"Street life is expensive/And what it cost some niggas/Is everything!/But I been buggin' since I lost my nigga." - Anthony J. Shears - Mea Culpa 2008I am lost. At a lost for words. Lost in this way of life. Lost in thought. Lost in pain. Lost in regret.
Death is always around the corner. But the neighborhood I'm from seems to give death inordinate help. My man has taken leave of life. And my only thoughts are on the uncertainty of how it all went down.
We used to joke about being willing to die to live like men. PJ was a real religious dude, and one afternoon as we sat in the gym he asked me if I was afraid to die. I told him I wasn't and asked him what he thought death was. He looked up and then at me and said, "Dying means we ain't got to sin no more." Stopped me dead in my tracks. I've thought about that conversation every now and then over the last decade. I used to think I had some subtle fear of death. That conversation with P that day changed my entire opinion on death and dying. I realized that day that dying was the easy part. Living like anything other than a man standing on my own two feet - that seemed much harder to me than death. Way back then we made a decision to live as men, no matter the cost. And in the end, the residual of the answer to that question is why my man is gone.
Someone said once "Coming generations will learn equality from poverty and death, and love from woes." I've memorized the pain of these woes and can recite them backwards. I don't think of myself as a kid from the ghetto. The home I grew up in had everything I needed. I think of myself as someone who knew from an early age that I would live my life totally responsible for myself, and all that I wanted to achieve. P was the yin to my yang. Where I was "cold and calculated", he was "warm and likable". I kept my distance from most people and most things. P wore his heart on his sleeve... To a fault. Where I had accepted the judgement and sometimes rejection of others, he took any perceived slight to heart and responded accordingly. In the end, we balanced each other out, in life and on the court.
He said to me once "I'ma die fighting!" And while I didn't attend his funeral, I sent a kite up saying I missed him and admired his commitment to his word. All great men want to live beyond their death. No one can say with any certainty they will be alive tomorrow. So we live hard, with no apologies today. My personal dead are never dead to me. I never forget them. And I'll never forget Mr. Princeton Jerome Latimer. You told me "when you blow up, I blow up!" It's taken awhile my friend. But I promise you I'll make good on that promise. You embodied everything a solider should be. And until I can fulfill my promise to you, I won't weep for you. I won't celebrate your life with morning because you're still alive in the hearts of those who love you. And will continue to live in the mouths of men thru my music.
That's my word.
AJS
