O.u.a.T.

It doesn't seem fair that people who write stuff about you are the least informed.

You used to have to be a celebrity to complain about something like that. It has, at least traditionally, a sort of mass-media ring to talk about your name in the "headlines". But headline writers, anymore, are people with a cell phone or work computer & appetite for Facebook.

Once upon a time, you needed .edu in the surname of your email address to bull-rush the security turnstile of Facebook new account clearance.

Not no more.

Jesus, the stuff people put on there amazes me. Recently I've seen a lot of summoning of "prayer warriors". I don't quite know what that is. Don't think I'd like to encounter one in real life, though. I imagine they walk from Sunday school to big church with a Bible loosely tied around their beltline. Ready to draw 'n hit you with a quote if you so much as challenge them with a bad mood. Or pessimism.

Another thing I see a lot of on there these days is political stuff. I don't really have any comment on that.

"No comment," that's one of the things I would say a lot if I was a celebrity. Like when the paparazzi bum-rush you at your car.

"Please. No pictures."

Man, that'd be cool for a minute. Just to be like a real celebrity or whatever.

I didn't used to be any kinda celebrity. Not even in my hometown did people outside who I run with know my name.

Once upon a time, I was a good kid. Above-average baseball player.

Good 3-point shooter.

My sister always would come to my games. In the beginning, she had to. Mama made her.

But then, even after she got a car and a boyfriend, she'd still come. She didn't cheer or nothing. But, from what I remember, she'd be there.

People knew she supported me or whatever, I don't know, I don't even like to put it that way. Because it makes me sound like I had a real problem. And that she was like my "support" or whatever, and like I needed that. Man whatever, I ain't ever really even had like a problem.

Just, for some reason, people started thinking my life was worth paying attention to. Whatever whatever. You know?

The headlines. Man, I don't even like to be like that. I don't want drama. I ain't about that.

I'm a good kid.

Dude, I can remember when my mom moved from two jobs to one. She had started up with this guy Darrell. Man, he was so good to her.

They'd take us with them on Saturdays errrrywhere. I can't remember hardly ever having babysitters.

Shit was sooooo good for a while.

Man, I think sometimes what if they'd ended up together.

Like how it was then. Not how it got.

Like, what if they could've stayed happy and he'd adopted me, and I had a steady good influence above me at the house, what with me having anger problems and all that, probably would've been good especially if it was a man, and what about if he'd never showed me pills or how they make you feel, and what it's like to go a day without 'em.

I think on that sometimes. Think on all that stuff.

Hell, thoughts is pretty much all I got. In here, man, the books I get my hands on ain't worth reading anyway.

Autobiography of Malcolm X, what the fuck I'm post to do with that?

I'd rather have my hands on something with meat on the bones. Know what I'm saying. I'm just playing, I'm just playing.

I ain't even have a girl when they locked me up. I was single.

Shit, I'll be lucky to ever get something warm and wet again. That's what they tell me. By the time they let you out, most dudes can't even keep it up.

I remember back in the day, once upon a time, when I was a pussy warrior. Fuck prayer warriors. I was a goddamn pussy warrior.

Man this one time, I can remember I did the Abraham Lincoln circuit. In Nashville, man, we got all the tourists. This one time, check it out:

Friday night Illinois girl.

Saturday night Kentucky girl.

Sunday night motherfuckin' Indiana girl.

Once upon a time. Man, I was a motherfucking pussy slayer. Street warrior.

I was a soldier. Darrell knew it too. He took advantage of my ass.

I ain't see it coming either. Mama, man, she was too messed up to warn me. Darrell, man, he ain't a good dude. That's all there is to it.

He played us. He played my moms. He played my little brother. That's what I'm most heavy on. Man, I can't even speak on that.

Yeah, he played me. I made peace with that, though. Only God can judge me. Know what I'm saying.

My little brother, man, they turned him. He wasn't no thug. Man, you log onto Facebook though. They make him sound like, man they got him up there like some serious gangster.

Kyle wasn't no goddamn gangster. Maybe he wasn't real smart. I happened to get the genes that way. And then I wasted 'em. I had a good look at the basket too.

I was about to finish school. I was doing my thing, drawing and writing comic books. I always had a good vocabulary.

Pretty much all my teachers told me I could write. Math, man, I just don't have the patience for it. But with writing, I don't know, it just rolled off my fingers.

I know good stories.

No good story about real people was ever written under some once upon a time headline bullshit.

Man, fuck that. I like real stories and real people.

Maybe one day I'll write my own. Leave Darrell out of it. Or shit, maybe I'll make him my devil.

Someday. One day at a time.