A Warped POV by A. Dacosta Brathway

July 2nd, Thursday/ I gotta tell you... I thought MJ was bizarre in life but he is more out there in death! What the hell is going on? I won't even try to figure out the whole children thing! That I don't get at all but what I want to know is how the money thing works? Please, somebody explain to me how someone can have a compound go into foreclosure, be $400 million dollars in debt, pay $100,000/a month on one of the most exclusive mansions on the planet, be considered "BROKE" and have an estate worth millions? How does this happen in America?
Bad economy? Homes in foreclosure? People losing their jobs? MJ is broke, allegedly, and he has an estate worth millions? How? I'm broke and I can prove it. I have no estate. When I die, I will have nothing to divide up except my bones, if anybody wants them. It's a good thing I have no children. I just cannot imagine them being happy when they realize that they can fight over the division of my bones! "I want his foot bones that are connected to the leg bones, and the leg bones are connected to the thigh bones, and the thigh bones are connected to the hip bones..." (And you know the rest of the song!).
Man, I played my life all wrong. I should have majored in Economics, in college, like I started to but I let a, so called friend, talk me into majoring in English, which prepared me for writing a blog! Where is the estate in that?

Divorce by A. Dacosta Brathway

Miles & miles & miles of love
spread out over scenic views &
point of views...
Gentle touches & light conversation about
everything & nothing...
Slight glances at romantic outings,
Intense & passionate love making-sex
in warm vertigo to the point of no return
while silently planning to nest for the rest of your lives!
The "darkside" plots & schemes
to shatter those dreams
as you skip lightly to that unforseen place...
Your vision, blinded by the "rat race,"
that manifests itself in your
"keeping up w/ the Jones'" psychic...
" I want more... the mansion, the big ride, the whore!"

Upon the discovery she escorts you to the door,
only to reconcile & do it once more... &
more becomes less & a burden like a
weighted vest, bogging the relationship down-
town to file & restore the smile
that once existed during the ride through the countryside!

(c) A. Dacosta Brathway 2008

A Warped POV by A. Dacosta Brathway

Yeah, yeah... I know. I haven't been here since early April. I was in new York City catching up on my life and getting re-aquainted with "from wence I came." I had forgotten how spontaneous life can be (if you let it) until I was standing on the corner of 5th Ave and 45th St., when from out of nowhere a crowd gathered and a breakdance broke out! I stood there and watched and thought, "You know, I would never see a bunch of naive tourists willfully be conned out of their money by a group of breakdancers in Maryland!" Their moves were choreographed and set to music blaring from a boom box! Then there was the fire truck that t-boned a car that killed a young woman in Queens and the juryless trial, that ended in the aquittal of three detectives that killed an unarmed, young, and intoxicated black man at his bacholar party in a hail of bullets!It was a boring trip to say the least, not to mention the argument I had with my 80+ year old mother who claimed that Marilyn Monroe had absolutely nothing to do with Playboy because she saw MM's life story in a movie and they made no mention of it. (However, they did mention how she didn't like to bathe and didn't like to wear panties when she went to a formal affair!) Go figure! It was very cool and rainy the whole time I was there and I had no warm clothes. I slept on a futon that was a foot too short and I had minimal money. (Okay, so I donated some to the breakdancers' fund! Sue me.) All in all I had a good time. It was good to get my blood pumping again and I will always have the lasting image of watching the Black folks file out of the old Brooklyn neighborhoods, like lemmings, because of gentrification issues. "New York, New York, the BIG APPLE!"

CRAP/ My Journal by Al Brathway

September 26th, Wednesday/ Man, I was watching a show last night about what it cost to create a beat for a rap song and it hit me like a shot... Nas (the rapper) is right. Hip Hop is DEAD! I remember when hip hop got started. It was a movement. It was a mobilization of young people creating a subculture and being heard. It started a new language, a new dance, a new artform... It started a new dress code and new music and a whole new way of life for young cats! Even though it was out of my reach, I was feeling it bigtime! But now... Something got in there and f#@ked the whole thing up! Now you have the same elements that screwed up the principles of America screwing up the hip hop movement! Back in the day, rap music had a deep message for the community... It was about uplifting a race, a generation... Now all they talk about is assimilating the unethical rich. Hell, the forefathers of hip hop must be spinning in their studio chairs, seeing the kind of money they can't make because the movement has passed them by... the very movement they created! How sad is that? You create something with all the right intentions only to have it snatched from under you because you didn't get it patented!/ Sorry, I gotta go. I feel another movement coming on... It's my bowels./ CRAP!

CRAP/ My Journal by Al Brathway

July 17th, Tuesday/ I have to admit to being addicted to watching shows on Bravo. I have a weird way of getting addicted to something. It does not capture my attention, at first, but I circle around it like a buzzard until I go in for the kill. The show, TOP CHEF finally got to me and I started watching it. So I'm watching the episode where the contestants are trying to impress a chef judge w/ seafood dishes. The Asian dude makes some concoction w/ oversized croutons and the judge/chef rejected his dish because of the oversized croutons. What the hell is that? (And the Asian chef defended himself by saying, and I'm paraphrasing here, that the judge/chef did not "understand" the concept!) What happened to the days when food smelled good, looked good, and tasted good? Now what's on the plate has to be in proportion w/ everything else on the plate. Gormet, schmormet... Who comes up w/ this stuff anyway? How anal are you to be that nit-picky about food? It's just a tv show, sure, but people watch this kind of stuff and incorporate it w/ reality! (Hence the term, "reality" show!) I can see myself now... I go to a restaurant, hungry as hell and looking to eat a juicy steak, and end up judging the food as unacceptable because my baked potatoe is not the correct dimemsions w/ my steak! Then, I keep doing that everytime I go out to eat, I starve, and then I die!/ CRAP!

CRAP/ My Journal by Al Brathway

June 18th, Monday/ I started my day today w/ the expectation that it was not going to be that great. I worked a basketball camp and I HATE basketball camp! I've been doing it for quite a while and it's time for me to stop. So, being that this is my swan song foe summer basketball camp I figured that I would put myself on autopilot and get it done. So I'm cruising through the day until I hit a bump. .. I met an 8 year old kid named Ky. What an imagination! We connected for some reason and my life has changed forever!/ Ky started talking to me about his life and his thoughts and I was blown away! Come to find out, Ky is a writer and an inventor. He told me some stories and made me swear that I would not repeat them so that he would not have to sue me for copywright infringement! I was blown away!/ On my way home, I started to think about Ky and then I thought of my life at his age. I was not allowed to be a kid at 8 years old. I was told that I had to "grow up" and "be a man!" I got to thinking about what I would be like, today, if I had the freedom to be a kid back in the day? I vowed that I would live out the rest of my time on this planet like Ky, even though I don't have much time left! CRAP!

CRAP/ My Journal by Al Brathway

June 17th, Sunday/ Sunday... Ahh... Sunday is my creative day! Why? I have no idea. It seems like nothing can get me down on Sunday. Sadly, that is not the case this Sunday! / My routine started today like it starts every Sunday. I got a good night's sleep. I got up early, came downstairs and turned on the TV to watch Sunday Morning. I like that show! They hardly ever feature a story on someone Black but I kind of understand that living in America. To the powers that be in America anything Black is not cool so why bother? Anyway, I saw this piece on a French singer named Edith Piaf, who was advertised as the French Judy Garland (No, Judy Garland was not Black either!) There was nothing special about the woman by any standard except that she grew up somewhat similar to the way I grew up (poor!). But there was a statement made about her that struck a cord w/ me. "She was in love with love!" (Damn, just like Judy Garland!) Imagine that, I thought... This woman was in love with love!/ I was in love with love, once. The very idea of it, during the day, would have me dreaming about it all night! Because of it, I had a reason to live... I felt alive when it crossed my mind. To love love.../ What is it about being in love with love? Why do people do it? Is the world really that screwed up that people would even consider the possibility? Any other type of love is 10 times more lethal! Yet, being in love with love will foster the same result. Piaf died with some illness but I believe it was the notion of being in love with love that killed her. Just like it is killing me! Sure, they will say that I had some sickness that went undiagnosed and that my heart quit. Damn right it is gonna quit. It's gonna quit because being in love with love was and is a stupid endeavor. But, when you think about it, if you don't love yourself or nobody loves you, being in love with love doesn't sound so stupid after all does it? CRAP!