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NO Merry Christmas Memories
5.18.97--The Dumaine Players
CL, a 20-year-old young man raised by Mama D goes my the name K and while shirtless sports the pucker of bullet wounds across his stomach and back, wounds inflicted during his fifteenth year. More of a ladies man than a street hustling drug dealer, K follows the flow of current events and avoids conflict to the best of his ability. Sometimes seen on the street holding his newborn daughter, K smokes the blunt, raps a few modern lyrics, but mostly stays on the border of any serious business dealings in the area. The mother of the baby is in jail on a charge unrelated to shooting through the front door K's ex-girlfriend across the street here about six months ago. For a man of his age in this environment, K has been plenty respectful of the two white people at 2646. On one occasion at the Magnolia convenience store across the street M found herself laughing at the sexual advances one young gangster was making towards a young girl, and while the young man was inclined towards getting in M's face over this small humiliation, K, with some theatrics, dissuaded the other young man from pursuing his actions. So M likes him and perhaps K appreciates (and is yearnful of, himself) the time M spends with his younger blood relations on the street. Just a week ago M had put out on the front porch some coloring books and crayons for the younger children to play with and when she came out a bit later she found K proudly displaying his colored picture and asking her opinion of its worth compared to his sister's, LL. LL is a 14-year-old honor student.
6.2.97--Surrogate Parent
I proposed a few months ago to some of the neighborhood children (ages 6-12) that if they would clean the street on Sundays I would take them on road trips outside the 6th Ward: to Audubon Park (where I say--come on guys don't pull your dicks out and pee off the jungle gym, go behind a tree or something. Or they call each other motherfuckin' nigger in front of the rich white children), or to the New Orleans Lakefront where I let them illegally swim until the park police come and bust them, or to the beach in Waveland, Miss. where a carload of good old boys drives by yelling out--hey you niggers, or to a local music festival where Shelton, 12, punches out Eric, 10, or this weekend to a festival in the French Quarter where M and I went with three boys and came back with only one. Even knowing that all these boys roam the Quarter on their own and can walk or bike the distance in less time than we drive it didn't relieve me of guilt for leaving the two boys (even though we waiting in one prearranged spot for four hours). But they know I don't mind, even expect them to stray to Bourbon St. to ogle outside the titty bars, as long as they check in once in awhile. So while Fermin hung close, got an outlandish balloon hat from a clown (who wouldn't accept my money but took everyone else's), got his face painted (also for free) and shared a po-boy with us (which is a special treat because I usually make them bring their own food), Shelton and Eric disappeared to do God only knows what. When Fermin tells us he has to go home and take some medicine, we drive back to Dumaine, where I drop him and M, and pick up two more boys, Glynn and Michael, and head back to the Quarter to make at least the pretense of a search. I centrally locate myself (next to that damn clown again) and send the boys off into the Quarter. They go to the river, the French Market, Bourbon St. and back, get free balloon hats each (the most extravagant that clown made all day), and I say so you guys looked for Shelton and Eric to which they respond, oh yes, and we head back home. Shelton and Eric are there, sitting on the porch, and knowing I'll be mad try to sucker punch me with--why did you leave us down there, at which point I yell some grown up stuff at them (although not once did I call them motherfuckin' bitches as their guardians sometimes do), and banished them from next Sunday's activities. To which they respond--what about the Sunday after that? I guess I showed them.
6.8.97--Depravity, With Despair On The Side
Shelton, at 12-years-old, is the oldest boy living in Mama D's house. Shelton is the neighborhood bully and as much as we see him being a bully and can imagine and remember what it's like being the the recipient of a bully's bad attitude, it's hard to see Shelton as much of a threat to the world at large when he's laying on our front porch with his head in M's lap, sucking his thumb and pouring out his worst fears about this most obviously fucked up world he lives in. Shelton is cursed with the gift of insight combined with a seriously lacking education. He sees and interprets everything with amazing clarity. He knows where he's from and where he is most likely to end. And he sucks his thumb.
Shelton spent his first weekend down at juvie. He and Michael and Eric were playing in D's backyard on Thursday (Which D's mom, Y, forbids, because all the people across the street are "animals.") and when D asked the other boys for some candy they had, Shelton told him he could have some if D would suck all three of their dicks. Eric then pulled his pants down and Shelton pushed Eric on top of D and that was pretty much the whole incident. Until the next day when J, Shelton's 12-year-old girl cousin (who is bursting ripe with sexuality and likes to hang around the young gangsters hanging on Y's porch), tell's Y about the incident. So that same day three cop cars show up, and Y's ex-husband's mother, who is a cop in the child welfare division, also makes an appearance. Mama D comes across with Shelton, S and G with Eric, and then Y shows up with D. Mama D tells Shelton if he wants to get his dick sucked he should just stay home and get one of his brother/cousins to do it for him. S, not to be out-done, yells something unintelligible at Eric and then pauses briefly as if at a loss to say something meaningful, and suddenly cold cocks him upside his head. G pulls Eric away in a protective embrace and then leads him back across the street. Y, who I think secretly admires Mama D's parenting skills, starts telling D a thing or two--I fuckin' told you not to take any goddamn shit from any of those boys. Those boys try to fuck you up, I don't care how big they are, you better fight your fuckin' ass off. I told you this before but you're so fuckin' stupid you don't listen. You're so fuckin' stupid you're smart. Everyone agrees that Shelton is the instigator of all things bad around here so he takes the fall. Undoubtedly he will make some new friends this weekend down at the juvenile detention center.
6.15.97--The Adopted Father Of Dumaine
Fun projects for the kids: An empty 20-ounce coke bottle becomes a macabre, lifeless terrarium, in this easy-to-do project for children ages six to twelve. Simply put two live chameleon lizards, with or without tails, in a bottle. Make sure not to puncture bottle as any breach in the plastic will extend the life of your lizards. Pass bottle between children, letting each child torture these fascinating and harmless creatures to their satisfaction. Slick and gooey with bloody contusions, your lizards will soon stick to each other in a myriad of real life positions. Marvel as your children learn to recognize everyday predicaments of life in a vacuum.
Look at 'em making love (that one on the bottom look none too happy).
Look at 'em fight (that one on the bottom look none too happy).
I think they dead (that one on the bottom look none too happy).
As an added fun feature to this project, witness your children as they explore the applications of Darwinian theory. Yes, stronger children really can hold down weaker children and place pulverized lizard parts on their heads...
Note: the lizards were already dead by the time I came to witness this little science project. I did not interfere with their fun until they began exploring the antiquated sewage line access, inside the fence below the porch. It has an eight inch square hinged metal lid and is about ten inches deep. A four inch diameter clay pipe opening can be seen at the edge of the hole, disappearing under the sidewalk. Players: Shelton 12, Jacque 11, Bryan 9, Marqin 8, and Erica 3. All the players are huddled around the hole when Shelton says--Mr. Jim, come see. Grumbling in protest I step down from the front porch and stand over the hole. I see the tops of five children's heads.
You see 'em, Mr. Jim
No
Erica squeals--lookit Mr. Jim, lookit (Erica, the sweet dark angel of Dumaine, father unknown, mother, 17, is hiding out in CA from a local attempted murder warrant). What has her attention now I finally see, oh, how nice, baby rats. And as I watch these children open and close the iron lid, banging on it with sticks and then opening it again to see what effect they are having on newborn rat babies, I wonder what it is going through other people's minds when they query me as to why I have no children of my own.
Shelton! Do not torture those rat babies!
I won't, Mr. Jim.
I mean it Shelton. I didn't come out here to watch a bunch of psycho kiddies torture animals.
I know that Mr. Jim. Ya'll cut out all that banging.
And don't poke 'em with those sticks.
Shelton slaps his cousin, Marqin, across his head. Marqin says,
Why you hit me, Shelton?
Mr. Jim don't want us torturing those babies.
That right Mr. Jim?
That's right Marqin.
We can look at 'em, Mr. Jim.
Just look at 'em, Marqin.
And I'm trying to figure when I will have the opportunity to throw some rat dope in that hole to kill the bitch rat. Fuck a bunch of rat babies.
7.27.97--Going For The Gold
Five more murders last night, makes twelve in five days. One of the murders happened right across the street from H-A's bar in the 7th Ward. H is the Neighborhood Watch cop for this district. P was over this evening giving M some Night Out Against Crime paraphernalia. Party at Mama D's in a couple of weeks. BBQ chicken and whiskey, maybe some stuffed (deviled) eggs. Anyway, P said H heard the shots and when he went outside, there was no one there--except for this young man lying on the sidewalk with the top half of his head missing. Last time there were this many murders in one week the citizens marched on City Hall. I went down with P and M. My brother, Alex, was in town and he came too. Our smarmy mayor set up an image control team outside on the grounds. Had a stage, some inspriational speakers, maybe even a little gospel music, I can't remember. Then we all rushed the chambers. P and M made it inside. Alex and I were forced to retreat and enter from the back and made it as far waiting area but we could see inside the chamber. Again, the mayor had the fix in and had half the chamber filled with city employees and lackeys. But there was enough pissed off screaming citizens to make for quite a show. The mayor never did show up though. Unlike this week, that week's murder count included three white people (employees of the Pizza Kitchen in the Quarter; the killers used potatoes for silencers on their guns). This week, as the boys at work might say, is just a bunch of niggers killing niggers. Punks and gangsters who aren't productive members of society, so fuck 'em.
Monk's wife would not respond to calls from her sister today so her sister called emergency services and they busted the door down. His wife had been living with cancer for some time and today it killed her.
It's ten o'clock Friday night and Jacks closes at eight so I walked over to Kim's on N. Broad, near the corner of St. Ann. I wanted a 22 ounce Heineken. Monk was standing in front of the iron gates that Kim puts up late at night. I gave him a feeble wave as I approached. We shook hands and he told me what I already knew and I told him how sorry I was. He had a lot of gin in him and was looking for more. He was married for 33 years. He walked off with a man I did not recognize in search of something I cannot imagine.
Happiness is the absence of intellectual thought.
Saturday: three more dead last night but one of those might be a repeat in the count so let's just say 14 in six days. One more day to go. Murder cannot continue at this rate but if it did the toll would top 600 for the year. The per capita equivalent in NYC would be 12,000. The actual count in NYC is closer to 1,200 for a year.
But overall the murder rate is down for the year, and all crime in our district ( The First) is down, and the 2600 block of Dumaine is pretty quiet, so maybe I should just cheer up. There is no TV here and if I didn't read the newspaper I wouldn't even know any of this is happening. I wonder if ignorance is an option at this point.
Sunday: some punk shot his lawyer last night. And that makes fifteen.
8.10.97--Slapping The Bayou
H-A's restaurant, bar, grocery store, over on LaHarpe in the 7th Ward burned down last night. The establishment was 90 years old and was known by the original owners' name--Mule's (Mulays). H and his brother co-owned it with members of that prodigious Ngyuen clan.
Things are sleepy and quiet on Dumaine. Temperatures are down but the air is too still and wet. Some of the boys playing football in the street. Sharon stabbed Greg today. The Saints are playing the Chiefs tonight in the Superdome. I'll probably listen some on the radio.
I've been staying inside lately, pondering, stagnating, resting. Reading a couple decent books.--Richard Russo's latest, Straight Man, and some good detective fiction by a Boston writer named Robert Parker.
Mr. Dave, around the corner on Dorgenois, died Wednesday, deserves something of an extended obit but I will have to confer with JW, who sold the house next door to Y.
I'm going outside to see what happens.
Sunday: (I never did go outside last night. There was no place to sit what with all those kids and coloring books). Got up around 6:30, went to look for paper but it wasn't here yet. Came in, took a bath, made coffee and toast, loaded up the one hitter, and drove down to the bayou, parking on Moss, just down from the corner of 3300 Dumaine. I sit at the first set of steps, the Dumaine bridge to my left, and that church with the green copper dome to my right. Early Sunday mornings are so fine in New Orleans; so quiet the sound of repentance. My coffee is good but I burnt the toast. I light a cigarette and bow my head in prayer. That fisherman two hundred yards away might be jealous of my trained fish, which glitter at sunrise, high above the water, before reaching the arc's pinnacle, when they lay flat and to the right (as per training), and come down slapping the water in high fashion. God, I love those fish.
Joggers, bikers, and dog walkers are making their appearances. More cautious than curious, they seem to carry with them an inherent understanding of the folly of running yourself healthy in a place so casual about killing. Reiterated too often in the news is the that discouraging reality that no place in New Orleans is completely safe.
I set fire to the little morsel of weed in my pipe and suck it dry. A little dab will do me. I have to hold the smoke in my lungs longer than I like out of respect for that pedestrian who snuck up behind me. By the time I do exhale, very little smoke leaves my mouth. I guess I got all of that one.
I am completely alone on the bayou when the church bells start clanging what soon becomes a brief melody. Just when I think I might be able to hum along, the notes begin breaking down, slow and easy, until the disentigration completes itself with a single wavering note. Silence.
It's 8:30 when I get back to 2600 and there are five boys waiting in front of the house, ready to clean the street. Only four of them will fit in the Festiva.
So the four boys and I leave out of here for the beach in Waveland, with Michael crying in the rear view mirror.
A white family let the boys play with their nerf football. When I went to return it prior to our departure, the man said--"well you're very welcome, it looks like they were having a lot of fun." I'm not sure, but I don't think he was referring to the part where they were holding each other's heads under water, yelling, "stay down bitch, stay down."