Stories Are About People and Community, Not Awards–I’ll accept nonetheless

I started this blog with starry eyes and hopes to tell gripping stories. I got tired of piling them up , wasting space in notebooks and filling up zip drives. I had to get them out. If I ever hoped of being a ground-breaking writer/poet/speaker/journalist, I would need to lose my reservations about showing my work. I needed to learn to share. My mom came up with the idea, “Maybe you should blog Christopher,” she burst out during our nightly bonding over The Rachel Maddow Show, “You know she (Rachel Maddow) blogs, and so does Ezra Klien (I think Ezra Klien is brilliant).” I toggled with the idea for a month and even signed up for WordPress, but I didn’t post anything. My blog sat empty for another month until, I got the brass to at least say hello. The rest from there, is history as they say. I’ve been blessed to meet a wonderful community of writers. I can tell you reading your posts, about whatever, have inspired me in my craft. I appreciate the likes and comments. Every single one I get makes me smile. Writing is so solitary and so personal, to know your thoughts touch someone else is truly gratifying. This entire experience has been exactly that. Case in point: The nomination for an award.

A week or so ago, C.K Hope, a brilliantly funny writer, was kind enough to nominate me for The Versatile Blogger Award. C.K, if you are reading, I can’t express in words how much this means to me. I thank you again and again. To everyone else reading, please, make sure you check out her blog (Ok, Who Ate The Daisies…), you’ll be glad you did. I don’t write to win awards or recognition, but I can’t deny it feels good. Knowing there is an audience out there listening (reading, whatever) has been a driving force for my hunger to get better. I hope you continue to see my growth. I hope I can continue to draw inspiration from the world around me and give to you what you have already given to me. You all had a part in this–no man is an island. Thank you.

With that, I must fulfill the rest of my duties in accepting this award. The first being naming 7 facts about me.

1. I will projectile vomit if you feed me green beans. That’s not a threat, it’s a guarantee
2. I was one of the best wide receivers to ever attend my school
3. I’m a city kid, but I LOVE nature.
4. I HATE reality TV (Except nature shows and documentaries)
5. I didn’t know I could write until 19, didn’t get serious til this year (I’m a baby)
6. As well as I can write, I’m a terrible speller
7. My mother is the strongest person I know, Sister is the most focused, and Dad is the smartest. My nephew imagines like me.

And now, drum roll please, my list of nominations for The Versatile Blogger Award (in no particular order). Great work guys.

1. justjabari
2. flyingbubbles
3. good2begone
4. Patrick Latter
5. Jmro98

 

Rusty Spoons and Broken Bottles (PT 4)

Previously…

She paused, seemingly frozen by the pictures of life she’d forgotten out of necessity. As she blew the dust off and looked at who she once was, her demeanor bore signs of frailty. Her leg shook uncontrollably and her lips puckered with sour thoughts. But this was a weathered woman, who was simply worn, not weak. True to form she pushed on.  “I wanted to save her,” she repeated. “I swear I did. I looked around at my neighborhood—I wanted to save it. I wasn’t no different from you. I wanted to save the world, ‘cept I wanted to be Oprah.”

“Oprah huh? In what sense?”

“Money,” she belted. “Ha, naw but I wanted to be in media, I wanted to be able to influence the way shit was—shit, the way shit is in these neighborhoods—a lot like you. Chris, what if I told you, like yo smart ass, I wanted to be a writer.”

“Ha-ha, get the hell outta here,” was all I could come up with. Nobody, at least no one I knew, started life dreaming of being a writer. Heck, I wanted to be a basketball player, played all the way through college. Writing had only become the main focus, because my six-inch growth spurt was still held up in a prepubescent traffic jam, and  student loan companies apparently wanted their money back at a point. I wrote for a living. Ms. Upshaw spoke of writing for life. I had to hear more.

PT 4

“Well damn nigga, She jerked back, “I’m not smart enough to be a world-changing author huh?”

Behind her smile and sarcastic question, I knew she was appalled. My heart uncomfortably sunk and into my stomach, because I also knew, that wasn’t a secret she shared freely. “Trust ladies and gentlemen, it’s imperative,” Professor Reed used to overstate. “If you ever hope to get an interviewee to open up and tell you, the world for that matter, things they haven’t even said to their family—they better well trust you.” If he could hear how I was disastrously blowing this interview he’d say “I told ya so.” The previous week he’d warned about the difficulty in interviewing someone so close, so deep. I didn’t listen. And for my first article at the Chicago Tribune, I choose to tackle the toughest of tasks. The stakes were high for both me and her. I couldn’t fail either of us.

“No-no,” I sat up apologetically, “I wasn’t laughing at that—it’s just…”

“No little girl dreams of being a ground-breaking journalist?” She grinned. “I know. I have lived a lil’ life nigga, sheeesh.”

“Tell me more. How did writing spark your interest?”

“Ha-ha, how did it spark yours? I looked around—I told you that. I was sitting on my stoop in 1982, I was thirteen, a little city girl from Altgeld Gardens—didn’t know nothin’ but that the gator was home, white people was police, and that was where I belonged, ‘least that’s what momma told me.”

She cracked her neck and popped each finger as if she was preparing for a piano solo. The symphonic calamity that for her was life, would soon get more accessible stings to be strummed. But her eyes weren’t concerned with publicity. They were back in her childhood. They were back in 1982.

“You believed what momma said—it was a different time back then—you didn’t question, you just believed. And I did, shit ain’t know no better, but that day I learned. I was sittin’ on the stoop and Leroy, my momma’s ‘man’ at the time, come runnin’ ’round the corner with two niggas chasin’ behind him. Now, I actually liked Leroy; he used to buy me shit when momma wouldn’t. For a kid, you know that make him alright,” she smiled halfway, but her eyes remained distant. The longer she starred the more the smile faded from her, the more the memory sucked her into painful reminiscence. I could see in her face what nudged her towards creative expression was as ugly as the disheartening look she bore. I could’ve never guessed, though, the depth of grotesqueness.

“They caught him—caught him right in front of the stoop—snatched him up by the back of hes shirt. He looked dead at me when they did, like he was begging me to go inside. I couldn’t—I was froze.” She looked down and put her hand over her mouth for a moment.

“Humph—he was as good as dead, I knew it—I knew it and I couldn’t do shit about it, but watch. I watched them hit him with that crowbar, they kept yellin’, ‘Where is it! Where’s the money!’ Leroy ain’t answer, just kept beggin’ me with his eyes to go inside, and I couldn’t..” A single attempted to run off her face but she wiped it away. “POW! POW! Them shots startled me, his brain halfway across the sidewalk scared me, but that fuckin’ man still haunts my dreams. He seen me standin’ there, scared shitless, and he kneels down next to whats left of Leroy’s face, opens his mouth and cuts his tongue out. He never took is god dam eyes of me. He walks over and sets it on the step in front of me, looks at me, and squeezes my cheeks. He says, ‘you open ya mouth, that will be you,’ and jerks my head towards Leroy.” She paused, “I still see his eyes today, feel his disgusting hands rub down my leg, said, ‘you a cute lil bitch, you get a lil’ older—i might make you mine,’ flips my dress up and walks away. I can never forget that moment, and dammit I’ve tried. No one did nothin’—it was more than me that saw—not momma, Mrs. Percy, nobody. They all told me forget about it. How you forget some shit like that! Just ain’t seem right—i felt alone, have ever since. Thought maybe if I wrote, I could give description to that shit, save a lil’ girl from it down the road. Turned out writing was my only friend, my lonely confidante.”

Her eyes welled up as she looked at me. It seemed the dam that’d hid her emotions my whole life was suddenly crumbling under the weight of her past. I understood the power of memory, but never seen it in effect like that. I knew as a journalist, I would, but never imagined that my first experience would be iron-casted Ms. Upshaw. She held herself and looked at me appearing comforted by her rolling tears and my quiet listening. For a few minutes, neither of us spoke.

 

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Lost Flower

She prefers the taste of tears over rain, and she falls at night like drops do
To her, tranquility’s too plain, and calamity’s all the rage
I’ve wondered if she thinks of change
does she have the time to stop to?
Her taste for tears, that love of pain, keeps her in wrongful arms

When the rain falls, she watches from the window
When the pain summons, she runs to it
Those lonely nights and tasteful tears
Mad at men–she says they blew it.
Does she know the rain might cleanse her soul? And tasteless can be pure?
Her trials and those love drunk tears
The rain will cure, if you walk through it

She prefers loveless games, over freeing rain
She says, I’ll never know the half
That might be true, but what I do, could free her soul from bondage
The taste of rain and the feel of pain are all each of us know
Those bitter tears, swallowed over years won’t allow her mind to grow

The rain will.

 

The Ills

The ills of the world–they cause much chagrin

And gin-sipping old men call them out

shaking their index finger at the world

But still it spins

Still we sit, set in place

As troubled mothers, brothers and friends

Fighting ills by

Chasing money

And welcoming sin

The Segram’s bottle breaks against the pavement at the same time my pen

it touches paper, and spills what I’ve held within

The ills of this world–please, tell me where I begin?

Breathe

Take a deep breath Chris

They say it’s better when you count to ten.

 

One life that boy was given

Two times before he’d seen that man’s face

Three days before, he’d walked past that place

Four times his mother had warned him

“Your saving grace, you silly boy, it isn’t found in these streets.”

“Check what you chase, or you’ll end up waste, or a trophy for police.”

Five sons heard that speech.

Six shots rang through the gallows that night

Seven witnesses found cold feet.

Eight times that man screamed, “DIE,” in a rage

Nine years ago, he was that boy’s age

Ten years in prison force change.

 

Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Dont you find it strange

that the ills remain in all of us

Attached to the names, we were given, insane

to think that the young boy whose life, it now wanes

in a hospital bed, is connected to his shooter

what they’ve seen is all the same

It’s all too much

It’s all on my brain

The ills of this world–I wonder if they’ll ever change.

 

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Writing For Release

writing for release

fighting in the heat

of the hard nights of my life’s winter

praying for wins

feeling beat

my passion gives way to persistence

I won’t retreat

I won’t lay down

I take no seats,

so here I barely stand

but its on my own two feet

Fighting time, and writing lines

For release

 

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Motherly Overtones

Ole girl talkin’ on her cell, frontin’ like she do well

her baby cryin’

her baby daddy sits in his cell

she’s 19, young and dumb

so her thoughts are propelled

by the sate of mind, of a woman in her prime

living in hell.

You couple that, with the fact

she’s a dropout as well

and you got a recipe for disaster

savor the smell.

 

She doesn’t get it

But look how—her clothes are all designer

And her little man’s a whiner

But that’s ’cause he couldn’t find her—

‘Cause last night, she was showing off the booty that’s behind her

to a nigga at a diner

He said his name was Tony and he wasn’t ’bout the drama

only making money, claimed to be a headliner

It musta turned her on

She told him where to find her,

So while her son was crying,

“MAMA!”

she was giving him vagina.

 

It’s a cold world.

 

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Rusty Spoons and Broken Bottles (PT 3)

She blew out smoke and nodded, “I think it was just me and him. I told him, ‘baby go play, it’s OK to go out and play again now,’ and he smiled at me—he was so excited—I couldn’t even get a jacket on him before he dashed out the door. Fearless, right? But, I watched him through the window—watched him run to the middle of the courtyard—and stop. He ain’t move, just looked around. I watched him for thirty minutes—crying the whole time—Chris, he just looked around, watched the other kids play without him.” She shook her head and I could see that more than beer churned in her gut. “You wanna know about my childhood? It’s all there,” She smacked the table, “It’s all in that moment. You know what it feel like to know  it’s good in the world, but have some bullshit happen, and be too scared to try again to reach for it? I do—I felt it for a lifetime.” She cupped her face in her hands and her now fast flowing tears tributaried into a pool of regret.

I began to stand up, but she waved me off before I could comfort her. “My daddy was a john,” She looked up, “Yea, you guessed it, momma was hooker, God damn I used to swear my kids wouldn’t go through the same shit.” She gulped down a swig of beer and the lump in her throat all at once, “This world gets to you—I’m proud you haven’t let it yet.”

I leaned back in my chair, blown away by the widened scope of reality she’d just dropped on me. She lit up another cigarette and looked anywhere but into my eyes, holding herself for comfort.

PT. 3

“You talk about knowing—shit I knew. I was six when I knew. Momma would come in with them men, and Chris—god dammit, I knew what was goin’ on. She lied to herself mo’ than she did me, and shit, I guess I did that with my boys too. I understand.” She guarded her emotion with that veil of smoke once more, but I could see in her eyes, not all of her was there with me. “I understand momma. Ha, never thought I’d say that shit.”

“You find more empathy with your mother, rather than with your kids?”

“You think I ain’t care?”

“I’m just asking you a question, it’s just…”

“Yea, Yea, part of the interview process, I know—I know. The question was condescending though—you think cause I’m a junkie I can’t pick up on that, but I do.”  She pushed the ash tray and half empty bottle of MGD toward me and leaned back, “Imma do this without a crutch,” She said. Her eyes told me it was true. “I’ve been in denial—still comin’ out of it—I told myself that my boys couldn’t see my struggles, other days I ain’t care if they did or not. Them drugs hold on to you, and you hold on to them—ain’t no room fo’ nothin’ else. I don’t expect to win momma of the year.”

“What do you expect? If your kids could take one thing away from knowing you, what would you want it to be?”

Her eyes glanced at the beer, but she had to know it was too late. She was probably wishing she’d never made that statement about crutches and addiction. In that moment it probably felt too hard. She probably realized each question I would ask of her would require her to deal with what she ran from. She’d been running from some things for a lifetime. I wouldn’t let her run anymore.

I met her eyes as they reluctantly left the beer, and reassured her with mine she was doing the right thing. “We as parents are examples,” She burst out. Her eyes wandered as she leaned back in her chair collecting her life into coherent conversation. I could tell her distant smile held memories.  “I was about to have Rome—I was 19 and I was about to have Rome. I’d gotten clean enough to actually do that,” she laughed. “ I was at this rehab center for expecting mothers, and that was their preaching point—we as parents are always examples—good examples or bad examples, but examples nonetheless. They used to always say, you choose what type of example you want to be.” She sat up, “I guess I’ve made that choice huh?”

“That’s a loaded question”

“The truth fires bullets some days Chris. It’s my turn to stand in the rain.”

That might have been true, but my ammunition needed to be saved for directed questions not rehashing’s of the past. It didn’t matter what I felt she deserved—that wasn’t why I was there. I was there to shed light on her story—it was so common and so sparingly told—I was there to make the invisible seen.

“I wanna start over, Ms. Upshaw. Whatever is between me and you can be discussed outside the context of the interview—I don’t want to bring our relationship into your story. I want this to be about you. OK?

“OK”

“Alright, I wanna go to one of the first things you said, you asked if I wanted you to say you envisioned the life you lead today. I’m guessing that you didn’t.”

“Ha-ha, is that what they taught you in college? You a god damn genius boy. How did you ever figure I ain’t wanna be a drugged up deadbeat mother?”

She reached for the beer. I stopped her.  “What did you envision then? Before the world stole your innocence, what did you dream? Where did you think you’d be today?”

“Not here, that’s for damn sure,” she folded her arms, but not before motioning me to take her beer and cigarettes of the table completely. I complied and she proceeded. “We not that much different,” she smiled. “I know you think that’s a crock of shit, but it’s true. When I was little, I used to just watch my mother—like I said, I knew—I used to hear her crying in her room at night, askin’ God for a miracle. I wanted to save her.”

She paused, seemingly frozen by the pictures of life she’d forgotten out of necessity. As she blew the dust off and looked at who she once was, her demeanor bore signs of frailty. Her leg shook uncontrollably and her lips puckered with sour thoughts. But this was a weathered woman, who was simply worn, not weak. True to form she pushed on.  “I wanted to save her,” she repeated. “I swear I did. I looked around at my neighborhood—I wanted to save it. I wasn’t no different from you. I wanted to save the world, ‘cept I wanted to be Oprah.”

“Oprah huh? In what sense?”

“Money,” she belted. “Ha, naw but I wanted to be in media, I wanted to be able to influence the way shit was—shit, the way shit is in these neighborhoods—a lot like you. Chris, what if I told you, like yo smart ass, I wanted to be a writer.”

 “Ha-ha, get the hell outta here,” was all I could come up with. Nobody, at least no one I knew, started life dreaming of being a writer. Heck, I wanted to be a basketball player, played all the way through college. Writing had only become the main focus, because my six-inch growth spurt was still held up in a prepubescent traffic jam, and  student loan companies apparently wanted their money back at a point. I wrote for a living. Ms. Upshaw spoke of writing for life. I had to hear more.

 

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Whispers from Our Essence

Patience is pertinent to progress

Its needed like wind, and the rain

The divides that chasm between us

Prohibit fellowship’s gains

 

Again, we come to the table

And look to the peace we see near

We are able,

But the chasm whispers discord

And comforts our hearts to adhere

 

Revere the wind and the rain

Because they, like patience and change

Steer the world through forever

And urge us toward fellowship’s gains

 

Stand with me, we are brothers

My heart, it sings the same song

Our time here is finite in nature, you see

Progress can only wait, for so long

 

The divides that we’ve put, between me and you

The ones that feel like forever

The chasms that whisper unraveling notes

Threaten progress, but never the weather

 

Patience is pertinent, so before me and you

Succumb to the wind and the rain

And are given back to this world that made us

Let’s have the patience, to fellowship change

 

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Rusty Spoons and Broken Bottles (PT 2)

Previously…

“I’m so proud of you boy—look at ya—you took this shit and made somethin’ out of it. You took my son, got him off the street, waited for me to get clean, and came back to tell my story. I want the world to listen.”

“And they will M—”

“But I don’t want them to know.” She put out her cigarette and looked at me like never before. “I don’t want you to know—it’s a lot of shit,” she paused, “It’s a lot of shit that I ain’t never said, that imma say to you—a lot of lonely tears. I always tried to be strong”

“You are strong,” I reached across the table and cupped her hand in mine, “the strongest I know—that’s why I’m here. What you’ve been through, I couldn’t handle, most couldn’t handle—let the world see that strength.”

A single tear fell as she nodded. It was the first I’d ever seen fall from her eyes. “OK—what we gotta do,” she sniffled, “Where do we begin?”

“Begin where you begin, tell me about your childhood.”

PT 2 

Before she could start, she got up and walked toward the fridge. There was a slight gimp in her step that’d been there as long as I could remember. I’d never heard her complain about it though; no “Lord, I’m getting old,” or, “My body isn’t what it used to be,” type statements. I couldn’t help but think—she was numb to all the pain. She pulled out two MGDs and cracked one open. “You want one?” her eyebrows raised. It was 11:16 am. I’d glanced at my watch in anticipation of this question when she’d gotten up.

“I’m ok.”

“You sure? I ain’t gon’ ask twice.”

“Yea, I’m fine,” I smiled.

She shrugged her shoulders and gimped back over with both bottles of self-prescribed numbing medication. I knew from experience, she’d make quick work of them.

There’d always been a catalyst, an agent of escape that put a haze between her and the harshness of her reality. It broke my heart to see her sit down with those beers, but I was glad it wasn’t the needle. I was glad she wasn’t rolling up a blunt or breaking out a plate to snort angel dust off. I knew from childhood, beers were a victory.

“How long you been clean?”

She swallowed her first gulp, “since y’all left that day. It really put shit in perspective, you know? I mean, shit, I didn’t even know when my own son got out of jail—what if y’all ain’t go get him? He sure as hell couldn’t depend on me. I was too high to feel anything then; it was when y’all left, that night I cried myself to sleep—don’t write that down.”

“This is off the record.”

“Chris, I know what you thinkin’, one beer is gon’ turn into 5 and then ten, shit I still struggle with that.”

“With what?”

“I feel like,” She took a swig and shook her head at the bottle as if she was disappointed she couldn’t put it down, “I feel like I traded drugs fo’ liquor. I feel like—I still need the escape.” She took another swig, “I don’t expect you to understand that.”

“There’s no judgments here. I might not understand your addiction—you know what, you’re right, I don’t. I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you can’t set your ills aside to make sure at least your sons don’t go thru the same things. You got issues—I understand that—it’s why I’m here, to talk you and myself through them, but you know my whole life I’ve just never understood.”

“You resent me for it?”

“Honestly, I do, not as much as I once did, but Ms. Upshaw, we’ve been through this before. You get ‘clean’ for what seems like moments and every time you fall back it’s worse than it ever was before. You’re like a mom to me; you know how hard that is to watch?”

“I kept it away from y’all as much as I could…”

“You kept what?” My temperature rose as I did with the blasphemy of that statement, “Do you really believe that? Do your really believe that we never saw you in that stupor, with the needle in your arm? That we never wondered where you were when you disappeared for days? That we couldn’t hear what was going on when you needed a fix? You sure had a lot of male ‘friends’ over the years.”

Silence. Our eyes locked and my body froze with astonishment. My mouth hung open as if it was pleading with her ears to give my words back. When she rose to her feet, I was sure the chances of me telling her story had dissipated like smoke, her trust swallowed up like beer by the vivid remembrances of my good friend’s trials with her. I bore his burden because it’d become too heavy for him; since he moved in with me that day, the two hadn’t spoken.

Her eyes welled up, and surprisingly, she sat back down. “You remember when Nu-Nu broke his arm?” She lit up another cigarette as the tears rolled.

“Yea, I do,” I sat back down.

She chuckled as she blew the smoke out, “The boy didn’t even make a sound—y’all thought he was fearless.” She smiled at the memory. “I did too, but what you probably don’t remember, is when he got his cast off.”

“Naw, I don’t even think I was around for that.”

She blew out smoke and nodded, “I think it was just me and him. I told him, ‘baby go play, it ok to go out and play again now,’ and he smiled at me—he was so excited—I couldn’t even get a jacket on him before he dashed out the door. Fearless, right? But, I watched him through the window—watched him run to the middle of the courtyard—and stop. He ain’t move, just looked around. I watched him for thirty minutes—crying the whole time—Chris, he just looked around, watched the other kids play without him.” She shook her head and I could see that more than beer churned in her gut. “You wanna know about my childhood? It’s all there,” She smacked the table, “It’s all in that moment. You know what it feel like to know  it’s good in the world, but have some bullshit happen, and be too scared to try again to reach for it? I do—I felt it for a lifetime.” She cupped her face in her hands and her now fast flowing tears tributaried into a pool of regret.

I began to stand up, but she waved me off before I could comfort her. “My daddy was a john,” She looked up, “Yea, you guessed it, momma was hooker, God damn I used to swear my kids wouldn’t go through the same shit.” She gulped down a swig of beer and the lump in her throat, “This world gets to you—I’m proud you haven’t let it yet.”

I leaned back in my chair, blown away by the widened scope of reality she’d just dropped on me. She lit up another cigarette and looked anywhere but into my eyes, holding herself for comfort.

© Chris Hampton 2012

 

Rusty Spoons and Broken Bottles: Irene’s Song (PT 1)

This is the first part of a new piece of short fiction I am working on. Depending on how it turns out, I may submit it to the various MFA programs I will apply to in the coming months. That being said, I know that while the act of writing is very solitary, community is what fosters great revisions. Give this and the coming “chapters” a read and PLEASE let me know what you think. As always thank you for stopping by.  

Rusty Spoons and Broken Bottles PT 1

She sat back in her chair and took a long pull from her cigarette, “Humph—what do you want me to say? That I envisioned living this life? That I failed my sons?” She ground the cherry off and before smoke could rise from the embers smeared across the ash tray, she pulled out another and lit it.

“Life’s tough,” She choked out. As the smoke thinly veiled her stone expression, I attempted to look through her. I hoped to take the pain she buried so well and write it down for the world to understand. She understood why I was there, but I wasn’t sure how she felt about it.

“I want you to tell me your story Ms. Upshaw. I don’t have an agenda, I just want the world to get a sense of who you are.”

“Ha, who I am? Shiid, the world don’t care nothing about who I am,” another pull from her cigarette, “A poor single mother, with four kids—two of them locked up. Chris, I’m what the world calls—a statistic.”

Her worn eyes intently followed my pencil as I jotted down notes, “So, you would say that you don’t have a voice?”

She leaned back and drug her fingers down the sides of her cheeks. “Naw nigga, I got a voice, just ain’t heard, hell. Like I said, don’t no one care about my story, shit they don’t care about nobody story around here—you from here, you know how they treat us.”

“How is that?”

“Aw com on nigga, don’t act like just cause you graduated college them boys wont stop and frisk you like anyone else. Only person that might have a pass is Jaylan—and he’s in the NFL, hell.”She took another long pull and smiled, bearing her one gold tooth. “Don’t act like you don’t know. You lived it just like me.”

I was supposed to command the interview much better, but she was right. I had seen the things that poverty does to people, and was fortunate enough to get out. Most didn’t. Most, like Ms. Upshaw, the mother of my troubled friend Rome, spent there lives in this hell, trapped by lack of opportunity and society’s demonetizations of who they were. Transition didn’t seem an option, so instead they adapted to their elements. I hoped to capture that adaptation by delving as deep into Ms. Upshaw’s life as she’d let me. When was the switch? When did becoming something other than a person of the neighborhood become too far-fetched? Did she snowball down a slippery slope, or hit a wall? I’d known her all my life. Now, though, I needed to understand her.

“I’ve known you a long time,” my voice cracked, “I’ve lived in this neighborhood my entire life—my momma still lives here—you two go to church together every Sunday. I know the facts that can be seen from the outside, I know what its like. But what I don’t know, Ms. Upshaw, is what you, or my mother, pray for when you walk in that church. I don’t know if you still dream when you lay down at night. I have no idea what its like to live and work in this place, we both know, drains anything it can out of you day after day—for a lifetime. I can’t fathom how you cope.”

I picked up the egg-shaped pepper shaker and spun it in my hands as I had so many times before. Years ago, I ‘d spent a Saturday cleaning every inch of the laminate floor and wiping down the dingy plastic tablecloth after a shaker fight with Rome. He was salt. I was pepper. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but Ms. Upshaw didn’t subscribe to the idea that “boys will be boys.” I could still remember the look on her face. It microcosmed life—that moment—it reminded me that my sharp sense of the world was born out of the untimely death of my naivety, the shortness of my childhood innocence. My neighborhood peers had the same happen to their adolescence. I imagined Ms. Upshaw was no different.

“You don’t learn, do you boy?” She coughed out. “You remember that? I came home 14 hours mo’ tired and mo’ fed up and you muthafuckas had salt and shit everywhere.” She laughed. “I was hot.”

“Ha-ha, I know.”

“Yea, I know you know nigga, I tore y’all lil’ asses up.”

“Then when I got home, my momma whooped me too.”

We shared in a laugh. It reminded me how far I’d come, and made my being their more urgently sentimental. The smoke hung thick like the weight of the interview, and for the first time Ms. Upshaw leaned forward. She took another pull, but this time blew the smoke out behind her. Her expression was sobering and I knew the bags under her eyes hid stories. She appeared ready to tell them.

“I’m so proud of you boy—look at ya—you took this shit and made somethin’ out of it. You took my son, got him off the street, waited for me to get clean, and came back to tell my story. I want the world to listen.”

“And they will M—”

“But I don’t want them to know.” She put out her cigarette and looked at me like never before. “I don’t want you to know—it’s a lot of shit,” she paused, “Its a lot of shit that I ain’t never said, that imma say to you—a lot of lonely tears. I always tried to be strong”

“You are strong,” I reached across the table and cupped her hand in mine, “the strongest I know—that’s why I’m here. What you’ve been through, I couldn’t handle, most couldn’t handle—let the world see that strength.”

A single tear fell as she nodded. It was the first I’d ever seen fall from her eyes. “OK—what we gotta do,” she sniffed, “Where do we begin?”

“Begin where you begin, tell me about your childhood.”

© Chris Hampton 2012