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August 1, 2005
So Called Chaos
"I want to be naked, running through the streets,
I want to invite this so called chaos, that you think I'd dare not be
I want to be weightless; flying through the air
I want to drop all these limitations but the shoes upon my feet
I want to invite this so-called chaos that you think I dare not be..."
-"So Called Chaos"
From the album
So Called Chaos by Alanis Morrissette
...I was going to call this piece "Welcome to Monkeyville," but it was met with criticism, mainly from my boyfriend who swore that he wouldn't read this peice if I didn't change the title. He claims that is racially offensive to refer to people as primates, and that I should know better considering I'm a Black woman. I suppose he's right, it isn't nice to refer to people as monkeys, but when I think about how some humans behave, especially the ones I'm about to tell you about, I'm more worried about offending the monkeys.
The idea to call this piece Welcome To Monkeyville" entered my head as a result of my daily experiences travelling in and around the county of Kings-otherwise known as Brooklyn.
I feel that it is my duty, as a writer and a concerned member of an exploited race, to express my horror, sadness and embarrassment about the way that some of us behave towards one another, and still have the audacity to demand respect. I'm just writing about what I see, and how it hurts to witness certain facts. As much as I despise them, I cannot separate myself from them because I share a common ancestory, and socio-political-I share the same hatred for a racist system which keeps these-my people exploited and angry, and makes them lash out at one another instead of at the system which keeps them caged. This is my way of lashing out. Also, I'm a believer that everything happens for a reason, and one is meant to do certain things in his or her life, regardless of whether or not it's controversial-I was meant to write this peice because the things that I am going to talk about affect me deeply. Also, I got a fortune cookie which said "wisdom becomes knowledge when it becomes your personal experience...", and who am I to argue with the valuable insight of a fortune cookie. C'mon, haven't you read the Celestine Prophecy?
Picture it: A hot summer day in Brooklyn. Downtown Brooklyn to be precise. The tale I'm about to tell is modern tale of two cities/ It's bout two,o'clock on a Monday afternoon, and as usual, around this time, I'll break out of the office for a breath of fresh, gentrified Brooklyn air. I'm a collections manager by trade, but I whenever I get the chance to escape the office, I pretend I'm a travel journalist,with my finger right on the pulse of this great borough, and as Brooklyn lives, and breathes, I'm right there-to capture the essence of the daily lives of Brooklynites...
My journey begins on Montague Street,in trendy Brooklyn Heights. Excuse me, before I begin, I must stop into Starbucks for a Venti Caramel Macchiato. (It's just the sort of thing one does in Brooklyn Heights) The place is saturated with young yuppie mothers and bohemian babes in flowing skirts and colorful jewelry. Some carry their cute curly blond babies in snugglers across their chests, others push monster strollers-the equivalent of S-U-V-s that dominate the bloc, while other fresh-faced young mother's roll past roller blades, their hair flying in the wind as they whiz past me. I exit the Starbucks, and walk back down Montague Street, trying to avoid stepping on pint sized pups looking for a place to doo doo. Every so often young fathers stop in the middle of the street to exchange pleasantries with the other young mums and dads on the way dropping their kids off to day-care. I see "friends shaking hands, saying "how do you do..." It is a live version of the Luis Armstrong tune, and I am right in the midst of it. It's a quite different scene from the one I'm about to enter... .
I don't know how many of you have seen the movie "A Bronx tale," but there's a scene in the movie where the main character "C", anItalian-American boy walks his Black girlfriend home from school to the sounds of a sweet, romantic, melody. This romantic melody is meant to enhance the romantic mood of two young lovers as they flirt, and giggle and get to know one another. However, as soon as C approaches the young womans neighborhood, the soft, romantic mood music abruptly changes and you hear Jackie Wilson's raunchy cry that, "99 and a half just won't do" and young C gets a bottle thrown at him by angry brothers and he scurries back to his Italian neighborhood. Everytime I make a left on Livingston and continue on down to Court Street I'm reminded of that scene in the movie. This is definetely a Tale of Two Cities.
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The smell of freshly brewed Starbucks coffee is replaced by the aroma of stale grease, and fried food. Sidewalk cafe's are replaced by streetvendors who are busy feeding hungry young legal-aid lawyers and their clients. The peace and quiet I took for granted only minutes ago and blocks apart is interrupted by impatient drivers erratically honking their horns every few seconds, speeding to beat the light, and every once in a while slamming on brakes. Friends shaking hands, saying "how do you do," has turned into loud obnoxious voices cursing at the drivers or pedestrians who get in their way, slowing them down. Delivery trucks rumble over potholes, while beady eyed drivers ogle young women waiting to cross the street.
Courthouses and lawyer's offices replace the Starbucks this side of Brooklyn, and they are saturated with men and women, mostly people of color, who are not smiling, or shaking hands with their neighbors. They are angry, annoyed and irritable as they wait in line after long line to have their complaints taken care of, pay their bills and then scurry back to work like mice-on with their busy lives. There are no rollerblading dogwalkers, S-U-V style strollers or time to exchange pleasantries in the middle of the street on this side of Court Street.
The atmosphere on this side of Court street darkens in comparison to the neighborhood I've left behind on the other side. There is a line a block long in front of 141 Livingston Street. This is small claims court. The line is pregnant with old men, and young women, the elderly and disabled and recently arrived immigrants. This line looks nothing like the one I just left a while back at Starbucks. We all wait impatiently as the Court officers bark orders, enjoying the authority their uniforms and guns afford them. It is time for the old man at the head of the line to pass through the medical detectors. He is ordered to take everything out of his pockets, put them in the grey bin and proceed through the detectors. He doesn't speak English very well and cannot understand why the beepers keep going off, and the officers keep calling him back. The court-officers, point to his pockets, their strained red faces becoming redderas their patience wears thin. "EMPTY YOUR POCKETS!" They repeat, a little louder, as if perhaps their language would become clearer if they yell. The man looks down at his pockets and removes the few coins that set off the beepers. The large woman with the nine-inch bright blue acrylic nails impatiently folds her arms across her chest and taps her feet impatiently. She curses the man for not understanding goddamm English livin' in "fucking America." She pulls her tight green tank down over her bulging belly and smacks her gum loudly. She shakes her head in disgust as she drops her box of Newports, and keys into the grey bin and continues through the metal detector.
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Hometime: The end of today's journey...
Finally-time to put an end to today's misery. I'm on the B41 bus-limited, which runs along Flatbush Avenue. I'm staring out of the window to my right on Livingston Avenue, observing the people outside, waiting for the bus to come and transport them from the hell of a days work and take take them away from their thankless jobs and mundane existence and deliver them to whatever remnants of peace and solitude can be found at home. They knock one another over to find a seat. Animals...but what can I say, to have a seat on the bus, a few minutes of solace and comfort after an entire day spent on one's feet I cannot fault them for. It is well deserved compensation that only a lucky few will receive. It's survival of the fittest to obtain a seat on the bus; every man, woman and child for herself, especially when it acomes to the coveted single seats by the window. Even though I'm the last person to arrive at the bus stop, I am the first person on the bus and the first to occupy the the third single seat by the window, and I'm a little embarrassed to say that I outsmarted two old ladies and a young woman who was too busy cursing at the young lady with the child for jumping in front of her. She didn't even notice that I jumped in front of her. Phew, thank God that's over. I got a seat-and the seat that I wanted. Now, I will sit back, try to relax and enjoy the relative calm before the inevitable storm...
And it arrives...in the shape of a robust, heavy set woman-probably in her late twenties, She's sporting an oddly shaped windblown, orange-red hairdo that sits lopsidedlyl on her head. Her oversized frame is smushed into a bright orange halter dress that is too tight and too short for her age and size. What cannot be squeezed inside bubbles out of every crease and crevice in her outfit. Her tight angry face is heavily made up, in shades of burgundy and pink, her wide mouth is stained with bright red lipstick and twisted in snarl, giving her an evil appearance. I mean, the woman would frighten the devil himself! She wobbles up the stairs on the bus with great effort and as soon as she makes her way onto the bus, she stretches one mammoth arm behind her and produces a little girl about 5 years old and practically throws her in front of her onto the bus while she digs in her pink sequined bag for carfare.
The little girl is a younger, miniature version of the woman, so I imagine it is her daughter. She finally finds her metrocard and pushes into the slot. She parts her bright red lips revealing big white teeth, the front two are rimmed with gold and stained from her lipstick. "Stop play'n'git yo' ass on this bus," she says as she shoves the girl into the two-seater in front of her. The little girl's pink ribboned pigtails bob from side to side from the force of her shove and her arm hits the window with a thud. The woman plops down in the seat behind her. She busies herself for a moment, digging into her purse, straighteng her skirt and fidgeting in her seat. She glances up and around at the many faces who do their best to avoid making eye contact with her. Satisfied that no one is staring at her, she makes her daughter the target of her rage. "Takiya, quit that crying before I slap the shit outcha," she says to the little girl who turns to face her mother with fear and confusion in her eyes, a trickle of tears crawl down her plump, brown cheeks. They fall slowly, as if they too are afraid. The little girl called Takiya looks up at her mother's twisted, angry face and then quickly resumes looking out of the window and away from the monster beside her.
Passengers shake their heads and kiss their teeth in disgust, whispering back and forth and commenting to one another under their breath.
"Do not roll your fucking eyes at me," she shouts to no one in specific, yet everyone. The devil with the red lips shoots a murderous look at the elderly woman seated before her; her defiant stare says challenge, but to avoid what would be an ugly confrontation, she quickly averts her gaze and shrinks back into her seat. The fat woman slumps back into her seat with a thud, satisfied. She even has a small smirk on her face-she can keep her title as heavy-weight champion. The queen intimidator. "I don't know why people don't mind their goddam business" she says, to no one in particular, but to everyone. We all stare at the floor, as if we will find answers there. And when we find none, we begin to make ourselves busy, as though we haven't witnessed a scene that should have us all up in arms, lined up to take turns brutalizing the woman the way that she has brutalized her daughter. We all want to say something, to do something, but we can't. We don't. From the corner of my eye I notice the mammoth arm reach out, like a big tree limb dangling from it's enormous trunk. She rings the bell to alert the driver to stop. She abruptly stands up, without regard for the passengers she knocks out of the way. As she gets up she tries to straigten out the too-short skirt which has ridden up on her to reveal a cellulite ridden, dark and flabby butt-cheek. She doesn't seem to care. I did. That was pretty disgusting, and unnecessary. I recoil in shame and suppress the urge to vomit. I don't think I'll be able to eat dinner tonight.
As the bus rolls to a stop, she yanks the little girl back up again, her head and skinny limbs flopping too and fro limply. She looks like a little rag doll. The woman, without excusing herself (there would be none for her)yanks the girl up,pushes her heavy self through the crowd, and heaves herself off the bus with much effort. we can feel the the bus tip as she steps off the stairs. When the bus resumes it's balance we breathe a collective sigh of relief.
I watch the little girl trails along pathetically behind her mother, head drooped, shoulders slumped. She looks lifeless. Her mother runs ahead of her thick limbs jiggling, heavy arms lifted in an attempt to flag down the dollar van that has abruptly stopped to pick her up. I continue to watch as the woman, begins to chastise the little girl for being to slow. I can't hear her thank God-I can only see her wide red lips opening and closing like a shark. The young girl picks up her pace, but she never lifts her head. She's lifeless, defeated, useless. I watch them both until they disappear into the van, darkly tinted windows hide them from my view forever. I sink back into my seat and stare out of the window again. I notice a group of girls hanging out in front of a sneaker store on Flatbush. I can't hear what they are saying but they are animatedly pointing to some sneakers in the window. Coming towards them is a tired looking woman in a nurse's uniform. She looks like she's just finished a long shift. Perhaps she's even put in some overtime. Perhaps she is on her way home to daughters, or sons the same age as the young women admiring the sneakers in the store. I wonder if she has dinner prepared, or if she is going to drop down on her couch and just fall asleep. I just sit and watch her. I watch her until I can no longer see her and I feel sorry for her, and for myself too. There's got to be more to life than this...I'm desperately trying to find it within this so-called-chaos that is my life.
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Posted by renee at August 1, 2005 8:32 AM
Comments
You are a fantastic, and creative writer. When will your public be able to purchase some of your other stories.
Posted by: Ray at October 11, 2005 8:37 AM