it took to get it.

After Tammie’s mother found out she was seeing me, she told Tammie her all-too-familiar “You can get out.” That day Tammie
gathered her clothes and went to her grandmother’s house, as she had done many times before, where she called to let me know
she was okay. But, after this time, she would never again move back with her mother.

On many nights, Tammie and I lay in that dark duplex, sweating on each other, sweat mixed with a fervor untouched by any wrong.
Unlike many young couples in the neighborhood, we were serious. We were spending a lot of time together. Times were pleasant.
I was excited about the possibility of success, and this helped us with the relationship. Even though we were opposites, Tammie
and I had grown close. She would not let anyone keep her from seeing me. “But, Grandmother, I love him,” she had said one
evening. Her family began to accept this.

I stopped being with my friends so much once she entered my life. We could often be found at the Hardemans Barbecue on Oakland,
where they still remember us today. We would sit in there and eat, and play the jukebox, and do the same thing at the Ponderosa
on Pennsylvania Avenue. When I had extra money, we sometimes spent nights at motels. Tammie didn’t drink, but she wasn’t bothered
by the beer I like to have sometimes. To support our relationship, Jamie and Shelvin would pick us up in the mornings and
take us to breakfast sometimes.

She didn’t care much for them, my friends, and would often want me to choose between them and her, wanted me to be with her
all the time. But I always managed to divide my time up in a way that made everybody happy.

I would meet Tammie downtown, to ride the bus to south Dallas with her. I had never been much for going out, so when she wanted
to go to a ball game, party, or formal dinner, I would stay home. In a way, I never thought I fit that form of teenage life-style.
I had way more experience on the streets than Tammie, and I preferred, instead, the small, close gatherings with my friends,
with whom I felt comfortable and safe.

Tammie seemed to be the perfect addition to my life. Her concern for me seemed genuine, and at the start she was very supportive
of the ideas I had. Then one day, only three months after we met, the troubles began. I was about to learn a valuable lesson
about the power of a woman and the priceless bond between a man and his child. While we played on the couch one afternoon,
her shirt flew up. I saw the little nudge in her stomach. She was pregnant.

A
fter Tammie and I confirmed the pregnancy at Dr. Mason’s Clinic on Martin Luther King Street, from the depths of my mind sprang
the deeper passion.

Deeper than my love of privacy, deeper than my love of my own life. It was a calling of manhood, of responsibility, of too
much knowledge of children abandoned by their parents, deceived by their parents, abused by their parents, good children,
manipulated, hurt, molested, and molded by an organized society, deserted in their most urgent times, left to chance a ruthless
environment.

From the moment of confirmation, heredity took over. This was me, a man, a black man, all black men, to either accept or deny,
nourish or suppress, love or scorn, the child. It was nature, human, godly, all these things, to know that I was appointed
the director of this life, as my mother and father, as their mother and father, even as the first mother and father had been.

Whether it meant sacrificing high ambitions, slaving as a blue-collar laborer, miserable and depressed, or running away completely,
choosing not to be responsible, giving up the ghost, choosing not to comfort my own hurt in the godforsaken life, I had to
choose.

As I would, many teenage black fathers chose to be responsible. Many did not. The latter were everywhere in the neighborhood,
denying their Pampers- and milk-lacking babies, denying the desperate, burdened girls. These were the young, hopeless fathers
who abandoned their children, ignored their needs. Rather than face another failure, knowing their ragged lives could only
take so much, they refused to try.

The thoughts were in my mind, and I chose, just as surely as there is night and day, to be a true father. It was still spring
1988. Tammie was only four weeks pregnant. I had some time to sort out a plan, however much that trouble would assail me.

Tammie and I both agreed that an abortion was out of the question. We wanted to just be responsible and do the best we could.
But I could tell she was very, very scared. She had come from a spoiled background, with a wooden spoon—a good poverty spoon—in
her mouth. She was afraid yet was trying to be brave.

She decided to keep the pregnancy hidden from her family for the time being, and so did I. Hopefully, everything would work
out with the things I was trying to do with my friends, which I discussed with her in detail. And maybe we could move together.
She believed in me.

At Vernon’s small duplex, we had combed through every idea from a car detail shop, a small record store, a small grocery store,
and a record production company. We chose a record shop, wrote an outline, and even caught the bus around west and south Dallas
to look at some possible sites.

Needless to say, nothing ever got off the ground. The first major obstacle was money. We couldn’t borrow any—not with our
zip codes and lack of collateral. Our parents didn’t have money. We didn’t know any investors. Jamie did draw up a couple
of proposals, which, I believe, he submitted to some small loan, government, and business entities. They were laughingly rejected
or caught up in some bureaucratic process. The only way we were going to get any money was to take it.