NYCeek

Blog - first of all let me say sorry for neglecting you for so long. The last few months have been so hectic with travel, fun, and work that I haven’t found the time to sit down and jot down some thoughts. Honestly, it would have been many more months if I didn’t have the fortune of running into Rasheed. More on him later.

So this afternoon I was up on Brooklyn Vegan checking out today’s concerts (instead of working) and the site showed that Mr Fishscale and Digable Planets were set to perform at Highline Ballroom. Right away I knew there was a 30% chance I’d go, a 50% chance I’d stay too long at the gym, and 20% chance I’d just pass out and call it an early night (unfortunately, I’ve succumbed to the 20% way too much recently)

After heading home early, I head over to Crunch and sign up for the Knockout Boxing class. It wasn’t nearly as hard as the Chisel with Boxing Elements class, but still worked up a good sweat. On top of that I made a new friend with a really odd, but unforgettable name. Resolva - it was great to meet you and sorry for spraining your wrists, I forgot you weight about 50lbs less than me… and you’re female. My bad.

By this point I’ve already decided to attend the concert all the way across town. I shower up, put on my pathetic attempt at looking down (backwards fitted A’s cap, supreme shirt, 514s, and some hemp green dunks) then hop into a cab. Worst $8 I spent in my life. Not because it was a bad ride, but because when I arrived at the venue they weren’t letting anyone in unless you were on the VIP list. Motherfukas… After a few futile attempts to get in (sweet talking the door girl, drawing the “2″ handstamp on my hand with a nearly empty ball point pen, I was ready to give up and walk my ass 7 Avenues and 14 Blocks back home. No Ghost, No Beats, No Rebirth of Slick, No F’ing Luck.

Then Highline realized they were hemmoraging people and started to sell tickets at $7 a pop. $8 was already invested in the cab ride, so whats another $7? I had already missed Digable Planets (well, technically I heard them while I was trying to weasel in) but Ghostface, Alcemist, and the Red Bull Producers battle was still to come. Like RB says, I was in there like swimware.

Stepping through the door I was luck enough to catch a new producers 14k, Frank Dukes, Hitmakers, Best Kept Secret, and C Sick do their thing. There is a lot of young talent in hip-hop and tonight gave the audience confidence that the next generation is ready to take the torch. Also in the house were CrazyLegs from the Rocksteady Crew, Prince Paul, and some other mid-level hip-hop acts.

Between the semi-finals and last round, Ghost blessed the mic for the crowd playing favorites such as “Ice Cream”, “Victory”, “Shimmy Shimmy Yall”, and “Be Easy”. In an awkward moment GF tells the crowd he’s outta time and abruptly leaves the stage. The crowd is puzzled, but is eager to see the final matchup.

In the end C Sick ( who is 17 y/o) won over the crowd beating Frank Dukes in the final round. It was close, Frank had him after 3 rounds but the crowd wanted more and in the 4th round C Sick proved victorious. IMO Frank Dukes beats were more complex and had depth. C Sick’s beats hit hard no doubt, but they followed the same formula and it was hard to tell them all apart.  Either way, that kid just made himself a millionaire today — don’t let it get to your head duke.

That was the end of the show. I proceeded to the exit, saw Ghostface standing by the door then mustered up the courage to ask him for a photo. Stunned at first, he quickly obligied and posed for the camera. Before I had a chance to step to the aide, Ghost asks me my name and if I BUY his albums. “Of course” I say, then he smirks and calls me a “goddamn liar”. Guilty as charged, I haven’t bought a Ghostface album since Ironman.

On my way home, I decide to walk up 6th Ave towards 23rd street. As I approach Chelsea Papya, I see a homeless man sitting on the sidewalk. No surprise, he asks me for change — but today I felt unconventional, a little different. I pause for a split second and ask “do you want a hot dog?” I can tell the man wasn’t use to that response, but after processing it for a second he happily nods. Thank you sir, you’ve just given me a reason to have a late night snack!

2 hot dogs with everything, 1 coffee. I roll back to the corner dish out the goods and eat my hotdog with a total stranger who just refered to me as “China”. We somehow manage to talk while stuffing our faces with processed pork goodness, we exchange names (Rasheed), home (Patterson, NJ), occupation (former dock worker), Age (51, although he looked like he was 30 something), what we were doing there (he gets a different perspective on things while in NYC), how we got there (he went to prision, lost job), clothing (keeps clothes and self clean at church), and what was next (immediate - get enough money to go back to NJ, long term enter a program to get himself help).

That’s about 10-15 minutes worth of conversation, most of which I would unfortunately forget in the next few days. There was on moment I had with Rasheed that will always stick with me, that is when he asked me if I had anyone special in my life. It was a bit of a personal question, but knew he didn’t mean any harm by it so I happily answered. His response was simple but really resonated to my core. He said, “That’s nice, its nice to have someone in your life.” There was no need for me to say anymore, his eyes told me everything I needed to know. We said our goodbyes and I haven’t been able to think about anything else since.

Bless you Rasheed - tomorrow is a new day and I know you’ll find your way. Stay up, stay strong, and I hope we meet again.