Recap from 2007: Urban Renewal The Building of Minds
Part I
(I wake up every morning at 6:30 a.m. to my cell alarm playing "That Girl" by Frankie J, pop out my bed like the last 4 hours of sleep was sufficient, and make coffee – strong coffee while the news informs me of what I probably need to put on. Within the next hour I have checked both my personal and business email accounts from my cell phone and added three to four more assignments to my never ending "To do" list. My day has just started...)
I live less than a football field away from IH-35. East IH-35 to be exact. No fresh spring air around here, boo. You can't get more urban than that. Yeah, I got birds with nicely hidden nests chirping when I become conscious of the new day but that's quickly drowned out by the sounds of the morning rush hour traffic. If I can't hear a busy street when I step outside then I'm out of my element. That rustle and bustle noise is essential since my mind is consistently in grind-mode. My urban lifestyle is consumed with every effort I can make to walk through the next opened door that will allow me greater resources.
What goes around comes around faster in the city. No small deed goes unnoticed in my hood. It may be quickly forgotten but never unnoticed. I have to give a lot to get a little and with the way today's "To do's" are looking – Karma is still my best friend. I'm used to taking what I got and working with it. I got a good grip on getting things done on my own without having to ask too many folks for help. I'm an independent, female hip-hop emcee. My production company, 1205 Productions, is a sole-proprietorship. Meaning if I don't do it nobody else will. This includes financing every venture pursued within my company from releasing albums and booking/managing artists to coordinating events and travel arrangements for speaking engagements. Stepping on toes is inevitable.
My goal isn't fame but the building of minds – a sort of mental "urban renewal" in the way generations under me process their thoughts. If the Texas educational system knew "street knowledge" is just as essential as book knowledge I'd easily be a certified salaried teacher. As a player in this male dominated, indie music chess match, every move I make determines my outcome. Since my life is comprised of many wins and losses, I feel that the wisdom or "game" learned is to be taught and sold. Everybody doesn't share my mission so toes do get stepped on. Karma showed me years ago that it isn't what I do, its how I do it. So, I got some aspirin if anyone needs it.
My homeboy Element 7D told me that time is the only real currency in existence. The game that was spit that day made me more conservative of my time. Let me be the one to tell you that I spend every minute on the grind multi-tasking. My real advantage is that I've mastered that skill. Forget two, I've figured the most efficient ways to kill five birds with one stone now. By the time two o'clock hits my list is ¾'s of the way accomplished and I've started tomorrow's list.
See I play this mixtape cd by Mddl Fngz, a gangster rap group created by Pimp C and Bun B on UGK Records, to maintain a certain mentality. I chose this genre about making money and staying sucker free because I have to run every aspect of my small-business and failure isn't an option. They influence me to believe procrastinating can easily set me back a season or two and so can toxic people. They stress that I need to have the sense to know this and avoid it. I agree with them that poverty isn't a joke so it is mandatory that I produce hot products and keep key players on a higher level than mine in my circle, just as they advise. Damn, that's real talk! With the odds stacked against me I continue to check off items on my list. Mindful of Karma encircling me, I stay on watch for any opportunity for me to put the benefit of our friendship to motion by giving out the game I take in.
Six p.m. is when my free minutes start and I'm almost on that twelfth hour wind down. By now I've forgotten whatever I accomplished yesterday because tomorrow's to-do list is looking promising. I pull up to the Chicken Store on Loyola and bump into an old homegirl who hasn't seen me in years. She asks me how I'm doing and I tell her, "Doing it big, lil mama." She has seen various promo materials with my name and face on them so she already knows. I ask her the same thing only to hear her say, "I'm trying to make it, girl, you know how it is. Just maintaining." I show her my winning smile and spit game. "Lil mama, its 2007. We're not trying to do nothing no more, you're either doing it or you ain't." I see the light bulb brighten over her head. She received the game when she heard it. The stare of self-realization is priceless. "Already!" she exclaims.
Mission accomplished. I gotta renew one urban mind at a time. And that's the reality of my lifestyle, boo.
