How much is too much Information?

I don’t get it, I really don’t. Maybe it’s a generation thing. Maybe it’s something like certain dance movements that you only do when you are in early 20’s because to do them when you are older would throw your spine so far out of alignment you’d have to walk with a cane for the rest of your life. I don’t understand why the need to share what we are doing every minute of the day with friends or even complete strangers. Now I’m not talking about people with small children who really do need to know where the kids are and that they are safe, or people who do that for security reasons. I’m referring to those of us who sign on to certain websites and log every minute detail of our lives no matter how dreary and obsequious those details may be.

About 2 or 3 months ago I signed up with Facebook because a friend asked me to. But apart from him and an organization that asked to become a friend, I have no one else listed as a friend. It is not because I want to remain reclusive or set apart from everyone else, but because I don’t really know anyone else who belongs to Facebook, so I mainly keep some junk on it that will be easy for me to find in the future and prevent me from cluttering up my computer. It’s another resource for me.

I should also mention that I belong to 4 or 5 groups that have pages on Facebook, one of which is my gym. Out of the 5000 members that belong to my gym there are about 144 of us who also signed up for this group and except for the trainers; I haven’t seen a single person that I know. But it is a source that I can use to learn things about different events going on, or schedules that I might not be aware of. Also, Facebook is an icon featured on my iPod so it’s all linked.

Recently I noticed that I had not filled out the profile part of the webpage for Facebook and that there was also a section where you could tell people what you were doing exactly at that moment. There was a field for about 30 or 60 characters or words where you could say what you were doing at that moment. You could tell people that you were heading over to the movies, or having a cup of coffee with Jill or soaking in the tub with Bob. These blurbs about your life would then be instantly sent out to your friends’ email bins, websites or sent out as a text message to their cell phones and I thought this must be how Twitter works.

But then I asked myself, why would I want to let people know about every minute of my hum drum life, it’s tedious enough just living it. And worse than that, why on earth would I want to know about someone else’s life minute by minute? So you felt a little ill after lunch, do I really need to know right away? That shit can wait, no pun intended.

Take for example I gave a homeless guy a dollar after he held the door for me at a convenience store this evening. Should I have let the world know right away? I don't think so. If it’s really that important to you we can talk and reflect about it at the end of the day over the telephone if I haven’t turned it off and if I know that’s what the conversation will be about it probably will be off.

I know that there are many people who have signed up for Twitter and I guess similar programs and I don’t mean to point fingers at anyone because it’s not about them, or even you, it’s about me. I like to be up on gadgets and trends and stuff, but this one… I don’t get. It's funny that I’ll show you a picture of my behind and maybe more in a heartbeat as long as the picture looks good, but Twitter somehow seems like it’s too much of an invasion of my privacy and that just doesn’t sit well with me.

Am I wrong?

Change You Can Believe In

I have a question.

When Ronald Reagan ran for President against Jimmy Carter, I remember the Carter campaign came out and said that when Reagan was Governor of California, he had closed all the state mental institutions and that there were now hundreds if not thousands of crazy people roaming the streets with no where to live bothering ordinary people. How low can this man go to show his ineptitude, I thought about the former President from Georgia?

Sure enough less than 4 years later, I was entering the World Trade Center from the south side at night to catch the Path train to Jersey where before it was always clean and empty, I noticed there were men lying on the ground stretched out and getting comfortable from the revolving doors through the lobby and all the way to the escalators that lead you down to the lower levels. Once again, my assumptions had been proven wrong.

Well many years later, after Senior’s, “1000 Points of Light,” Clintons “I feel your pain,” and Junior’s,” mission accomplished,” people are still sleeping in the street and begging for change at an ever increasing rate it seems.

Apparently, there are said to be 3 types of homeless person. The 1st one is one who dresses neatly, cleanly and you could never tell that they were homeless unless someone told you. You’ll probably find them sitting at the library during the day or the train station reading and or trying to figure out a way to make some change. The 2nd is the type is the one who will wear an overcoat in the summer and six layers underneath that. Or they will walk about not realizing that their privates are being exposed and being aired out so that you can smell them from about a half a block away. They will scream at you unintelligently making noises and guttural utterances no one can recognize. And the 3rd, will fall somewhere in between the other 2, the type who will ask you for change.


The 3rd type was the one that approached me the other night outside of Rita’s Water Ice. In the above picture, he was the one in the yellow asking everyone for change. The picture doesn’t really show the dirt that he was covered in or the pathetic way that he held himself as he went from person to person begging. I didn’t want to take advantage of his situation especially since I only gave him 50 cents and then only after seeing him for a second time that evening and asking him a silly question.

Close up, I noticed how young he was and how reasonably good looking he was and I wondered how he could have gotten himself into this mess. I could have thought the “there but for the grace of God,” line, but that’s something that anyone would have to worry about in my case. Yes I appreciate life but not that much. I’m the type who you would find floating down the river or lying splat on the side of the sidewalk next to a 10 storey building before I could accept that way of life. I’m not that strong. I’m not built that way.

Anyway, I wondered why the taxes I pay, or anybody pays can buy bullets and bombs and salaries for Halliburton, but not cover the costs for the homeless. Also, why after all these years, the sight of people sleeping in the streets or having them ask for your change has become acceptable and even normal in our major cities. When will all of this change?

That is my question.

And I bet you thought this was going to be about Obama.

It's too darn Hot!

Forgive me if you've heard this before or have lived it yourself. Back in the day, rich folk would leave New York City or where ever they lived and head for Europe because it was much cooler there in the summer. The rest of us would slave away in the sun picking cotton or dropping dead somewhere in the mills or a factory because of accident or heat exhaustion. How times have changed.

Today, I'm walking the 3 blocks from the train station to where I work and I start popping this vicious sweat thing which make me wish that I had carried a change of clothing, or at least a shirt, so that I could at least start the day out right. At lunch time, I'm heading back from getting something to eat and I am so wet I start to feel the sweat drip down between my legs and I start to think, if this keeps up I may have to head for the feminine hygiene aisle at the pharmacy for some help and protection, maybe eve the one with wings. When I get back home, I am so completely exhausted the only thing I can think about is stripping naked and collapsing on the bed.

In the city it was over 98 degrees today and with a heat index from the sun rays bouncing off the sidewalk that took it somewhere close to whatever it is in the Mojave Desert. Although with the dirt and pollution and the crazy bastards lining the streets begging for money or airing their unwashed privates for all to see and smell, I would have preferred to have been in the desert.

True, I don't really have it bad compared to other people. I'm not watching the house float away from floods in Wisconsin, or climbing up from under rubble in China, but this is too much.

I had wanted to write about something else today but I forgot what it was. I'm a black man who doesn't like heat, so sue me. The only thing I can think about is this damn heat, global warming, hurtling towards the sun and another thing that I can hate George Bush about.

The Plan

Now I’m not one who is a believer in great conspiracies. Even though I wasn’t there, I don’t think there was a paid CIA trigger man on the grassy knoll in Dallas in ’63. I don’t believe that Princess Diana is being kept on life support in the cellars of Buckingham Palace. In fact, even though there is a whole bunch of shit that doesn’t add up, I don’t believe G. Dubya or the Jewish Defense League or anyone else not associated with the hijackers of 911 were responsible for the destruction of the Twin Towers. But I was listening to a podcast of This American Life on NPR this week and they were doing stories on an episode called Human Resources. One of the stories in the show was called The Plan.

I have heard about The Plan since the late 70’s early 80’s. It is usually referred to as a white conspiracy that started around 1967-68, the period MLK was shot and the riots started in many of the major cities like Baltimore, Trenton, DC, Detroit and Newark.

The idea was for white families who had sold their properties and fled the cities to the suburbs to eventually come back into the cities and buy back land that had dropped in value due to neglect. The result would be to force black families out and usher in white families who would have made a nice neat profit; selling high and buying back low.

I would hear this theory and just laugh at the absurdity of people denigrating gentrification just because of some silly fear they had about displacement. Who would be able to organize such a diabolical arrangement? No one could tell me. “This was a story right out of George Orwell,” I would think to myself. Nowadays, I would even attribute it to an Oliver Stone movie with a meaty role for Kevin Costner that could jumpstart his career. That is I would, but I don’t.

I haven’t been to Harlem since President Clinton took up rooms there, but I get the impression that the neighborhood has changed. Rates and rents are slightly more expensive than they used to be. Some small businesses have been forced to move further away from 125th St. and replaced by larger ones that were usually seen in mid-town New York. The GAP and Starbucks now occupy the spaces that used to be held by the local barbershop and family owned eateries. There are parts of West Philadelphia that are now being called University City as many homes are being bought and taken over by the University of Pennsylvania. In New Orleans, I remember seeing on the news many of the residents of the Lower 9th Ward who had lost their homes from Hurricane Katrina, will no longer be able to afford the replacement homes that are being built there now.


In many cities across the nation, young white couples are now being seen walking the dog or strolling down the streets with their children, whereas before the only whites that had been seen before were those who worked for the city or came to collect the rent. And now I wonder.

I have witnessed the 30 years of benign neglect that has been allowed to occur in certain urban areas. I witness the change that has turned many of the slum dwellings of the poor into million dollar homes for the more fortunate. I have seen or heard of the many people, mainly minorities, who have lost their homes because of the subprime mortgage fiasco and I wonder.

Has all of this urban renewal and fictional wealth for the poor just been one vast scheme by the “man” as another way to take advantage of black people? I don’t know. It’s been a question that I have lived with my entire adult life and then some. But I'm afraid, just like the destruction of the Hindenburg and the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa, the existance of The Plan maybe one of those questions that will never be answered.

"Brother can you spare a dime?"

After I left the gym tonight, I was feeling hungry. What to do? Get something from a fast food restaurant or pizza place? Quick and easy? No, the best thing would have been to go to a supermarket and get what I needed so I could actually have something nutritious, possibly fresher and in the long run cheaper. So I went to the Whole Foods Market on South St. in Philadelphia and got some vegetables and something to drink. The purchase was small and was done quickly. I was in and out of the store within minutes.

As I left the store, I passed a man, taller and younger than myself, as seems to be the case more and more these days, standing outside. He was only a few yards away from the exit door and while he looked clean and well mannered, if there is such a thing, I knew that the first thing out of his would be the plead for money as I passed him.

Sure enough, even though I had my iPod on trying to shut out the world and keep what I didn't want to be seen away from me, I heard him ask, "please, can you help me out so I can get something to eat?" as I got closer.

Hah, the nerve. Asking me for money so he could buy food outside of a supermarket. Everyone knows that people in his situation want money for only two things, drugs and alchohol. I wasn't going to fall for that line, so I just shook my head and walked on my way. "Happy Thanksgiving," he said as I left him behind.

"Mother fucking bitch," I thought. He was trying to make me feel guilty for having what I had and he didn't. That was another line that I wasn't going down for. You have to wake up pretty damn early in the morning to think of something that would make me feel bad, or guilty over something that I had no control over. I walked away fuming, but solid in my commitment not to fall into his trap.

However, as I reached the corner and I began to hope that the few dollars that I had in my wallet would be enough for me to get a pack of cigarettes at the Korean store on 10th St. I know, cigarettes, a dirty habit, I've heard it all before, but if you're not sleeping with me, lay off. Anyway, I also began to wonder what made me so holier than thou. I thought, "how can I get my drug fix and look down on him? How do I even know what he really wants to do?" I didn't and even if I did what difference would it have made?

So I turned back. I walked over to young man and handed him two dollars. He said something to me, I didn't really hear, either the iPod had become louder or the blood was rushing in my head. I'm not quite sure. But I did know leaving the area that no matter how "happy" my Thanksgiving would be, I woud not feel guilty about my new found friend this season.