Tag: Life and Mind of an Only Child

Jrnl Entry No. 10.3.2003

So I’ve decided to put my own album out. This industry is a trip. No one is willing to help you out to let you in and that is the bottom line. I would say that getting into this shit is like hitting the lottery for a small jackpot, and once you spend that up you are ass out cause most niggaz just get a little money and then go broke in the game. I got good product, so I think, so I’m gonna get a few MCs that I know and get them to record my songs. I’ve been listening to this shit for 17 years, dreaming about getting into it for 15 years, and actually trying to make my dreams come true for five years.

For the five years that I’ve been trying to make my dreams come true, I have seen none to very little results. I got a call back from Black Rob about a beat tape I gave him like when I first got to New York, right around the same time he was coming down off of his “WHOA”, one hit wonder, high. He called me and left a message. I called him back left a message. I called him back and left another message. I approached him on the street about our calls to each other, and I haven’t heard from him since or called him. I’m not calling nobody else who claims to be in the music industry. I’ma put out my own shit and try to promote steady and hard, THE ONLY CHILD! I’ma see if I can get some niggaz to call me. I feel like I know what it takes to make a good album, or I should know from listening to all the albums I have at home, so I’m gonna give my knowledge a go. If my knowledge doesn’t show me any results, then maybe I’ll quit.

I’ve tried everything: handing out beat tapes to rappers with deals (Talib Kweli, Raekwon, Black Rob, Lord Have Mercy, Rampage, Rah Digga, Graig Mack, DJ Clue, Skane, The Hood Fellaz.) I’ve tried to go out and meet people to talk to them to see who and what they know and if they could connect me to anyone. I’ve tried not handing out my beat CDs unless we have a face to face second meeting. I’ve given my stuff to people who work for Bad Boy (Damon Eden, Hen-Roc). I’ve given my stuff to people who work at Violator (Andre Neal). I’ve tried hanging out with so-called rappers who know a lot of people and who get into any club or big party in New York for free (Metaphor, Combination). I’ve tried making a connection with a guy from the town I went to college in, Youngstown, guy by the name of Rufus who had an album out under Chad Elliot and Al West; album called, “Credentials” He works at Ark Angel studio with a guy by the name of Prince Charles Alexander who is a mixer/engineer in the industry and has mixed for Mary J Blige, Faith Evans, Angie Stone, etc. Rufus writes R&B songs. He wrote”Jumpin Jumpin” for Destiny’s Child. He wrote a song for Angie Stone on her second album. He never put me on to anyone in the business. SoI’m through with all that shit.

I am __ years old and I have been dreaming about getting into the music industry since I was __ years of age and that many years is a long time to be dreaming. I’m gonna try to give it one last hard go and if that doesn’t work, I’m quittin’! I will hang up the towel and just face the fact that I wasn’t meant to be the next Dr. Dre or Pharrell of the Neptunes, or Pete Rock, or DJ Premier, or Timbaland, or just any no name album filler producer. I will let the dream die with the thought that, “I gave it a serious try.” Trying is worth something after all, right? I think it is because if you never try you will never know if you could have made it or not. It seems as if I can’t make it, so hey.

It also seems I can’t make it with relationships also. My two relationships with women who had three kids were great it seemed, as if they could last forever. My relationship with a 24 year old with one kid, a good job, sexy, stylish, etc., it is falling apart also. We recently moved in together and I notice that she doesn’t pay attention to me and that she rarely wants to have sex. She often ignores little words or things I say to her. I can say “BOO!”. Instead of her saying, “was that suppose to scare me?” she’ll say nothing, look at me like I’m stupid and go on about her way. I can’t be in a relationship like that. I’m not too worried about it because I still look good, bitches still give me eyes. But what if I didn’t look good, we __ or older and I still find myself not being able to get along with a bitch? I would have to deal with it, but that really wouldn’t be a good situation to be in. I don’t know where my life is headed right now and where I’ll land because it seems that at the rate this relationship is goin, it’s not gonna have a happy ending. But I guess in the end, all will work out how it was meant to be. Right now I’m meant to be in New York, broke, no job, not many friends, no where to go exciting, not too interested in fucking with all these sexy bitches in this city for fear of catching aids because condoms ain’t my thang.

Maybe it’s meant for me to put this album out and the shit blows up. The way I want to do is promote like a big label album with big posters and flyers. I want to promote in Chicago, LA, Detroit, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Buffulo New York, and possibly Canada. Maybe that is my fate. I can remember when I was little around the house in Warren in the Highland Terrace Projects with my two aunts buying and listening to 45s. I think the music got into me from way back then. I guess looking at my life just in general, you never know what is affecting you and how it is affecting you until years down the road and look back on it.

Like now at age __, I’m starting to think that fucking at the age of 13 and having a girlfriend at 14 – 16 and having lots and lots of sex, having a girlfriend at age 17-18 and having lots and lots of sex, having two girlfriends at age 20 – 24 and having double lots and lots of sex, having a girlfriend from age 24 – 26 and having lots and lots of sex. All that sex at such an early age has left my sex drive at this point kinda low I think. My dick doesn’t get as hard as it used to. I’m not excited about it as I used to be. I see all kind of bitches in New York City that I could try to and probably make it fucking around with them, but I don’t have the desire. For the first time in my life being single or having a girlfriend, I turned down some pussy from an 18 year old at that. I didn’t turn down Carmel when she met me at a gas station on Wednesday and I was over her house on Friday night fucking her. She was white and fat. She wasn’t thick. She was fat. I didn’t turn her down though. And it turned out that on her back she would fuck you to death, wiggle that ass around so much, you’d think she was having a seizure. She wouldn’t let me fuck her any other way but missionary. But that was some good missionary pussy. I turned down an 18 year old who I was two days away from fucking if I had hung in there. Many guys don’t start fucking until age 16, 17 and even then they still don’t have as much sex as I did from age 14 to 16 until either they move out of their parents home, in with a girlfriend, or until they are married. Now, I’m feeling the effect of that. But thank god they have created Viagra, a get your dick hard and stay hard pill. I’m not ready for Viagra yet though. Hopefully, if I keep exercising, and keep my blood circulation up, I won’t ever need it. At age __, I started a little exercise program. I started with just running just one lap around a ¼ mile track and stopping for breath and rest. At age __, I’m up to a whole mile straight and I guess the ¼ mile and whole miles will just keep growing and growing.

I have a job interview on Monday with this company of god knows when I sent them my resume. I came to the library to look them up on the internet but the internet is down. I need a job badly right now. My girlfriend Watrina has been nice so far but she won’t be always, especially with my attitude and her attitude clashing against each others. I don’t know what the problem is. We are two beautiful people who should be able to see that we can have a bright future together and we should be trying to preserve that future in advance, but it seems as if we are not. Maybe she doesn’t think that I am beautiful, or maybe she is trying to tear me down or break me down from thinking so highly of myself. Maybe she knows that I have labeled her as my only girl with all the right credentials so she feels she can do what she wants to do and treat me like she wants whether I like it or now. Well she can’t and she will find that out soon enough as Victoria did.

I think Victoria thought that since I had her baby that I was obligated to stay with her, or that I had a new job and was afraid of child support. She tried ignoring me and not giving me sex and you see where she is at. I just don’t respond to that threat of no sex well, and I probably never will. Watrina says I only pay attention to her when I want sex. And so it has been since we moved in together that half the time I have made an advance for it she has turned me down. She turned me down the morning before she was to go on a trip out of town for her job where this guy she thought was gay, whom she eventually ending up liking and going to dinner with him, was gonna be. She got home from her trip and diddn’t have very much to say to me. She got up this morning and didn’t say anything to me. It’s heading toward where we are just gonna be living together and not talking, just sleeping in the same bed or she will sleep with her daughter until I leave. I will try not to leave but I don’t think my ego will allow me to stay with a bitch who seems to be ignoring me. So I’ll see what happens with my relationship.

I’ll see what happens with this album thing. I’m see what happens with life and my future because right now it doesn’t seem to be bright in no aspect. If I didn’t have my daughter, and things were this bad, I’d probably kill myself. But then again, my daughter is a reason why things are this bad so maybe without her they wouldn’t be so bad. And just in case something should happen to her and this is getting read in court: I don’t want my daughter to go away. I love her very much. Sure, things would probably be better if she went away but I wouldn’t have a part in her going away. I don’t wish her away. I’m just looking at the reality of what I think the situation would be if she wasn’t here. I think people would be lying to themselves if they didn’t think about the best and worse case scenarios of their lives with and without their present situations. Like what if you weren’t married to that fat bitch who was so fine and beautiful in her 20s but as soon as the 30s hit and the second kid came along, her ass went south. Now you don’t look at her the way you used to. You are only there because you are used to her, probably too old and fat yourself to get another finer bitch, and you don’t have the power and money to survive child support, alimony and the demands of a hotter sweeter, and maybe younger bitch. And of course, yeah, you love her too. THINK ABOUT IT!

Jrnl Entry No. 6.29.2003

Well, my daughter left New York this morning. We, (her mom andI) were to have a six week summer visitation plan, just as the standard, long distance, visitation agreement says. Janelle, says she doesn’t want to stay that long because when she gets bored, expecially at night, she starts missing her mother. For the most part, she’s fine when she’s here, no problems. But since Victoria wants to be a good mother who listens to her child and plus, she probably has a hard time being away from Janelle we agreed upon 3 wks in June, 3 Wks in August. So it is that, and since, if we would follow the way we’ve been doing things, that would require me to make 4 trips back and forth from New York to Ohio to pick Janelle and my mother up and drop them off; now, when my car was new and I was excited about taking trips in it and driving back and forth from New York to Ohio, thinking I was doing something, mobile, not stuck in Ohio with no life or half a life at best; back, three years ago, taking all those trips was fine. But, New York is my home now. I been here four years, and I hate taking trips to Ohio, and plus my car has 120,000 miles on it.

The plan was Janelle stay three weeks, Victoria come and pick her and my mom up in New York and take them back to Ohio. Just so happens Victoria fucked me out of a week and I only got to spend to two weeks with Janelle. On her pick up mission, Victoria wanted me to meet her an hour outside of New York in Pennsylvania.For one, she picked up Janelle in New York before in Jamaica Queens, so why this time, she ask me to drive an hour out of my way? For two, the hour drive was not a part of the original deal. For three, she’s been dicking me on visitation from the beginning; the first year of Janelle’s life until I went to court; when I first moved to New York until I went to court again; and in 2002, I only seen Janelle a total spreadout, one month the whole year. So fuck her; she has to follow my direction, which she was scared shitless to do, and meet me in New York City to pick up Janelle. Since she was mad, she didn’t take my mom back to Ohio.

I had my FINALl fight with Watrina. We’ve been dating for two years now and every since the beginning, because initially she wasn’t serious and had friends calling her cell phone all the time; over the past two years, she has called her self being serious and has gotten rid of a few friends. But one guy in particular, Thurston, calls her often and tells her about his life and she tells about hers I suppose. This same guy, in our first six months of dating, invited her to Vegas to initiate his killer advance attack to fuck her. She went; she claims she didn’t fuck him; he tried rubbing on her, but she made him sleep on the floor. That could be true, but it could also be true that she fucked him. I rule out neither possiboility. She claims they’ve been friends since she met him on a trip to visit her sister in Kansas City when she was twenty. But this guy, even though she says she told him she don’t feel him that way, he’s just persistent in his effort to maintain a friendship in hopes of fucking her one day; she knows it and I know it, but she still allows this friendship to exist even though, I, the guy she says she’s made a commitment to be with in life, doesn’t agree with the friendship and wants it to end. Thurston called her yesterday while we were at her cousin’s baby 1st birthday party together. He calls most of the time when we are together like when we were at disney world he called. So I ask her, ‘what do I gotta do to get Thurston out of my life?” She says, “stop answering my phone and listening to my messages.” She was making it clear that she is gonna talk to this guy no matter what I think, want and feel about it. I started to ask her what I got to do to get Thurston out of her life, but I rest my case and stood silent for the rest of the day to contemplate can I be with this young lady who is suppose to be serious and trying to build a future with me, but who blatently is disrespecting my feelings on this other male friend issue.

She asked me did I want to see her later that night and I said, “no”. She asked was I gonna see her ever again and I said, “I don’t know.” We rode silent for a moment again and then she ask, “can I make a phone call.” I didn’t say anything. She picks up her cell phone and calls Thurston to talk about his day. I tried to keep my cool. About three minutes into the conversation, I grab her cell phone and throw it out my car window. After her pointing hard on the side of my head and asking why I did that and saying I was gonna buy her a new phone, we were five minutes away from her house and she tries to get her daughter and get out the car. Now, I wasn’t gonna let her do that so she’s fighting to get out the door, and I’m fighting to keep her in. I almost got into one accident. It’s surprising how close you can be to a car and actually swerve and miss it. So we fighting the whole five minutes home. Finally, when we get in front of her door, and I think its over, she grabs my keys. My car was in neutral and I hadn’t put the break on yet. I hopped out the car on the passenger side to go after her and get my keys and the car went rolling down the hill and scrapped the side of a jeep grand cherokee. I have to not pay rent and pay $1,200 to fix that car. I’m already $3,000 behind on my rent. I might be on my way to eviction.

So now I got no girl, no job, no money, soon to probably not have an apartment. Is this what I get for not believing in god? But I’m calm through all of this. I guess  I’ll see how this turns out. I plan on not talking to Watrina anymore. I plan on taking Victoria to court to get our visitation finalized. I had a good interview with the YMCA and they’ll pay $50,000 which is $10,000 more than I was making. I still got my good looks, my good dick and tongue game which keeps any woman coming back like “The Magic Stick”.

My music is not going anywhere, and now is one of those times when I’m losing faith in it, but my music strength and faith will get back up in time. My life to me is better than some, but yet still fucked up to my in my eyes.

Jrnl Entry No. 9.25.2003

So today is my daughter Janelle’s birthday. She is – years old. I called her early this morning just to say Happy Birthday really, not to talk like I usually do. Yeah, I remember when she was born. I thought I had life all figured out. I had a nice job working at Circle K Corporation, my first job out of college which it took me six months to find. I was making $25,000 a year, living with my mother, saving money, shopping a little, etc. I think I saved 5,000.00 in a year. Janelle’s mother went for child support and they awarded her $389.00 a month. She walked out of the court room happy like she’d just hit the lotto, maybe in an effort to try and piss me off. But I didn’t care cause even minus that amount, I was still bringing home more than I’d ever made before. I was still saving. With the decision to become a Hip Hop producer, I bought an ARS 10 Sampling Keyboard for $2,000.00 and starting making Hip Hop songs.

A little after that, my 1986 Oldsmobile Ninety Eight broke completely down and I had to buy a new car. I bought a brand new Chevy Malibu. After the car purchase, with payments and insurance, my pocket was low. At that point, I decided to really work on my move to New York City. I was two years in at Circle K; they had just given me a lateral promotion (meaning more responsibility with no talk of more money). Just as the change was about to take effect, I’d found me a job at this company in Brooklyn called The Italian Job, a mob spin-off legal business. I was making $34,500.00 which was only enough for my needs and bill responsibility; no money left to shop, go out, nothing. After about a year of that shit, I stopped paying my car insurance for a little extra cash, which ended up being dissolved by this new credit card I transferred to for a lower interest rate in exchange for higher minimum payments; $100.00 more a month. That’s what I get for not reading the fine print.

I really was starting to hate my job also, so much so that I stopped working because it seemed as if I was not doing anything important or learning anything. I got fired a week before the Sept 11, 2001 terrorist attack. After that, it took me six months to find another job. There were plenty of jobs out there it seemed; I went on 22 interviews before I finally got hired somewhere, which was at an advertising agency. It was a cool job, no dress code, open-bar on Fridays after work and friendly people for the most part.

I really learned my job after the guy who hired me left and this Italian lady came on board. She didn’t know what she doing so I had to learn the job with her. One thing I understood better than she was the EAS Accounting Software they had. After she and I came to an understanding of all the changes she wanted as far as my work went, she challenged every piece of work I did. When I met her challenges and began answering her questions before she asked them, she made up some bullshit to tack on to the official warning I received concerning my underperformance, according to her standard, and I was fired. I had her all figured out. Told myself, “Just do your duties, ignore her attempts to get on your nerves, and everything will be alright.” Everything was not alright. Now, I’m going on another six months of being unemployed but this time around, there aren’t many jobs out there. The economy is getting weaker by the week. I’ve only been on about five interviews.

I moved to New York to work as an accountant and to try to get work as a Hip Hop producer, neither, especially the Hip Hop production, are working out for me. If I wasn’t living with my girlfriend, I’d be on my way to being homeless right now. She thinks I eat too much salt and butter, and at age –, I’m on my way to a heart attack. I say to her, “what I got to live for?’ She says, “life is a precious gift.” She says that shit because just like me; at age –, she’s making $56,000 on her job; she’s able to take care of her daughter; she shops and buys expensive clothing; she’s doing, so it seems, better than her friends; she just moved from one room in the projects to a two bedroom apartment with nice wooden floors; and she just recently purchased equipment to start making clothing in pursuit of her dream to open a children’s clothing line store called Queen by Queen. She’s young and ambitious just like I was with the world ahead of her with her dreams.

Me, I’m starting to come to reality that my Hip Hop dreams may never materialize. I’m –; I have not a dime in the bank; my credit has gone bad; I ain’t got a job. So yes, what this life is presenting me right now is shit. What the world is presenting Watrina is sugar right now and probably for the future also. So she, in essence, would be saying some shit like, “life is such a precious gift.” Everybody says that shit when they are on their feet. I wanna hear a homeless New Yorker, on the street, in the cold of winter, say that shit. When I hear them say it, on the street, on a cold Christmas night, then maybe I’ll start singing the same song. But hearing that shit from people like Mary J Blige: who has millions of dollars, and has sold millions of records, and is so spiritually fulfilled now that she has a real man, not afraid of her success, who is gonna marry her; my response is, “shut the fuck up witt that bullshit.” Mary J wasn’t singing that same shit when was drinking, smoking, sniffing, and being in a relationship every other year with any male R&B singer who said hello to her. Lauryn Hill wants to accept grammy awards, preaching, “the money don’t matter, God matters.” This after the group she was in sold 13 million records of one album worldwide, making all three members millionaires. After that, three years later her solo album sold about 10 million worldwide, to make her more of a millionaire. When you’re a millionaire, the money don’t matter. When you have a good job making decent money, a beautiful intelligent daughter, and a nice apartment outside the New York City Housing Authority Projects, life is precious. My response to that shit is …….!

Jrnl Entry No. 9.15.2003

So I’ve been living with Watrina for about two weeks now. My observation is that; while we like/love each other, we don’t need each other; we don’t appreciate each other. She wants a helpless, needy nigga like her father; whereas, if she’s not home to cook, her mother is not home to cook, her aunt is not home to cook, HE WON’T EAT! Me, I make dinner for myself if she’s not here and for her and Queen to eat when they get home. She wants a man like her father who won’t or can’t: wash dishes, wash his laundry, iron his clothes, make a bed just as she would. I guess she wants a lazy video game playin nigga who may work a job, but his job and helping with the bills is all she wants him to do, and I’d put a “maybe” on the help with the bills part.

She’s probably only letting me stay here right now because I don’t have a job. And if that is the type of nigga she want, I definitely am not him. Maybe that is why she keeps Slauson, her friend’s brother, in the wing. Maybe he’s that type of helpless nigga who’d love to be served hand and foot. I mean I appreciate that she works, cooks and cleans; a few of the reasons I’ve deemed her high quality material. I’d like someone to appreciate that I can do the same on the help out.

I guess she wants to raise her daughter in that good ole Jamaican tradition that your man, husband, or whomever is not supposed to lift a finger unless it’s to fix things with a wrench or screw driver. Well, she got the wrong nigga for that lesson to be practiced on.

Besides that issue, she pays more attention to the dishes and wooden floors around here than she does me. By time she gets finished with putting her daughter to bed and wiping the dishes and wooden floors, she’s too tired to give me any attention. I’m tired of begging for sex and always the one to make the first move. At – years old, that shit is for the birds. Like tonight, after I’d made dinner, Queen was in her room, and Watrina was washing dishes. I was watching t.v. and figured I’d go and pay her a little attention. I go to make small talk and she really doesn’t have too much to say. So I just stood there watching her.

She figured I was going to say something about the preposterous way in which she washed dishes. But one thing you learn when dealing with someone else is that they are gonna do things different. She soaps up the dish towel and washes every dish separately, wetting the dish towel after washing each dish to stir up the soapy reaction; meanwhile, also diluting the soap on the towel and therefore having to add more dish washing liquid to the towel. This method of washing dishes often leaves the odor on the dishes as I discovered from her using it on my dishes at my apartment. And also since the dish being washed is not submerged under soapy warm water, in addition to the odor, food and grease spots get missed a little.

Another example of doing things different is on a sunny Saturday morning while enough sunlight shines through the windows for clear vision, she turns on the artificial white electric (which we have to pay for) light to cook, eat and clean. All you can do is try to impress upon and explain your way to the other person, if they don’t understand it or won’t understand it and insist on their way, so it will go, and no big deal.

I didn’t say nothing about her and the dishes. I just hugged her from the back, rubbed her breast and kissed her neck thinking about making love to her later. She says, “get off me”, which kind of spoiled my love making thoughts for the night but not entirely. I went and sat down and began watching a DVD I had gotten from the Queens “Ravenwood” library because it had Makhi Phifer and Lieutenant Dan’s (from the Forrest Gump movie) face on the cover. Watrina then came and asked me a question about placing garbage out back since we don’t have a trash can out front. She asked me, “so, is the garbage out back getting wet since it rained?” I was a little irritated from her telling me to get off of her in the kitchen, and also by the question because you already know the garbage is outside; you already know that it is raining, so yes, you know the garbage is getting wet. You are just asking that question to fuck with me.

So she puts on her clothes and takes the garbage down the street somewhere. When she came home from work at 9 P.M. she didn’t use the key to get in the house, instead she rang the doorbell. This time she also went outside without her key and rang the doorbell. I let her ring it a few minutes before I opened the door. What the fuck am I, her personal doorman? We both have a key, use it. Don’t kick me out of my comfort zone because you don’t feel like reaching in your bag for your keys or you have trouble opening the locks. After that incident, she went into her room, closed the doors, and I knew I could forget about sex.

My guess is that we are not adjusting well to this, move in together, thing. I think it’s all just a matter of getting to know and dealing with each other’s ways. Do you think the other person is worth it to deal with their way of living. I think she’s worth it. But you gotta wonder if me, with no job, no money in the bank, bad credit, and a pipe dream of becoming a Hip Hop Producer; at her age of –, am I worth it to her? At – I had Elizabeth, probably considered one of the tightest girls in town. She was – living with her mom, a good job, no money in the bank, and no potential to move to New York as far as I saw, so I had to get rid of her.

Watrina is talking about quitting her job, maybe moving to Paris in a few years. There probably is no maybe, she’s probably as serious with her plans as I was about moving from a little small town in Ohio to small (but packed with millions of people) New York City. Maybe she’s just passing time with me like I was passing time with women in Warren. I would mention them coming to New York, knowing full well they wouldn’t leave their employment, family and comfort zones. Just like Watrina mentions Paris and me coming, knowing that more than likely I will not. It’s Karma! Well, as long as I know it’s Karma coming behind to bite me in the ass, I guess the pain won’t be as great as if I was ignorant to the situation. Know in your mind about the worst so the worst won’t kill you if it comes to pass. LIVE BY THIS!

Jrnl Entry No. 3.31.2003

Over the weekend, I was supposed to spend it with my girlfriend but what has been happening in the last month or so is that our weekend plans have been getting botched up into arguments and us not spending the time together. See about a month before that I went on an escapade. I wasn’t feeling Watrina at the time because it always seems as if I’m the one giving her all of the attention. I love her very much and would spend most if not all my time with her if I could. I’m always trying to be around her following her like a puppy dog, and she doesn’t mind so I guess you could say that is a good thing. She could tell me to buzz off so she could do her own thing with her friends, male or female, sexual, non-sexual, whatever. But she never complains about me being there. But on the other hand she never invites me there neither. I invite myself: go to her job and meet her and then maybe we’ll go out to eat; to spend the Saturday with her and her daughter if she is not gone with her father; to spend time or the night at my house, I always ask her for these things. She never does it on her own which makes me feel like she is not that concerned at all with spending quality time with me; she can take it or leave it, it doesn’t matter. So I said, “Fuck Watrina”! I’m not asking her shit: to spend time with her, to see her, to call her.

I was kicking it with my new buddy Metaphor “Simile” “MS” Kipperton, this rapper I met on the New York Music scene who I gave some beats to and because this girl from Youngstown Ohio where I went to college at, managed him before, paid for some of his studio time; through her, he connected with me. He is well known on the scene so he gets in all of the spots for free and most of the time, would get me in for free also, so it was all cool.   We were goin’ out on Saturday night to ”CREAM”, Sunday nights to “CLUB NV” or “TIKI ROOM”, Monday nights to “LOTUS”, Tuesday nights to SESSA”. I was actually having fun, living, which ever since I got here to New York, I haven’t been living because I’ve been too broke, paying bills, or not knowing where to go in the first place.

At this point, I had stopped paying my car note, I didn’t pay half my rent for one month because my electricity was out and my landlord didn’t seem as if he was making a strong effort to get the lights back on through electrical work that he had to have done. I also stopped paying my credit card bill which was draining me of $200 a month. So I had a little money to spend. I bought me a Mitchell and Ness throw-back basketball jersey for $325.00 to have the look of the male music industry scene in at least one outfit.

I wasn’t paying Watrina too much attention. And she didn’t seem to be making a big fuss out of it until like three weeks in, after I didn’t go to her nieces birthday party that she thought I planned on attending to meet most of her whole family and plus she had a magic show by a guy that I hooked up with and my other friend Zero was there. I didn’t go. After that weekend, she started really trying to see me but I was still like no, because every time we see each other, I have to wait around for her to do something else. I wasn’t waiting anymore. If she wanted to see me, no waiting till 10 P.M. or 12 A.M. is what I was on.

After that tirade, we got back on schedule a little, except for that the two weekends after that, we planned on spending Saturday night together, but we never did. One night she claimed she went to the Bronx to party with her friends in a hole in a wall bar and didn’t have cab fare back to Queens. The next weekend, which was actually the Friday and Saturday before this day that I’m writing this; Friday she claimed she wanted to see her daughter before she would send her off the next day to her father for a day and half. So at 10 P.M. she went home and told me to call her in an hour. I went home and shaped my hair up because I had this party in mind we could go to of another music industry friend who was promoting the party and the tickets were $20.00. I called her at 11 P.M. and she was not ready, saying that her daughter wasn’t home when she got there so she didn’t want to leave yet. And she knows that at these parties and clubs in New York, that if you don’t get on line by 12 A.M., chances are you won’t get in till 2 A.M. or later and the parties are over at 4 A.M.

So this was another case where she would have me waiting around on her when she told me she would be ready. I told her to forget it I was going by myself because I knew she was not ready. She said she thought the night was about me and her not the party? Well it was until she mentioned that we could go out, and I got all excited about going out with her looking sexy and being there for this dude because he knows a few people in the music industry and he likes some of my beats and he may manage me as a producer. I never told her that is why I really wanted to go to the party. What I was gonna do was go and get the tickets and come back and pick her up but after I bitched at her about not being ready when she told me she would, which seems like a ritual with her, she said she was out of the mood. So I went alone.

I got there at 12:30 A.M. The guy didn’t arrive with the ticket until 1:30 A.M. and then he was trying to get rid of 8 tickets outside so we didn’t go into the party until 2:30 A.M., and it was cold out there and I didn’t have on a jacket so I was kind of glad she didn’t come. The party was crowded, especially in V.I.P. where we were standing. I really wasn’t feeling it. I just went to see who in the music industry I could meet, which I met no one. It’s kind of hard to meet people in the V.I.P. section flossing with bottles of champagne; at least that is what I think, so I didn’t talk to anyone.  

The most I said to someone was to this lady goin’ in and out of the bathroom with this guy. I said to her, “you better stay outta the bathroom with that gentleman.” She laughed at me and told me, “nothing happened in there; I know him.” As if I cared if she knew him or not, like I was gonna spread rumors around the neighborhood the next day.

I stayed till the party ended. I didn’t try to talk to any women because I wasn’t there for that. Talking to women is a job, and when I got my baby Watrina at home who seems, at times, to really care about me, and other times not, I don’t need to work to talk to other bitches, especially if they ain’t that cute and classy to begin with; which there wasn’t one woman who really caught my eye for me to say anything to.

I got home at 5 A.M. I wakes up at 8 A.M. to wash my clothes and my car, and take a shower to take Watrina’s daughter Queen to dance class at Alvin Alley. I was gonna wait for dance class to be over, and Queen’s father was getting her from there, and I was gonna spend the whole day and night with Watrina. When I went to pick her up, she claims she was ready but she took 10 minutes to get down stairs, which also seems like a ritual when it comes to me and she knows I hate that. I called her 8:30 A.M. and she said she would be ready at 9:45 A.M. But when the time came I was still washing my clothes and my car so I told her I’d be there at 10 A.M. I left my house at like 10:07 A.M. get to her house at 10:11 A.M. and she didn’t get downstairs till like 10:20 A.M. I thought she left and got a cab, which would have made me more heated because at times, she isn’t ready for her daughter’s 10:30 A.M. dance class and we don’t leave until 10:40 A.M., but she couldn’t wait on me? But she did wait on me and when she finally came to the door, I says in a comical way, “I was just getting ready to be like forget you, and leave.” She didn’t smile or nothing, just looked at me like I was stupid and got in the car. She continued to have this stupid look on her face as if she had an attitude with me but wasn’t gonna discuss it with me. So I say to her, “I don’t like your attitude.” I didn’t drive off either, so she says, “what, you want me to get out and take a cab?” I didn’t say nothing but again, “I don’t like your attitude.” She got out the car and took her daughter to take a cab, and I left.

I was ready for a joyous day with her and she gets into my car with a gas face. I just drove off and went home and went to sleep. Around 1 P.M. I woke up and got dressed, went and got my coat out the cleaners, and put my suit, which Watrina made for me, into the cleaners. I drove back home and was gonna go upstairs but I just sat in the car because I really didn’t want to do that. After 5 minutes or so of sitting there thinking where I could go, it hit me to go to Barnes and Nobles on 66th street in Manhattan and read Russel Simmon’s book “LIFE and DEF”. So I drove to the train station, put on my jacket and took the train there. I got the book and sat down and started reading it. I sat there for like two hours steady reading. It was an interesting read because I am a Hip Hop Head who loves Russel Simmons.

After about two hours, I purchased the book and went over to Tower Records to buy Norah Jones’ “Come Away With Me” and 50 Cent’s “Get Rich or Die tryin’” albums. I already heard the 50 album because it was Hip Hop. But Norah Jones won like 10 Grammys for this album and she and 50 had been battling for the number one Billboard top 200 chart spot ever since the Grammys were televised. I knew of Norah Jones’ hit single and I liked it, hoped the whole album would sound like that. I saw the price was $12.77 and 50 was $13.99 so I bought both of them. I really didn’t want to buy 50 since I already had a good bootleg CD copy at home. But I figured, if I’m gonna buy Norah and support her and I don’t even know what this album is, what type of music it is or nothing; I better get 50, the hottest Hip Hop album out of a New York MC since Biggie Smalls “Ready To Die.”

After I left the record store, I went to Houston’s maybe hoping to see Watrina there since she said she wanted to go there; maybe catch her with a date or something because the last like 5 weekends had not been spent with me, and the night before she was acting very suspicious about her phone and me using it and maybe checking her voicemail messages. I got to Houston’s and didn’t see Watrina. I ordered dinner, during with the appetizer I started reading Russel’s book some more, and then after dinner, waiting on them to take my plate and bring my check, I read some more. I left the restaurant and went home and put the Norah Jones album in and started to read some more.

It was like 10 P.M. The Norah Jones album was light blues, and the whole album was like that single, “Don’t Know Why.” The music was light and her light voice over the light melodies and drums was a very relaxing listen. I didn’t hear the words, just the music and her voice. I’ve listened to the album like 8 times and I still don’t know half of what she is saying on none of the songs. But I could see why America is going crazy over that album. First, it’s the music and her voice. Second, if you listen closely to the lyrics, it’s blues-like and I heard a few of the lyrics and I understand why people are crazy for it. I know music of all genres, trust me, and she deserves every one of those Grammys she got.

So at this point around 10:45 P.M., I called Watrina for the third time of the day to smooth things over to see if she would come to my house for the night. She didn’t answer her cell phone. I figured because she was mad at me and also she was going out by herself, with girlfriends or a male. She didn’t call me back neither.

After realizing that I’d read over half of Russel’s book, I put it down, shut my ringer off my phone and went to bed because I was tired from only getting like 4 hours of sleep that whole night and day before. The Russel book told the story I already knew about starting Def Jam, RUN DMC, PHAT FARM, DEF COMEDY JAM, ending the distribution deal with Sony, signing with Polygram, Lyor Cohen, Russel’s model dating. What I didn’t know was that he took drugs like he did. He gave a few business pointers, life pointers, race pointers, etc.

I got up the next day and put the Norah Jones album on again and cleaned up my apartment. I still had my phone ringer off because I was mad that Watrina hadn’t spent the night with me. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. Eventually around 1 P.M. I turned my ringer on and went about my daily business. I went back to sleep, I got up and got dressed, did some push-ups and sit-ups. I started to cook some steak and potatoes and green beans for myself. I also started to read the Russel book some more.

Now this whole day I was contemplating just breaking up with Watrina because it’s been three years and we have been going through this shit the whole time. It’s really getting tired and old, and I just want to stop the relationship because it seems like all we do, every other weekend is be mad about something. Finally after finishing the book, finishing eating, I decided to call Watrina to talk to her and smooth over this rough edge of a weekend we had. All day I had been thinking about not calling her at all but I broke down.

See what I mean, I’m always the one, making all the effort to call, to spend time together, etc. I called her and asked her, “what are you thinking about me right now?” She had nothing to say. I was looking for her to say, that either she loved and missed me or she wants to break up. She said nothing. So we started going into the weekend issue and she had a little sass and chutzpah in her voice and speech. Let me tell you, “if a bitch is being hard with you and edgy, and unsympathetic, it says that she is tired of the situation or that she is tired of the situation and on top of that, she is fucking someone else.”  

Watrina hasn’t spent really good quality time with me in a month and the last two weekends, she has disappeared on me. At the end of the conversation, because she didn’t say that she wanted to break up, I said, “forget it, drop it. I want to see you.” She said she had to braid her daughter’s hair and she would call me back and didn’t know if she would see me or not. An hour and a half later, after she was in the bed half sleep, she called me. She tells me that she is not coming over because she should have been over last night; like that was all my fault. I called her three times during the day and she never answered her phone and didn’t call me later that night. So I bid her a good night and hung up the phone on her ear slightly. I tried to call her back 10 minutes later to tell her I was trying to smooth things over and she was playing games of you-did, who-did. I called her like 7 times and she didn’t pick up the phone, playing games, but of course she is gonna tell me that she was sound asleep in 10 minutes after getting off the phone with me knowing that I was angry at her for not wanting to come over. So I left her a message that, “this relationship is over! What is wrong with trying to smooth things over by spending some time together and forgetting about Friday and Saturday, and you fucked that up on Sunday. Fuck You! I’m going out to find me another bitch to fuck since you don’t want to come over.”

I went to the TIKI ROOM and chilled; met Metphor and Zero there. I was pollyin’ about music, not concerned about bitches. I met this guy who I’d been looking at for a month now who looks like he is in the music industry. Turns out he is down with DJ CLUE and Dessert Storm and works in the Sony building down the block from where I work. I met this female “Combination” whom I’d seen around at Justin’s Restaurant on Tuesday Industry Nights, and other places like two years prior, and Metaphor said she was a rapper. I met this other guy whose face I always recognize. He managed Uncle Sam, a fallen-off R&B Singer, and a few other groups or singers who have all fallen off. I left around 2:45 A.M. drunk off Hennessy and Grand Marnier.

My mind was still made up that I’d broken up with Watrina. I called her when I woke up at 7:30 A.M. to tell her that I’m bringing her leather she bought to make me a leather suit, and her mother’s plate. She tells me to bring it later. I told her I was bringing it now. She asked, “is it that serious?” I said “Yeah, it’s that serious!” She obviously hadn’t gotten my message. When I got to her house I asked had she gotten it. She said yes, not to argue in front of her father. I told her to her face, “this relationship is over, it’s no good.” She nodded her head, handed me the stuff she’d bought for my daughter from the GAP and I left. It was over in my mind. When I got to work, she called at 10 A.M. telling me that she is coming over my house tonight, so I’m just gonna have to let her in because she is gonna be there. I told her, “don’t come and I’m not saying it’s alright because I’m not gonna do like you, always say something and then don’t do it or be late doing it.” She hung up because she was entering the train station. She called me later saying, “we shouldn’t break up. We have a nice family, and we get along together.” All of which is true, even the part about us not breaking up. I love what we have, truly, but it seems that she doesn’t love it as much as I do, or maybe I don’t love as much as I say I do because we keep having these bullshit arguments, I’m tired of them and I want out! She wants to take some time apart but still be together. I don’t believe in that shit because if you need time apart, stay apart, which we can’t seem to make it together, so maybe we should be apart.

Jrnl Entry No. 1.17.2003

I’ve just decided that I am not working today. We get off at three o’clock in celebration of Martin Luther Da King Holiday. Today is my mother’s – Birthday. She just got out of the hospital for infectious blood, causing blood clots in her pelvic area hindering her ability to walk. She was just in the hospital for two months. I went to see her a month ago and ruined my Christmas vacation days but I guess you have to do those type of things you know.

My Christmas was nothing to brag about. I was invited over to my girlfriend’s house for dinner with her father and her daughter. Her mother was at work and her aunt who stays there was at another relative’s house so they filled the void with me. Any other time I’m not allowed to step foot in the apartment.

My New Years was alright. I met this girl by the name of Evette the Saturday before New Years at a party my friend threw at the Supper Club in Manhattan. She looked nice at the party in black pants and a white top. She seemed as if she was skinny. She is my age or a little older and she is a teacher. I was mad at my girlfriend at the time. She hadn’t called me in like three days. I went to Evette’s brother’s house to a little corny New Years house party. When I first saw her brother I originally thought that he was gay. I came to find out that he was far from gay, but maybe a little in the closet bi-sexual. He had two kids, a boy and a girl, and a sexy ass fiancé. His fiancé was short and light skinned, short length hair, and had a big round ole ass that I was staring at all night.

Evette was all corny looking in some corny jeans, a corny little top with her stomach out which was not toned; not really fat, but just not toned. She was a little heavier than what I originally thought at the club though. She had on some corny sneaker shoes that she may have picked up from one of those $39.99 stores on 125th St. in Harlem. We danced a little at the party and drank a little. At 3 A.M. I left. She must did not like me neither because we haven’t talked again after that night.

I crossed the Tri-Boro Bridge. I gave some white guy begging to pay the toll to take him over the bridge, a ride. I probably shouldn’t have done that. He could have killed me but I took a chance. He just wanted a ride, not to have to take a long train ride to get to the same place right across the bridge.

I went to Astoria Projects where my girlfriend lives and said she’d be over her friend’s house getting drunk for the night. I called her to find that she was at the Project Juice bar at a neighborhood party. I told her that I was coming there. I went and they tried to front and not let me in the door like it was some fancy club in Manhattan. I called her back and told her to come outside since they wouldn’t let me in. She told the guy at the door to let me in. They were charging $10.00 to get in there and I paid it; a free drink came with the $10 entrance fee. I went to the bar to try and get a Hennessy and Remy Martin drink. The guy told me that mixed drinks don’t come free with his stupid ass. He should know that Hennessy cost more than Remy Red so his overhead would have been cheaper if he would have mixed the drink than just give me straight Henny which is what I asked for after he told me that stupid shit.

The party was alright, full of all the hood rats, men and women from the neighborhood. Bonet, Watrina’s friend was there with her, and she was in the mood to dance. She was bobbing her head to the music. She had on this red outfit and was looking corny to me because it didn’t fit her body right and tight, or maybe she just doesn’t have a body like that. When we got outside later that night, I realized that the outfit was an Echo Red velour suit. She had on some blue and white Tims with it and it just didn’t go.

Watrina was in a dancing mood. We started dancing; me, her and Bonet. Watrina left me to go and dance with someone else she knew from the hood. I just chilled in the area where we were standing. I noticed every time she turned around the guy she was dancing with would purposely move his pelvis forward to put his dick on her ass. One time, he was pointing at her ass as she turned around. I didn’t trip. He was drunk, oh well. Another time she danced with another guy and he was doing the same thing when she turned around right there in front of my face. When she got done dancing with him, I told her, “please don’t put your ass on niggaz dicks in front of me.” She was like, “chill, I’m in my neighborhood.” I just repeated myself because I see these corny ass mutha fuckaz pushing their dick out every time she turned around. I didn’t mind her dancing, but the grinding shit had to go. I told her that I could go home if that is what she wanted to do. She went over and started dancing with some other guy. I saw her being a little more careful about him putting his dick on her ass. But I wasn’t really paying her any attention at that point.

I was sitting there chilling and some drunk lady came over telling me how good I looked, that I couldn’t be from around Astoria, etc. I danced with her and she wanted me to grind on her, but I don’t believe in pushing my dick on no bitch ass but the bitch I am fucking. If a bitch turn around and she puts her ass on my dick like this girl was doing, I just dance normal and do my thing. But these niggaz dancing with Watrina were like, once she turned around, running to grind on her ass. Her friend Ney, when she heard me telling Watrina to stop putting her ass on niggaz dicks in front of me, started screaming out, “don’t be the jealous boyfriend, she is going home with you tonight,”

When Watrina saw that one girl grinding on me she came over there to break that shit up. The girl was telling her that I loved her (Watrina) because I wouldn’t grind her ass and I had told her that I was there with Watrina. The night went smoothly. Watrina’s friend Temeace, whom Watrina thinks I like, showed up and we danced a little. There wasn’t but one bitch other than Watrina that I would have talked to in there that night. Some dark skinned shorty with a weave in her hair, a little fat ass, etc. I should have talked to her when Watrina left after our short argument and she went to dance with another guy, whom they were in each other’s ear for a minute.

Watrina does what she does but when I do the same shit she gets mad and bitch about it just like I do. She really doesn’t know how to handle this serious relationship which is what I think we have. But she is learning. I love her and want to work with her to make it work because I think we can have a good future together.

I had to leave her by herself in a club last week. She was acting like she didn’t want to be there with me so I went off by myself to do my thing. She was complaining from the moment she stepped out of the car; about her feet, she didn’t have any money. When we got inside she didn’t take off her coat. She moved from sitting with me because she said she wanted to get out of this lighted area where we were sitting. Maybe she didn’t want somebody, one of her friends to spot her there with me. I don’t know, but I wasn’t feeling at all that she wanted to be there with me. When I came back to meet with her because it seemed to me that she was gonna sit there all night, she was gone. I searched the club for her and didn’t find her. I went outside and called her and left a message on her machine and I went home. She didn’t call me Saturday.

Saturday night Carol Ann, whom I’ve been fucking with the whole time I’ve known Watrina; she called and I went to her house in Jersey and spent the night. I didn’t come home till the next night like 9 P.M. I then went to the TIKI ROOM, this Sunday night spot that is free to get into. I buy me a French Connection “Grand Marnier and Hennessy and I usually chill, talk to a few honey’s that I view as worthy of me stepping to them, and try to meet people in the music industry. This night I met my man Zero and we were chillin’ and talking. He bought me a second drink so I was real drunk after that. I was following this little short sexy dark skinned young lady by the name of Kim around. I probably could have gotten with her but by the end of the night I was so drunk I left and had forgotten all about her, as I did the week before, about this girl from Harlem whose number I thought I could have gotten. She was dark skinned and thick.

I’ve met a few people at the TIKI ROOM. I met Rockwilder there and talked to him about Hip Hop Production. I met Yogi of the one album group, “CRU”. He produced that whole album and I thought it was incredible. I met Pharoach Monche also. I tried to talk to him about getting a track on his album since he said he was working on it. He said it was finished though. They say they are gonna charge to get in the TIKI ROOM next week. It’s a cool spot and I like it so I’ll pay $10 to get in, definitely not $20 though.

I’ve been goin’ out every since the holidays, spending money that I don’t have. My electric is out in my apartment and I am not paying my landlord no money till he fix that shit. It’s been out for a month now. So I’ve been spending the rent money. I’m about to spend this half I got now on a trip to Atlanta for the All Star Weekend. I asked Watrina to send me but I don’t think she is. I guess she doesn’t want to feel like she is playing herself by sending me on a party trip. I told her that I would like to see my father which I would since I haven’t seen him in like 4 years. I’ma have to ask her again.

Watrina spends so much money I don’t see what is wrong with her spending a little on me. She bought me two pair of jeans for Christmas the day after Christmas from The Atrium. She took me shopping with her. She bought herself three pair of A.G. Jeans. I forget the name of the designer, but those are the initials. The jeans cost like $169 a pair. The total bill came up to like $579 and she thought that was cheap. One pair of my jeans cost $40 on sale, originally $79; the other pair cost $99, originally $139. I’ve bought some shirts to go with the jeans and a few pair of sneakers.

I hope Watrina reimburses me or this stuff or pays my rent because if she doesn’t I’m in trouble. She is trying to break up with me for leaving her at the club but I won’t let her. We’ve made love and spent a few nights together since that night. She could be just using me till she finds another guy but I doubt it and if she is, I’ll live. She told me that a guy like me in NY is hard to find, with his own apartment, car, nice job, big dick, etc. She says she know a few guys whose dick’s aren’t the size of mine on soft when they are hard. That shit just blows up my head a little.

Women always complain about finding a good man. I think I am good so I naturally think that any woman should be happy with me. I got many if not all of the qualities that they say they look for in a man. That is why when a bitch don’t do what I want her to do, I don’t talk to her for a few days to let her think about what she will lose if she don’t act right. If she gets too bad, I’ll break out. But I got to cut that shit out especially with Watrina because she is too young to be putting up with that shit and she is showing and telling me that she is not gonna put up with it. But I’d rather just walk away and not talk for a few days than have a big argument and still not talk for a few days. I’m finding out that is a bad way to handle the situation with your partner. If I ever want to keep a mate and I do want to keep Watrina, I better stop that shit.

Boy Watrina has done a number on me. She’s always thonged out. He ass, though it looks flat in some jeans that she wears, is so soft and jello-like when it is in my hands. I love when she rides my dick and her ass flaps up and down on my dick. I just bust a big ole nut and let the feel good out. I like her little cute tidies. We have a good sex life. She ain’t afraid to put the dick in her mouth neither. She licks my ass at times when she is sucking my dick. I guess she felt how good it felt when I do it to her when I lick her pussy and ass hole; she decided to return the good feeling to me. Now I got to work her up to making me cum in her mouth from sucking my dick. If we get married, I told her that I’m fucking her in her ass on our honey moon, or soon after. Now that would be the ultimate sex life without being a swing couple. I can’t let Watrina go because a good sex life; with style, money, not fat and flabby, and who is willing to take care of me, hit me off with some doe when I need it; I’d be a fool to let that go and I’ma hold on as long as I can. She probably thinks the same thing about me so maybe we will make it.

The re-po man is after my car since I haven’t paid my car payment in like 3 months. They called my apartment in Queens. At first I wondered how they got the number, but that was easy because it is a listed number. They still have no clue that it’s me who lives there though. They tried calling my mother saying they had an insurance check for me and could they send it to the Jackson St. Address. So apparently they’ve done a little research and found out where I used to live in the past and present. I don’t park my car in front of my apartment building so they may find it, they may not; if they do that will be fucked up.

It will be good to have the money in my pocket. Maybe I’ll live like a real New Yorker spending the money I would on a car payment and take cabs here and there with some of the money; rent cars to go to Ohio to pick up my daughter, etc. It will probably be a cheaper move actually than paying $342 a month for a car payment. I dropped my insurance two years ago, they are also looking for the car for that purpose. We’ll see if they find it though. If they do, it’s not worth much with 112,000 miles and it’s only 4 years old, so they won’t be able to sell it for much if they do get it back. I’ve gotten my money’s worth out of it; driven to Mississippi, to Atlanta, back and forth numerous times to Ohio and New York.

My finances are all fucked up. I consider myself a failure in life because of that fact. I’m nowhere in life right now; further than a lot of niggaz, but still nowhere to my standard of living. My apartment is raggedy, I don’t have all the clothes I want, I don’t have a dime in the bank, just debt, and that is a fucked up way to live. Watrina I my emergency money, and that shit is not always gonna be there so I better not get too used to it. I’ll get this shit together one day but until then I’m livin’ on the edge trying to get into this music industry and make money which there is no guarantee that I will make a lot of money doing that. All this make me constantly say that life is bullshit. But Oh Well.

Jrnl Entry No. 12.30.2002

So the year is over. My relationship with Watrina is about to be over. We lasted a year and eight months. I guess that is good for her being a – year old who said she didn’t want to be in a relationship anyway. I really dove in with her though. She was my girl. I took her to meet my whole family. I took her on a trip to Florida to meet my cousin/brother Romeo and his wife and kids. Nothing all that bad happened in our relationship except that she talked to a lot of guys claiming that they were friends. I don’t really think that she was fucking any of them, but I’m a realist who will never eliminate the possibility. I’ve been fucking with Carol Ann ever since I met Watrina so whatever she has done to betray me, I’ve done much worse. I was fucking Coffee for about six months of the time. I fucked Sausha a few times in Warren and she even came and stayed a week with me while Watrina was in Jamaica. I fucked three little neighborhood girls on sort of a steady basis for like three months. I fucked Haitie whom I met taking deposits to the bank for my job.

So trust, if Watrina did fuck Thurston who she went on a trip to Vegas with; if she fucked Lamont who used to call her every day; if she did fuck Catcher whom I’d catch looking at her ass on our meetings together because she was his fashion label consultant; if she’s went out with the last guy she gave her number to on the street (the 908 guy); if she fucked the guy she met at her job and told me that she thought he was gay, and the next thing I know he was on her cell phone leaving her a message; if so, I’ve did all the same, so oh well. I haven’t spoken to her in two days. She hasn’t called me and I haven’t called her. If she doesn’t call me by 12 A.M. tomorrow night, I’m calling her the next day and I will say, “this relationship is officially over.” I met this — year old teacher at the Supper Club on Saturday night. So now I have a woman who is older than I am and I will see the difference in the relationship.

I threw all of myself at Watrina and she didn’t do the same. She’s just now starting to show me that she loves me, but this not calling me is not cool. We’ve had two arguments in the last two weeks that have resulted in us not speaking. This last one I thought was cool because I left a message on her phone that it was O.K. I’d make an adjustment in my attitude and we’d move on, but she never responded. Watrina has a bright future ahead of her from what I can tell. She gonna make lots of money and be well off. With a good responsible man by her side, won’t be no stopping her. I thought that man could be me but it’s not looking like that will be the case. My prediction is that she will be pregnant within a year of us breaking up, and trying to make a relationship work with that guy. Good luck to her.

I’m a little scared by our break up but not broken down. I’m not old enough to be trying to save a bitch as if my life depended on it. I still got years left in me before I get to that point. I’ve taken Watrina back at my angriest points and settled and called her on many occasions and apologized to her for the simplest of things and taken her back when she was on my last nerve. BUT THIS IS IT! She has never apologized for nothing that she has done or made me upset about. I’M DONE!

I was out last night with my man Aderale who popped into town for the New Year I guess. He showed up here Saturday night unannounced, which is not bad. I ain’t on that shit really, but maybe he should have called because he traveled here five or six hours. What if I already had visitors or I was out of town. I guess he was just bored and wanted to do something and didn’t care if I was here or not, he just would have went somewhere else I guess. We went to the TIKI ROOM on 22nd St in Manhattan last night. I was politickin’ in there about my music pretty well I thought. I met this producer YOGI who produced one of my favorite Hip Hop albums, “CRU, Da Dirty 30”. Yogi gave me his number so I’ma try to get in the studio with him and check what he is doing and learn the business from him if he lets me. I got a few other numbers of rappers to send my beat CD to for a listen. I saw Pocahanas from Makin The Band. I didn’t know her but Aderale did. I never saw the show. I got her manager contact to get some beats to her. She raps and sings.

I’m not getting down on myself about this music shit. I have a whole new attitude about it. I wasn’t even excited about getting Yogi’s number or whoever else’s I got last night. If it happens it will happen if it is meant to be. That is how Watrina viewed our relationship and now it is about to be over. She never took it too serious I guess all that much so I’m gone. 2003, single to find a new bitch. I met this girl Julia last night from London. I like the look of her. I gave her my number because she said that she didn’t have a phone yet because she and friends moved here. I hope she calls me.

I’m going in debt by going out like I’ve been. As of now, I’m $100 in the hole. I’ll take it out of my rent money since my landlord hasn’t fixed my electrical outlets or hasn’t had them looked at by an electrician. I’m trying to get in contact with this guy who does photo shoots of nude guys for gay magazines. He says he’ll pay $250 per session that he uses you for. Maybe I can make a lot of extra money that way. I seem to have a nice body. I have heard too many times that I have a long big dick so that must be true; so maybe this, taking nude pictures for a gay magazines, will pay off if a big way. If not, I’ll probably just end up disgracing myself. But I need more money and I can’t think of any other way to make a quick $250. It is the only option I have so I’m taking it. I got to do what I have to do to survive and live how I want to live.

I haven’t talked to my daughter in two weeks. Her mom took her down south or somewhere for Christmas and didn’t bother to call and tell me. Maybe she is mad because I keep half the child support sometimes when I need it. I do that because she gets my tax return money. I mean hell, I need some relief from somewhere. Who’s gonna pay me back for when she was being unreasonable and not letting me see my daughter? She’ll eventually get all the money paid back to her somehow.

My finances are getting so fucked up. I had to pay $802.00 to get this lady’s hood fixed after Watrina tried to throw her daughter’s bike at me and missed and the bike landed on the hood of my neighbor’s car, and then she took the bike and broke out my rear car window. In all I paid out $1,300 which came from not paying my car note which is already on my credit report as being late because I don’t pay the extra $55 a month for an insurance fee after I dropped my full coverage insurance because I couldn’t afford it two years ago.

FUCK IT, is what they say, because you only live once right? That is why I fuck the way I do because it is or was my only source of entertainment. With hardly no money to go out and Watrina not being there half the time for me, it left a lot of time to fuck other bitches who wanted some.  I mean “I ain’t married right?” Isn’t that the statement to shove off the guilt of cheating on someone? SO FUCK IT! I just hope this behavior doesn’t carry over into when I do get married because that will be trouble.

I hope this music shit or something comes through for me with a nice size check in the next year or two because I sure need it. If not, I guess I’ll live like most, with fucked up credit and no money, moving from job  to job for a higher salary of thousands, of which I’ll only receive a few hundred because of taxes.

I tell you, life is bullshit. They say even with all the money problems solved, you still have problems, so when does it ever end; when you are dead? Makes you almost want to kill yourself to think about it. Fuck that, I got to have a win situation in life somewhere in the future. Everybody lives for a better future. I live for a better financial future, a better relationship future, to accomplish my music dreams in the future.

What am I living for today when I think about it? I guess I’m living to get home and relax. I’m living to get home and cook me a chicken dinner. I’m livin to get to Justin’s tonight to maybe meet more music people or meet a nice young lady. I’m living for Watrina to call me and ask what is wrong and how can she fix it. I’m living for the next time, which may be tonight, to talk to my daughter on the telephone. That is about all I can think of. But living for those things, am I happy?

I guess they all will make me happy, but I don’t feel they will make me as happy as being in the studio with Yogi recording a Black Rob song for Bad Boy Entertainment, or being a mid to big name producer in the studio with my second greatest rapper of all time as of now, NAS. KRSONE holds the crown for his 15 years of rockin’ his genre and generation. Tupac and BIGGIE haven’t gotten that time in so they don’t get a crown. I’ve already discussed that issue so it’s dead just like they are.

I have an open mind about the future at times, but most of the time I am pessimistic about it. I’m pessimistic about life: my wife will cheat on me and me probably on her; a divorce is possible if I get married; I may not make it in music; I may not get anywhere in this accounting career of mine neither; I don’t see a prosperous future with minor or major riches. I don’t know man I don’t know, but I’ma KIM (Keep It Movin) That I all any man can do. KEEP IT MOVIN!

Jrnl Entry No. 9.28.2002

My girlfriend Watrina told me that I gave her a little STD. I don’t understand how because I have had no symptoms of an STD. I guess it is possible since I’m fuckin Carol Ann, Coffee and Haitie from the bank all raw. I hate condoms. I’ve been fuckin Carol Ann for a year and half now so it didn’t come from her unless the last time she visited her fiancé in LA, he gave it to her. It could have come from Coffee most likely. She is a homeless chick from what I know, always moving around a lot. I shouldn’t be fuckin’ her. I don’t call her, but every time she calls me I go and get her. I just can’t turn down pussy if there is nothing else to do. I guess I’m a sex addict. I could have gotten it from Haitie. She was adamant about me using a condom which means she either does it with condoms all the time, or she knew she had a little bug and didn’t want me to catch it. I’d slip the condom off on her and she wouldn’t even know it. We fucked about two three times. She wouldn’t let me get wild in the ass because she wasn’t comfortable yet and her pussy wasn’t used to me. We stopped talking because she sensed that I had a girlfriend and I broke off a couple of dates with her. She wants a nigga to be there at her every beck and call and I wasn’t because I had a girlfriend.

So I took the prescription that my girlfriend gave me and then what did I do? I went and slept right back with Carol Ann and Coffee in the same night, raw. So now I got to continue to use condoms with my girlfriend, which she wants to until she goes back to the doctor. Then I have to go to the doctor to see if I have anything and then if I do, I have to tell Carol Ann and Cofffee to go to the doctor. It shouldn’t be a problem with either of them. Carol Ann doesn’t know if her fiancé is not sleeping with anyone so she shouldn’t have any questions. Coffee is fucking other people and keeps trying to tell me that she is pregnant. She wants either me or a child support check; neither of which she will get from me. Not because I won’t pay or I’ll disappear, but for reasons that only I know and will never tell if I haven’t told already.

I told Watrina to move in with me but she refuses. If she was there, I wouldn’t be able to fuck these other women. Like Coffee called me at 1 A.M. the other night to come over and I went and got her. I tried to use a condom with her but she wouldn’t let me. Carol Ann got her own place again so I could sneak over her house after work or something if I wished, but I probably wouldn’t if I lived with Watrina.

I really love Watrina. She is a beautiful, sexy, ambitious young lady and all that is a good combination. She treats me very well, better than anybody with the exception of Rebecca. I hope I don’t get busted in all this outside fuckin’ that I’m doin and that we stay together. She is it. And if there is an after her, I’m chillin’ the next time around, just fuckin’, no love unless a bitch is beautiful and has a bright future ahead of her and she wants love.

I got a CD burner now so I don’t have to depend on Medeline to make my beat CDs. I plan on putting like 10 songs on a CD at a time and selling them mix tape style for $10 a pop like DJ Clue. Nobody does that so I hope it comes off and maybe some of my beats will get picked up like that to be on professional albums. I’m now in the process of putting snippets of every song I’ve ever done on a CD. With my next tape, I’ll put the full length songs on a CD.

What is life bringing me, I don’t know? I’m tired of the unknown, but still I’m goin’ slowly and with less fire than before, but I haven’t quit. I’m gonna go until I reach age – and if nothing by then, I’ll go back to school if I’m still working as an accountant, to go and get my MBA. And that is my life plan. I don’t know what else to do. Watrina says I need to be an A&R but you can’t just pop up and be that. A&Rs start as interns; or they get hooked up through friends which I have none in the music industry. She says I should go to some modeling agencies during lunch because I look good. But I don’t have any pictures. She has a $500 camera but hasn’t taken any pictures of me. She took some last year but won’t give them to me to take to agencies because she says they aren’t good pictures.

I don’t know man. I’m trying to talk Watrina into buying this house that my cousin is selling in Ohio. It’s only like $15,000 at most and it already has tenants and all we’d have to do is be landlords and collect $300 a month rent, which will turn into income when the house is paid off. Real Estate is a little plan of mine if I ever get my hands on some money. I’m trying to save a little money now, $25 a paycheck for emergencies or whatever if an emergency never comes up. I’ve been paying my car note like every other month since I’m already classified as late because I won’t pay the $53 a month insurance fee they tacked on when I dropped my insurance about two years ago. That is how I’m livin’. I’m kind of on edge but fuck it, what can I do? Watrina is optimistic about the future, which is another reason why I love her. If I didn’t have her I probably wouldn’t be in New York right now. I don’t even think she knows how much I love and need her right now.

Jrnl Entry No. 9.27.2002

Watrina is getting on my nerves as of late where I’m thinking to just let that shit go and chill. She doesn’t really care about a relationship. She is just goin with the flow of things. I’m about to get on that shit also. I’ve limited my calls to her and my asking her to come and visit me. The past two weekends that her daughter has gone with her father, we haven’t spent them together. The first time because I had Haitie over my house spending the night at my house for a second night to dig the ass out, and what a nice thick, round ass it was. If she had a better job, she’d be in the running to take me away from Watrina especially since Watrina doesn’t seem to care about our relationship all that much at times.

I’m always getting upset, or telling myself to chill about some shit she is not doin’ to my liking. She is just not sweatin’ me enough that’s all it really is and I don’t like that. She seems as if she doesn’t care if I stay or go and I don’t like that. And all she does is fuel my insecurity about her passion in and for this relationship, which is why I got other bitches.

As far as my job goes, I’ve gotten better at it in the last three months. My new boss has shown me some things, or rather I’ve revealed some things to myself in the absence of Laudi. He knew everything so there really was no need to go searching for things like I’ve had to since he left. If you ask me, he was a hindrance to my progression here at the company.

So now at the same time while I kind of like my new boss, she is getting on my nerves. She is diggin’ into old shit and wants me to find the details behind it so that she can clear it up. And granted, that is her job, but damn, slow down, get into the groove of the basic job before you start diggin’ into other shit. She wants to change the process of how everything is working around here all the way down to the computer software that we use. Like for journal entries, she wants a description line for every item in the journal entry. I told her it doesn’t work like that but she wants to see anyway and look into it to see if she can make a way or find a way. I’ve been working with this system for six months, and you have been working with it for one month. I don’t know everything about the system, but I do know that little bit because I tried it due to the fact, just like her, I was able to do that task with the journal entries at another company. In a way I need to be like her and dig into my job like that. She is a little bug-a-boo I tell you man. And she is short too, which makes it worse.  I guess her detail oriented-ness is fueled by little man’s syndrome. She is little so she has to make up for it using other things like doing her job as detailed and perfect as possible. I know she is just trying to do her job well, but at times she gets on my nerves asking for shit.

Everybody seems to be leaving this job. In the last year since 2002, the guy whose place I took, left; my old supervisor left; this cool white guy who was an accounting manager of some sort, left; the AP/AR manager is leaving; and Shaleece is leaving. Like I said, I’m tryin’ to stay for five years and then leave if the money is not right, but if they make the money right, I’ll stay a little longer. But knowing these sucka ass companies like I seem to, by five years end, I’ll probably only be making $50K when I’ll want to be making $60-$65K, and Watrina will be making millions with her clothing company or $80K at her job if she stays there.

I gave the executive in charge of producing commercials a sample CD of my music for possible use in a commercial or two in the future. My guess is that nothing will come of it even though she is talking all optimistic to me like maybe I’ll get my music in a commercial sooner than I think. She mentioned something to me about working for a productions company when I handed her the CD. I wonder is she talking about part time or full time, and if she knows I’m a fulltime salary employee here at this company and I won’t leave my job unless I got a$500,000 advance in my hand and then maybe still not. She, like everyone else probably thinks I’m some young punk who is running around trying to find his place in life. I’m only trying to find my place in the music industry, every other place I pretty much have in order.

Man I look so young. I am – years old and these people around here are telling me I look — to –. This girl said to me that she never would have thought I was older than she, and she is –. She says I better start acting more mature, which I don’t know what she means. She don’t even know me, so I think she is goin off of my baby face alone. I mean how much more mature can I get? I got a full time career job, I got my own apartment that I cook and clean in and pay my rent on time every month. I got my own car that I pay for every month. I got women of all ages. She said that I run around here acting silly, laughing and talking loud, and that is not the case. The gay guy, Gaylynn is silly and loud all the time, way more than me and he is 38.

I don’t know what it is. I’ve grown a little mustache and a goat- t. I dress up in nice casual clothing occasionally, I keep my hair trimmed and shaped up, but yet, I can’t get over these people labeling me as a – year old. But I ain’t worried about it really too much because I have a main woman, and I pay my bills and have a place of my own to live so fuck what they think as long as I got pussy, food, clothing, and shelter, THE FOUR ESSENTIALS OF LIFE! I have no complaints except for being kind of broke, but everything else is peace.

I was so lonely when I first moved here it wasn’t funny. I was jacking off twice a week to fulfill my sexual desire, now I’m having sex four times a week, so that part of my life is great now. I make more money on this job, but my bills are getting higher. My gas and light bill are higher right now due to my mom and Janelle and Aderale staying with me for a month. I’ve also noticed that I leave lights on more than I used to so that is also a problem. My phone bill is getting higher from Watrina and me occasionally dialing *69. But soon, I’ll have all in check. I’ve started a savings plan of $50 a month, which I’ve done for the last three months.

I’m gonna combine that money with a skipped car note and get me a CD burner because Medeline hasn’t been there for me to make CDs. I don’t know what is up with that nigga. He has been acting funny lately. It’s almost like he don’t want to be cool with me anymore. I told him that Watrina wanted some of his CDs to give to people that she meet and he hasn’t given me any. I told him I wanted to do a CD with him and his man and me to give to the lady here at my job for the commercial music and he didn’t return my call. I’m tryin’ to help the dude out and be down with him as well because I think he has a talent for this producing thing. But if he don’t want to be down with me, I’ll stop calling him.

In fact I’m about to stop calling everybody. No one calls me so I ain’t callin’ nobody. I seem to always want to think of my friends and call them to see how they are doin’, but no more. I don’t get a call from a friend, a friend won’t get a call from me. Niggas don’t think about me so I won’t think about them. I guess it’s time to move on with life and stop tryin’ to keep old high school ties and old college ties. Like with my friend Rally Wallsworth. I’ve known this cat since Kindergarten. I’ve called this cat many times over the years but never has he called me once since we been out of high school and he had been at Ohio University for school. He had this girlfriend up there and they were together like 5 years and then she broke up with him. She was a good girl, the kind you marry and cheat on because she is not sexy or freaky enough but she holds down a good job and will be a good mother to your children. She dumped him for this older guy who was in Med School. I guess she was looking for a more stable future than Rally could provide because he was barely making it through college, paying for it on his own, and due to a child support bill taking his money for a kid he had by some other chick while he was with his girlfriend when they had been together for like 2 or 3 years at the time and she forgave him for that shit I guess. But anyway, if I don’t talk to him anymore I’ll see him in Warren on a holiday or something one day and we’ll hug and talk, but fuck that callin’ shit. If you don’t call me, I ain’t callin’ you.

WAS THERE A TIME YOU HAD A BAD BOSS? IT WAS 2002, PEOPLE STILL WERE NOT CALLING PEOPLE! WHY DON’T FRIENDS AND FAMILY CALL EACH OTHER?

Jrnl Entry No. 9.4.2002

So, regardless of my thinking that my skills are lacking on the job, I still have a job. I’m yet to find a month where I have all of my bills paid and relax. There always seems to be something that pops up for me to pay or use money for. Like this month I have to pay my car payment twice in one month because I didn’t pay it last month when Janelle was here.

Janelle and I had a good three weeks together. She is funny, growing to be quite a character. She likes to sing songs, listen to music and watch movies just like I do. I know her mom probably gets sick with the thought of me every time she hears Janelle humming a song or something. My daughter seems to have gotten – in just six months, really only a month of time spent together – attached to Watrina and her daughter Queen. They get along just fine together. Watrina treats Janelle as if she was her own. She definitely treats Janelle better than I treat Queen. And Janelle likes her for that reason. Watrina bought Janelle a scooter that she didn’t need before she went home just because she asked for one like Queen’s little Barbie scooter, even though Janelle has new bike at home. I told Watrina to take Janelle with her and Queen to the nail shop and get her nails done and she did. Now she says because of that, Queen thinks she is supposed to get her nails done every time she goes to the shop with her.

Janelle starts school when she goes back home, so I bought her some school clothes outfits: a pair of jeans, two pair of shoes, a Phat Farm dress, a warm up suit, and some black pants with a black turtle neck to match. She liked the clothes and we had fun shopping for them and trying them on in the store. It would be nice to have custody of her, but her mom would fight that till death. I’m gonna propose it to her sooner or later that Janelle come and stays with me for a year or two. If she says no, I’ll go to court and ask the judge like I’ve always had to do for fair visitation.

Janelle says she likes school and she knows all of the little girl’s names. She said her mom thought the warm-up suit was too big and won’t let her wear it; says she is gonna get it taken in which I highly doubt she’ll do and it will be just another outfit I sent her that will be wasted. I told Janelle to tell her mother that the Phat Farm dress and the jeans are supposed to be worn together so the dress will act as an overcoat, “New York Style” is what I told Janelle. She says her mom says she can’t wear the outfit like that. I guess being from Warren, she is too corny to see how that works or probably thinks that it makes her look too grown. She has this whole big idea which most parents do I guess, that if you keep the cursing out of the child’s ear, and the sassy clothes off of them, and don’t let them see R-Rated movies, that the child will somehow grow up to be an angel, not tainted by all the little evils in the world while too young. I don’t believe in that shit. You have to raise your child and don’t let the video and television and movies raise them; meaning that if you let them watch things and hear things without giving them the proper explanation that real life is not like that, or that they can’t do those things until they get of an older age, they will grow to believe what they see and hear because no one ever told them different. I guess Victoria’s way is good, but my way is not exactly bad either so Janelle should turn out fine, but I guess we’ll have to wait ten to fifteen years to see.

SINGLE DADS, WHAT GOOD TIMES HAVE YOU HAD WITH YOUR CHILDREN? AND WHAT VIEWS OF RAISING YOUR CHILDREN CLASHED WITH THEIR MOTHER’S VIEWS?