#NaptownSlim on ‘Yoga’
Yeah, man. Your boy is thinking about getting off into some yoga or sumn. My mind and body stay working so much, I might need something to help me get my centrerednessosity on, y’all. I could use a stretch.
I’m all on the floor after busting some improv poses. They ain’t even know what to call em in the streets…I mean some NEW stuff. I am not scared of new thangs.
Oh…that’s Jett. He actually chilled with me once he saw I wasn’t tryna steal his Nylabone. That’s all you, pup. I’m good. Slim got barbecue!
AW…so yeah, this ain’t no yoga. We just coolin. I laid my locks out and had a vision for the children though. God is good, dig this.
You get them trolls you stick on the top of writing utensils, right? But put The ‘Kid’s head on there. PIYOW!!
All the kids wanna take their standardized test with them ‘Number Two Naptown Slim-cils’.
I’m tryna help, y’all. I see some of these kids out here with some horrible penmanship. Texting, man. Kids are out here writing with their thumbs and their pen game shows it. Slim go longhand, kid.
Aight, man. I’m tryna get centered. They might be calling me ‘Maharishi Slim’ in these Naptown streets soon enough.
Just think about them Slim-cils though.
Another funky, cold blooded Naptown Slim production…for the kids.
#RustyWrites
‘A Mother’s Love’
I saw my Mama have a seizure for the first time when I was 5. It was during Christmas. She just tilted over and started shaking. I can still hear my Grandfather’s voice yelling that something was WRONG.
When I was 6 or 7, my Mama had a massive seizure. She entered a coma. Bad times, really bad times. We didn’t know if she was gonna make it. If she did, we didn’t know if she was gonna walk or talk again. We had come back here from Gary, IN after my parents split a coupla years before…so I was still adjusting. My family really stepped it up.
I never saw my Mama with all the tubes in her body and ventilators and stuff. My family knew it would be a bit much. I wasn’t sheltered, per se, but they knew it was not something I needed to see. Everything was in the air, in terms of her living or dying.
I was sent to Detroit to stay with my Auntie Fannie while some of this stuff was happening. I think my famliy was really trying to figure everything out and getting me away from it all for a while was a great move. Auntie took excellent care of me; I can remember going to a t-shirt shop and getting a shirt with an iron-on of a Corvette on it with my name in iron-on letters on the back. (My first lesson in ‘branding’! hahaha!). We went to Belle Isle too, first time I rode one of those big yellow giant slides.
Maybe two weeks later, we got a call. My Mama was awake.
They sent me home to see her. We went to the hospital and they sat us in the chapel. My family let me know that she wasn’t quite the same, she couldn’t talk or walk yet, but we had hope and that I was a part of that ‘hope’. They wanted me to be strong. I was strong.
When they wheeled my Mama in, it was obvious that she wasn’t the same. Well, shit, they wheeled her in, didn’t they?
Me and this lady used to draw together, she was the assistant coach on my softball team, we would make tapes of us singing, she sang to me, we read books, she got me to school on time, she made sure I knew what love and respect were, even from a very early age…and they were wheeling her in.
“Mama…”
She looked at me…and she just started crying. She reached out to me. Her hands moved slowly, as if they were heavy, but she reached out to me. I went to the wheelchair and I hugged her. I hugged her so tight. I didn’t wanna let her go. I told her I loved loved loved loved her. She didn’t hafta say a word. She couldn’t. I understood that. She said it all before she went into that coma. I knew.
She woke up for me.
My family knew.
She will walk again and talk again for me.
My family knew.
After the initial visit, I wanted to see her every day, but I had to understand that there was sooo much work to do. We were so far from outta the woods, man. There were years of rehab ahead, years of speech therapy, years of work to do to get back to some assemblance of ‘normalcy’. She still may not be what you remembered, but the core of that person is there. The soul of that person is there. I couldn’t lose sight of that as a child and I never have as an adult.
There is nothing as genuine as a mother’s love. She loved you when you were simply a thought simply because of who you are and will love you through whatever you become. The least you can do is do the same for her.
My Mother was at the Gates of Heaven and went through Hell to come back…for me.
There’s nothing in the world that will ever compare to that kinda love. Happy Mother’s Day, everybody. Cherish that woman.
Respect and Grace,
WoW.
Lemme say this; People are gonna be entertained by sex and violence and that’s that, but some kids are so desensitized to violence that they don’t even think it’s real until they maim or kill someone. 9 year-olds are looking at things on the internet that weren’t even in my imagination at that age.
They have FOOTAGE of it, man. Lord.
Also, mental health issues are obviously going unchecked in this case. Kids don’t just stab people unless they’ve BEEN having REAL issues. You gotta talk to em, man. You gotta KNOW what they’re up to, how they’re feeling, what motivates and hurts them. This kid needed help before this, no one can tell me different…and now, one kid’s life is ended way too early and another’s is ruined and scarred forever.
Talk to your children. Make sure you know the difference between ‘teen-ager crazy’ and ‘having issues with mental health’. There’s a big difference and it could mean life or death.
RR
#RustyWrites #TooSoon?
Oh yeah…y’all got jokes. OK.
I really hope you didn’t see that pic and that #TooSoon hashtag and expect me to be over here cracking tasteless jokes about someone in the midst of a health crisis. If you did, you obviously don’t know me, my writing, or my music very well…you can leave now if that’s what you expected.
Look, we are a nation of cynics and info addicts that are being given ammo for our snark at an alarming rate. There’s just some stuff I will not fire at, for any reason. I am not a Rick Ross fan, I own none of his albums, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have compassion and empathy for someone dealing with a health crisis…and I’m surely not gonna snipe at someone when they’re down.
EVERY time some celebrity deals with a health issue or dies and the TMZ tweets start getting retweeted, inevitably, some clown desperate for attention and retweets will tweet some tasteless, unfunny, cruel joke. Then the backlash comes from the decent people on Twitter or whatever forum they’re on, where they’re always outnumbered (unless they’re on ‘SenselessUnfeelingAssholes.org. I never checked that site’s stats. I have no interest.) Then, to cap it off, they’ll often employ the hashtag ‘#TooSoon’, stealing a standby from the most hackneyed of stand-up comedians. I expect this kinda behavior from 7th and 8th Graders who are too young to have any idea as to how to value their health and lives, not from grown people. Y’all should know better.
If you don’t have the respect for someone to STFU while they’re having CPR performed on them, you are truly a sad, miserable person. You don’t hafta give a damn about whoever it is we’re talking about to the extent where you stop what you’re doing and pray for them, but damb, is it that difficult NOT to be an ASSHOLE…especially if you know you’re being one and you know how the vast majority of people will react to your tasteless antics?
For some people, it is. And for those people, I offer another version of ‘The Rusty Challenge’…
Let me know that you find the misfortunes of others funny. When you do this, know that I will follow/friend you back, add your name to the #TooSoon list, and I will wait for you to get into a real space about something that affects you. Then that’s when the tasteless jokes will come from ME. I wanna see how great that sense of humor you possess holds up when we’re talking about an ailment someone in your circle of family and friends has. Oh yeah, I have a HUGE vocabulary and a WICKED sense of humor. I’ll be HAPPY to return some of that #TooSoon humor to some of those ‘comedians’.
No one will take that challenge…and to be honest, I’m glad because I would hate to have to lose friends to prove a point, but believe me, I will do it to break your spirit of that #TooSoon affliction that is making you the heartless, insensitive, callous asshole that you are, whoever you are. And if you have a problem with what I say to you, I’ll remind you of your ‘jokes’.
I get it, man. We all laugh at the ‘wrong’ stuff from time-to-time, but you clowns and your #TooSoon punchlines need to eat shit. I won’t wish death on you, but eat that turd and get all the fuck away from me.
#TooSoon…? Naw, I shoulda written this two years ago.
That’s all there is to that.
Be Human(e),
#iSick #RustyWrites
I hate being sick. HATE it.
I started coughing badly immediately after my shift at WTLC last night. I came home and by about midnight, it was over, baby. I was coughing nonstop, a dry raw hack of a cough that produced nothing. Throat sore as a mug too. The congestion came today.
Muhbabay got me all kinds of stuff to feel better. Airborne, chicken soup, sore throat spray, cough drops. I woulda fell out without this stuff.
I swear, when I woke up this morning, I felt AWFUL. I have the kinda cold that wakes you up before the alarm clock goes off. I tried to get out and act like it was just another regular ol’ day; ran to the store to get a gallon of orange juice for myself, stopped to get some coffee, thought wiser of it and got tea.
Man, you gotta watch yourself during these #Naptown ‘Indian Summers’. I always overdress anyway, figgerin it’s easier to peel layers than not have enough gear on to keep you warm. I guess I got caught out there tho. *cough*
This sucks. I’ll be aight tho…
Take your vitamins, y’all, and keep a thug Dunny close to watch your back.
