From the monthly archives:

May 2009

A Letter To The Black Star, Mos Def and Talib Kweli

by Jose on May 31, 2009 · 2 comments

in life

Blackstar

Blackstar

Dear Mos Def and Talib Kweli, (or whoever decides to read / respond / reflect)

Your concert piece last night reminded me why I’m such a big fan of yours. A myriad of followers from all over the Tri-State area, of all different backgrounds, ages, and cultures came through to show these two Brooklyn men love. Without any songs on the radio or much publicity, you turned out 2 sold out shows, one of which started close to midnight. And we waited for you. For that alone, I can assume you’re ecstatic and grateful to your fans for sticking around that long.

Meeting you, Talib, always came at the weirdest times. The first time I met you, it was in Union Sqaure while you were running around with your friends (literally). I remember just a really cool, humble Brooklyn dude, but little did you know this came right before I was going to purchase Quality, and since then, I was sold. I’ve converted many a non-believer with that one alone. I saw you at Syracuse University’s Block Party in 2004 with Wyclef, saw you at your free concert in downtown Manhattan, and even at a Barnes N’ Nobles, where you were getting some books with your kids. In all those moments, you never came off as larger than your fan base, never too cool to speak to anyone.

Same with you, Mos. You went and did a couple of solo joints, but have been equally as memorable for all your outside endeavors. Top Dog / Underdog. Def Poetry Jam. Brown Sugar. 16 Blocks. OK, maybe not the last one. But we dug the episode of House. And your random appearances on Talib’s materials. Again, all good to us. For some reason, your affable nature makes it easy to like you. If you walk down the street, you don’t consider yourself too big to walk down a street and grab a slice.

What’s weird is that, maybe you two never got that, but the rest of us, as anticipatory as we were, started losing our patience. Like how we got irritated with 88-Keys for being the second opening act when we were all there to see Blackstar. Like how we got irritated at the sound crew and everyone else who walked on stage before you guys, making us wait so damn long  for you all. Like how @realtalibkweli and @mrbey at first didn’t reply to fans at all, but your fellow celebs and hip-hop intelligentsia. And when @realtalibkweli started to, you sounded a lot like @rhymefest, asking us questions about trivia. Like how we only had you two in concert for exactly an hour and not a minute longer. Like how there hasn’t been a (joint) Black Star album since the first one, even with such visible chemistry on record and in real life.

And yet, here there we were, bopping our head to every damn song, 40$ a pop in the hole, making sure we had our cell phones, cameras, and camcorders out for this event in hip-hop.  We could care less about the people who appeared at the event, or the VIPs crawling the space. We just wanted that raw NYC hip-hop. We thirsted for those lyrics, and a reminder that the intelligent hip-hop fans / geeks matter, too. We wanted to dance, sing, rap along, and not feel like subservient model chicks and posers, but people of a movement that almost seems long past us.

For that feeling alone, and for keeping those flames, then, Talib and Mos, we have to thank you. Sometimes, we have these unrealistic expectations of our Black stars, especially those that touch our lives so profoundly, who write letters to their grandmothers that sound like ours, who offer us a way to get by and reach for the stars, who define and redefine our beloved music for us, who challenge us on so many levels, like we’re asked to simultaneously look at your humanity while we all reach for a divinity of sorts.

You’re truly Black Stars, against the canvas of an NYC night, appearing a curious celestial phenomena …

Jose, who’s all about the K.O.S. …

{ 2 comments }

Of Eccentric Confusions, Prestidigitation, and Legerdemain

by Jose on May 28, 2009 · 0 comments

in life

Spelling Bee

Spelling Bee

On Twitter, I revealed one of my great not-so-secret secrets: I used to be a spelling bee champ. Not that hardcore, but it was really cool. In 7th grade, our whole school (all 57 of us) would stand around 8 of us while we battled each other on the spelling of different words. I’d never been in any such competition, so I shrugged the whole idea off until my English teacher said, “Jose, you’re in.”

Oh crap.

I was definitely nervous, but I was OK because, frankly, my intelligence would get me far enough where I didn’t feel I’d embarrass myself. Little did I know that I’d be in a dead heat for what felt like an hour with a fellow nerd / 8th grader, who moved on to the most prestigious Catholic high school in the city (and I’d go to the second-most, coincidentally). Anyways, we’re going word-for-word, sweat dripping into my burgundy sweater, clammy hands, and loudly-beating heart. Then the word came up:

“Spell belfry.”

My brain had the spelling pictured already, so my brain thought it was easy. Yet, this contest between us had been going on so long, my mouth spelled it as, “B-e-l-f-r-e-y.” Death. And the realization that all the 8th graders were cheering on their representative, whereas the 7th graders still gave me props because, in my first year, David almost beat Goliath. Everyone would stare at us, too. Teachers, students, and school aides alike marveled at us going at it for a good hour or so, even as geeky as it might seem to someone who’d never seen this anticipation in person.

The next year, I worked so hard to learn as much vocabulary as possible and integrate it into my essays, speeches, and anything else I could get my hands on and read. My school? Easy. We moved on to the regional spelling bee. Easy. It was the first time any student from my middle school moved past the regionals. Again, a captive audience of kids from all across the region, from all the Catholic schools in Lower Manhattan, even kids who I haven’t seen in well over 2 years were there, cheering me on even as their fellow classmate was on stage. Scary stuff, but, because cell phones hadn’t even been as popular back then, all you heard was the echo in my voice. That’s all. All eyes on me.

Now, onto Manhattan-wide, where I made it pretty deep, but lost to a couple of cute girls, one of whom made it to nationals, so the competition was fierce. No biggie. I made up for it when I saw them 3 years later at the high school dance. (Muhahaha).

In any case, when I look at the Scripps National Spelling Bee Competition, I wonder if people realize just how much pressure they’re under to perform, remembering these words and learning new things along the way. On top of that, I also hope that, with this captive audience, they realize the power of the words they speak, whether they’re absolute nonsense or something they’ll say with conviction.

Certainly, their parents may try to instill in them a little wherewithal under pressure, but I wonder what happens to these burgeoning keepers of the English language. Do they become the writers, philosophers, and journalists or do they go into seclusion, writing our dictionairies in secret? I honestly haven’t done the research on that, but I’d really like to know.

For more important than the ability to spell words in any sentence is the ability to cast spells with your message. And these kids have a captive audience already. They might put that magic to use.

Jose, who defies examination, and deceives you again …

{ 0 comments }

I Was Never An Empty Cup (Consumer Beware)

by Jose on May 27, 2009 · 4 comments

in life

coffee-cup

Coffee Cup

Another poem inspired by that crazy Acentos workshop last Sunday I keep talking about. Comment as you please.

I was never an empty cup.
I was never a lifelong experience before.
I was never a sniffle, a sneeze, or a trifle.
I was never a drip, a snip, or a clip.
I was never a tumbleweed
Bouncing through indicating dearth of life.
I was never a fine.
I was never a small claim.
Though I’ve definitely been a warning.
I was never a small shoelace
I was never a thread
I was never a strap
I was never a minute hand
My experiences move at hours at a time.
I was never a blink
I was never a simple character.
I was never a small dosage.
I was never a simple sheet of looseleaf
Gliding in the wind wrought with nonsensical words and illustrations
I was never the simple piece of the puzzle
I was never a simple strand of hair
I was never the rubble, the scraps, the leftovers frozen
Readily reheated for easy consumption
I was never stardust
I was never just one digit
I was never just one stroke
I was never worth just one touch
I was never satisfied with just one kiss
I was never an easily disassembled package
I was never a note
I was never an alien
(Just kidding, I was never above a little white lie)
I was never an empty cup
Even as you drink, the cup fills until my handle whittles;
Its remnants aside the coffee grinds …

{ 4 comments }

Death Measured At Words Per Minute

by Jose on May 26, 2009 · 1 comment

in life

In this increasingly popular post entitled, “But I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For,” a commenter by the name of Kat, whose discussions on Twitter have given me food for thought, linked me to a video by Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love. Anyone who’s even ridden a subway, gone to a Barnes & Nobles, or walked down the park has made some contact with said book, even if they don’t know what it’s about. They know about a third of the women in their lives have read it, and that it’s probably made loads of money. What no one may ever see is the dedication she put to that book, or how that book may never come into existence if not for her conversations with her different personas and forces.

In the video, which I’m highlighting at bottom, she quotes Norman Mailer as saying, “Every little book has killed me a little more.” The man’s written more than 30 books easily over his life, and there’s this deep anxiety with leaving that much of your person for the world to see.

I think about my own struggles as a writer (yes they exist), and more often than not, it’s that question of whether or not I’m going to make a remarkable post, or a remarkable book, or anything where even a few of someone’s friends has on the bookshelves waiting to be read. Then, I think of the times when I just decided to write what I felt and really felt that writing, whatever the topic is, and more often than not, that’s where I’d get the conversations going, and the replies to my e-mail, or my site. It’s wonderful how that all works, and so, as you all watch this, think about how you are as a writer, and maybe we’ll find some commonalities.

Jose, who is getting closer to finding what he’s looking for …

{ 1 comment }

Don’t Ask Why Not, But How It’s Getting Done

by Jose on May 25, 2009 · 2 comments

in life

Kirk and Spock

Kirk and Spock

Sometime after I saw the movie Star Trek, my girlfriend and I sat in a diner and chit-chatted about education as usual, when the issue of “getting things done” came up. Of course, there’s now a million GTD and DIY-themed sites out there, helping you get from point A to point B for anything, thus making anyone into a virtual Angus McGyver. But this conversation? A little different.

Often, the problem stems from the idea of what people can’t do. You’ll have a row of instructional leaders from all the departments suggest one thing and get about a million rebuttals, most of them just a front to protect the speaker of said rebuttal from any further responsibility. “How will we raise test scores?” the principal will say, and the leaders will, one at a time, come up with something and counter-argue themselves before someone else gets to. Here, it’s on the principal to be like, “Everyone, just listen. No arguments against and for. Just throw out suggestions.”

In the outside world, we see that all the time. When a group of people want to make a movement in one way, there’s always a set of negators waiting on the fringe. While a little dissention is necessary to keep people balanced, we also need to see that fringe as a group of people who can easily turn virulent, and thus incapable of moving that group forward into their one vision. (That whole vision thing is important, too).

My girlfriend’s dealing with a similar situation (or maybe a little more caustic). And she just pops out with,

“My question isn’t why we can’t get this done. It’s ‘How can we get this done?’”

This moment reminded me instantly of some of the philosophical struggles I’ve dealt with, and that coincidentally, Aracelis Girmay posed a day later at the Acentos Poetry Workshop. Let’s ask that second question first, under the assumption that the first question’s been answered. Regardless of how you interpreted the first (implicit and not directly stated) question, the second question will prompt a much different response, almost as if you’re forced to respond in the affirmative.

We often look at certain people and wonder why that person, even if that person is standing right in the mirror, and pontificate on all the challenges that person’s going to face and whether they’ll be able to handle it. But people who are ready will always elicit the following: “Just watch. Don’t ask why I did. Rather, take notes as to how I did.”

Jose, who wants to follow this idea up more tomorrow …

{ 2 comments }

But I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For

by Jose on May 25, 2009 · 11 comments

in life

Frida Kahlo's "Le Due Frida"

Frida Kahlo's "Le Due Frida"

I walked into the Acentos Poetry Workshop at Hostos Community College, weary from a series of events including incurring a nasty virus and having to teach teachers how to affirm their voices in front of children (something I’m struggling with), but also resolved to make become the master of my metaphorical Starship Enterprise without getting my ass whooped through a quarter of the whole movie. (Seriously, the new James Kirk got his butt whooped through that whole thing.)

More than anything, I hoped to go in there not as The Jose Vilson, website extraordinaire / blogger / writer / teacher / etc, but Jose, the newbie at this thing. While it’s easy for me to give into my 202+ readers on Twitter, and all the other people who tend to follow my life without actually responding much except in “likes” and “that was hot”’s, it was good to come into a situation where I didn’t know most of the people in the room, thus leaving me a bit exposed and vulnerable. An advantage I haven’t had in quite a while.

There’s this idea that Aracelis Girmay presented today about multiple I’s, and what we consider to be just that one I when it’s really multiple identities. I’ve moved past simple recognition and now use those multiple identities to my advantage, and hopefully in the process, make them that one I, going back to that idea of oneness and peace we all seek, right? Right? Yet, today only proved that I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.

For one, in one of Girmay’s prompts, she asks us to write a piece using the words, “I was never a …” The first thought that popped into my head was, “I was never an alien,” but honestly, I think I am. Pretty damn sure of it actually. I was about to write an element I never materialized into, but as with everything, I’ve been every element depending on the circumstances and the person. I’ve seen myself as fire, water, earth, and air, and in every instance, I knew I could find my way back to the other three with the right conduit.

Then, as we all spoke to each other at the end, and I asked Girmay about her tastes in books (“all over the place,” which I should have known), Tara Betts, probably one of my favorite poets particularly because of her command of her art and her delivery, tells Araceli, “Oh he’s a sweetheart and he’s got a blog, too, and it’s really good. You should read it.”

At the moment, I was definitely shy about the situation: after all, Tara Betts just said my blog was hot. I’d heard it before from her, but for her to rec’ it to someone else? Even hotter. Yet, I was Jose, not The Jose Vilson, so I kinda gave a “Thanks, Tara. All blowing up my spot,” jokingly. After all, no one needed to know The Jose Vilson just yet, because Jose would suffice. Tara herself didn’t need to apologize because, unlike many humans I’ve met, she’s found a oneness in her image other young, aspiring writers (besides me) want in their aura. Thus, those sorts of compliments are second-nature to her. For me, there’s too much of a duality still: is it Jose receiving the compliment or The Jose Vilson? It’s weird.

And it got me to thinking: Jose and The Jose Vilson are separate beings encapsulated in the same life vessel. I also have Mr. Vilson (who people have familiarized themselves with quite often), Luis, and … well, I’ll leave it at that. The reason why, despite all my best efforts, is because every persona knows exactly what the others are doing, and those entities can’t really do much to intercept the other, but when they try, interesting things happen. I get a chance to be anew and prove myself all over again, or a chance to have conversation without bias to having read my work and / or know where I’ve been or what I do besides a very ambiguous “teach math.”

Then again, I don’t think I’ll ever find a place where all those roads intersect onto one crossroad. Thus, I still haven’t found what I’m looking for …

Jose, who’s glad he didn’t have to get ready for school …

{ 11 comments }

Tell Your Fucking Mexican Friends To Get The Fuck Out of Shenandoah

by Jose on May 21, 2009 · 30 comments

in life

Luis Ramirez and Son

Luis Ramirez and Son

… or you’ll be laying next to him.

That’s what Luis Ramirez’ murderers told his friends after killing him. And that’s why this post-racial talk is simply pure nonsense. I get it: we have a Black president, and we have the first____ and the first ____ in ____ and _____. While I get tired of the “first” attribute when it comes to racial achievement, it has its place. We’re only a few decades from the Civil Rights Movement and a century and a half from the abolition of slavery, an institution that this country’s had for five centuries give or take (and still exists in different countries). We’re only a few decades from Latinos officially being recognized as people in this country that existed, and only a few decades from Japanese internment camps springing up in the West.

So I have no such fancies about extreme racial progress in this country. We got a long way to go.

But when incidents like this happen, it’s just a reminder of how long we have to go. Even at my job, the xenophobia is rather atrocious. “Those damn Filipinos taking our jobs, they’re not better than me!” or “You look like a Mexican, orale guay!” Some of these Dominicans have nerve! Let anyone call these people (children and adults) Platanos or Dumb-in-a-Cans or “only good for beisbol and curvy, submissive women” and those necks will snap. Meanwhile, it’s OK to refer to others who’ve immigrated from a foreign land as hicks, immigrants, and “hard workers meant to do this.” Actually, sons and daughters of immigrants who are anti-immigration irk me. The whole crabs-in-a-barrel mentality irks me.

Then again, so do humans. Check this:

… this was a pretty clear-cut case of jury nullification: the weight of evidence against the accused was so powerful that it’s clear the all-white jury — like similar juries in the South during the Civil Rights struggle — was not going to convict two young white men of murdering a Mexican. Even if, as Friedman says, “the only reason he is dead is because he was Mexican.”

Prosecutors alleged that the teens baited the Ramirez into a fight with racial epithets, provoking an exchange of punches and kicks that ended with Ramirez convulsing in the street, foaming from the mouth. He died two days later in a hospital.

Piekarsky was accused of delivering a fatal kick to Ramirez’s head after he was knocked to the ground.

As they poured out of courthouse, the teens’ supporters shouted “I was right from the start” and “I’m glad the jury listened” at cameras that caught the late-night verdict.

But Gladys Limon, a spokeswoman for the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund, said the jury had sent a troubling message.

“The jurors here [are] sending the message that you can brutally beat a person, without regard to their life, and get away with it, continue with your life uninterrupted,” she said.

- Crooks and Liars, May 3rd, 2009

None of this is fair, and only one of the people who had a role in the death apologized. One can put a (gross) generalization that only 1 out of every 7 hate crime participants feels any remorse, even if it’s just to get out of a grossly inhumane situation. And to think, Luis only had 25 years to live, many of those he suffered just getting into this country and walking on a tightrope known as the illegal immigration worker program.

For his family (3 kids, at that). For himself. For a chance at a better life.

But they need to get the fuck out of Shanendoah. There’s no room for their American dream in that town.

Jose, who just wants a little more action for my satisfaction …

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

The Sounds of Quisqueya Call Me Right Back

by Jose on May 19, 2009 · 17 comments

in life

Jose In The Dark

Jose In The Dark

Today, Raquel Cepeda linked me to a post about Dominican-Haitian relations that she wrote on her blog, and for those of you who know me, you know I had to jump on that quickly. Most of you know my story already: Dominican mom, Haitian father, grew up conflicted about my identity and how people sought to mold it for me through their often contradictory actions, and eventually, I found my way to an odd but pleasant understanding of how my identity will work for me. It’s a gross summarization / oversimplification of the events that led to the man you see before you.

And even still, I have so many unresolved issues with my “mix” that I almost feel like I’m going to have to write those answers into the history books myself. For instance, why do Dominicans celebrate their independence from Haiti but not from Spanish / French rule? Wouldn’t it make more sense for them to celebrate it from those powerful empires and not a neighboring country that helped them become independent in the first place? Of course, the answers to these questions partly lie in one of the most reviled men of Dominican-American history, Rafael Trujillo, who ruled absolutely, almost like a now and forever king, except much more evil.

The ideas he helped instill (and ideas that many Dominicans were readily willing to accept) made way for people who’ve lived on the same island for centuries, have similar skin tones, foods, music, and DNA mixes to look at each other as completely different. It’s the reason why, when people look at my face, hear my talk, see my fluidity in culture, they’re puzzled and fight that feeling by stigmatizing my being. As a young man trying to understand everything around me, memorable quotes such as “Your lips are so big; you gotta be Black” and “How can you dance? You’re not Dominican.” or even “Man, this is the way we eat food here; you weren’t raised Haitian, so how can you be?”

I couldn’t reply in Creole. I couldn’t tell them about zouk and kompa, or that Quisqueya was the term that we both used to talk about our country. I couldn’t jump into a conversation because I hadn’t developed the ability to interpret conversation based on facial expressions. I couldn’t tell how hard it was to make peace with my stepfather’s ignorance about Haitians and how I felt so unwanted by my mother’s family because I came from a Haitian. I could barely speak Spanish either, except from what I taught myself to read and write. I couldn’t tell them to stop laughing at me for not knowing the word for tooth, or that I’d been to Dominican Republic more times than them.

Because I wasn’t Dominican or Haitian, even though I was clearly both.

But something funny happened along the way. Amidst the prejudice and pride, I used that disposition to assert myself as a whole everything. I am a whole Dominican and a whole Haitian, despite anything telling my observers the contrary. I will dance, I will eat, I will hear, I will speak. Not that I need to always prove people wrong, but icing is a really tasty part of the biscocho. I researched more than most of you care to hear, and got familiar with topics important to both countries.

And the crux of this discovery came from the sounds of Quisqueya itself. Wilfredo Vargas, a Dominican merengue artist best known for “El Perrito (the dog)” dance, had a string of hits in the 70s such as “El Jardinero,” “Cafe Con Leche,” and “La Medicina,” all very country-sounding merengues and all excellently written. In 2002-2004, I’d have these songs on rotation alongside my other musical obsessions of the day because my Dominican family played this during gatherings and parties. In 2008, while hanging with my Haitian family in Miami, I heard a song blair out of my cousin’s speakers. Oh snap. It was the same exact riff from “La Medicina.” All the melodies were there, and even the background singers sang the way “La Medicina” had them.

As Junot Diaz wrote in his meritorious book The Brief Wondrous of Oscar Wao, in one way or another, the island of Quisqueya always has a way of calling back its diaspora. In one way or another.

Jose, who solemny swears by his truths …

{ 17 comments }

So That’s Where The Genius Goes!

by Jose on May 18, 2009 · 1 comment

in life

The Power of Books

The Power of Books

I woke up this morning completely unready to teach. I’m talking about, I didn’t have a cup of Café Bustelo / I didn’t have my clothes ready / I forgot what planet I was on unready. I tried to get my mind straight about what I’d teach this week and I came up with the semi-brilliant idea of reviewing rates seeing as how we’ll need them for understanding linear equations. Good improv, Mr. V. Mr. V decides to sleep on that thought right on the A-train, taking his usual siesta a few hours too early but always right on time. I got my Whiteboard ready, laptop ready, Do Now / Problem of the Day typed up, and my collar straightened. It’s go time.

We’re in the flow of class, and I’m showing my kids some really cool functions on Excel that demonstrates the power of an equation, and they’re digging it. Again, all smooth. I do my usual walk-around, be quiet now before I call your house, let me pick up progress reports, move to that seat over there, alright you’re done, routine.

Something was off today.

And I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

So I sat down next to my front table of students, all of whom have confidence issues with math. Sarcastic teacher that I am, I test them to make sure that, when they give me a right answer, they can explain why before I give them the big “NOOOO!!!! What are you DOING?!” (The confident ones always just laugh at me.) As I’m sitting there, we’re struggling through a question that clearly states the rule as,

“It is a fact that a cup of sugar is about half a pound of sugar.”

Fair enough. So you’d think when it comes to the table, my “advanced” class would whiz right through this. Not so. My front table struggled with just telling me what half of 1 was. And after that, one of the girls couldn’t even make her y-axis right. Her increments went like this:

0, 1/2, 1, 1/2, 2, 1/2, …

Her dots went in a zigzag directly up. Hurt my soul. After I let the girls at the table converse about this situation, I just shake my head and say,

“This is my table of airheads!”

Of course, they giggle, but one of them turns to me and says,

“HEY!! I’m not an airhead! My brain has tons of books in it … I just haven’t read them yet.”

It’s officially the first time I let myself laugh in class. Quote of the year.

Jose, who wonders where all those books in my brain went …

{ 1 comment }

Where Does Drive Come From?

by Jose on May 17, 2009 · 1 comment

in life

Wolverine

Wolverine

She sat there, discussing her latest situations with adults and children with a sore arm, and a cup of coffee she sips so carefully. She resists throwing herself in a negative zone as she sees my worry; that she may lose her confidence about what she’s doing drove the conversation into what made her passionate. She then paused for a slight minute, and said,

“But more than anything, I know we can’t waste time because the kids have no time. We don’t have time to figure this out when the kids only have a certain amount of time in their own right.”

In the last couple of days, I’ve had the privilege of being exposed to various personalities and their mental drive. I’ve spoken with cameramen / producers of digital film, entertainment media mavens, writers, artistic directors, teachers who are soon-to-be-administrators, and even watched superstars with points to prove and heroes who’ve lived many lives discover themselves in an unknown instinct within them. All of them have this internal gasoline set to different degrees of heat, ready to set a fire ablaze at any point. Their fires are all very distinct: some give off smoke and light the place up at its mere presence; others prefer to have a cool, focused aura about them, and whether or not people know they’re there, people understand that person’s importance in what’s going on there.

But they all seem to have this common thread: their work has little to do with how many people saw it or how much money they’re making off of it or even how successful in the general sense that product is. It’s more about the impact that one move has on everything else from there on out. It’s the means to the end, not the end itself. The end, which for some is defined and for some not as clearly, is a destination that they feel they’re reaching through their actions.

These passionate people, in one way or another, convey a pain, a suffering they try to emanate in one single moment, and while everyone that supports them celebrates their astounding achievement, they squint their eyes and clinch their mouths at you like, “I know I’m not done.”

What makes you passionate?

Jose, who writes with a kettle of boiling water in his stomach …

{ 1 comment }

← Previous Entries