Today Was A Good Day...Well Sorta (PART ONE)

Last week was a momentous week for certain residents of Highland Hills, a small community located in Southeastern Dallas. For the past 8 YEARS the area lacked among other basic necessities a grocery store. Imagine 8 YEARS without a grocery store. Imagine having to go to another city to get food. Imagine having to ride the bus to go to another sector of Dallas, to go to a store and get fresh food. Imagine having to walk as much as 45 minutes to an hour to and from an adequate supermarket to get food. Imagine having to bring backpacks on your journey to load up with groceries to take back to your home. Imagine having to hop on the bus or walk with a couple of bags of chicken, a 15 pound bag of potatoes, a gallon of milk, bread, veggies among other things. I did all of that, and wore out numerous pairs of shoes in the process.

The previous local store, E-Zee Shop, which existed even before my parents arrived here in 1972, had become a shell of a supermarket until it closed around '07/'08. The atmosphere was dreary to say the least, and most of all meat, fruits and veggies were not up to par, the refrigerator equipment had become well outdated, causing meat and fruits/veggies to lose their freshness. Bread was rumored to have mold and droppings in them. I say rumors because I didn't witness it myself, but I clearly remember seeing Flour Weevils in a couple of cake mixes I purchased. When I went to the owner/operator to tell them what happened, they informed me of a switch in warehouses, mostly likely an older warehouse, as the reason for the change in the quality of food. 

Plus the people there were not always the best when it came to customer service. Some people had run ins with them. The old man who owned the building was somewhat cool, but after his death, it was off the hook. The story as some folks tell it was they closed up because they were robbed at gunpoint. Typical hood story, yeah I know.

However a neighboring tenant who ran her own tax service stated they were not only mean to customers, but also to her as well, and cited that mistreatment among local citizens may have actually caused the robbery, as an act of retaliation and not just some attempt to get money.

I can agree with that analysis, because after closing shop for several months, the same people came back as another so-called grocery store, this time they called themselves Value Giant, promising to open up as a totally different store, even promising to open a deli, and allow customers to rent DVDs. Doesn't sound to me like the robbery attempt affected them that much. 

Within days, maybe less than a week or two, Value Giant had to close down, selling off their meat at prices like 25 cents a pound. Did another robbery cause this to happen? Not at all. What happened was Value Giant was using E-Zee Shop's old outdated equipment (since they were the same people anyway), including the refrigerator, causing the meat to become brown and aged, and ultimately they could not operate any longer. My question is simply why would you try to re-open a store using the same antiquated, broken down, substandard equipment anyway? What does that say about your perception of the community you claim to serve?

Well you know how it is in the hood right? It's never their fault as to why these areas become targets of urban neglect, right? It's not the city's fault as to why a prison was built in the surrounding area before the crime actually came, right? It's all these damn criminals around here, right? Even if crime was not a problem at all, even when Highland Hills was considered a lower-middle class neighborhood designed and built especially for African-Americans who were looking to move their growing families into actual homes they could afford to buy, before the crack and drug era, before the proliferation of street gangs, but hey, let's not blame them, and definitely do not bring up the subject of racism. Racism and Dallas, Texas does not go together at all, even if in 2010 they allowed a casino named after a Native American tribe to post an offensive giant size advertisement in the middle of Downtown Dallas.

It's always the citizens' fault, and we blindly jump right on the bandwagon, with our self-hating, one -bad-apple-spoils-the-whole-bunch, believe everything they say about us, selves. Can you believe local ex and current politicians actually believed that developers refused to assist in "revitalizing" and investing in the area because of a few young Black men who wore baggy pants, and the supposed crime in the area? 

During a talk about art in 2013 one ex-politician tried to challenge me on not believing such an idea, leaving me to present the flyer that the city of Dallas was sending out in 2010, encouraging local residents to vote yes to allowing liquor and beer to be sold in local stores, claiming the money accumulated would help build roads, parks, and aid in the police force.

For more information on this please read my blog "Sobriety Is The New Enemy." Here is the link: http://realquwwa.blogspot.com/2010/10/sobriety-is-new-enemy.html

So imagine this community being persuaded to allow a store that we don't have, because nobody wants to invest in such a "crime-ridden" area (code word for "a place filled with niggers") to sell a DRUG which contributes to up to 20,000 road deaths ANNUALLY, but not good enough to actually put a STORE with FRESH, QUALITY, AND REASONABLY PRICED FOOD in a neighborhood to aid and assist its citizens? And don't tell me nothing about paying taxes...We all know about taxation without representation...

Now that's gangsta nigga....

(TO BE CONTINUED)

Well Lookee Here!

Peace All! It's been a very trying time for me, dealing with delays and other things that dealt with my art,  along with other issues, and to be honest, it took a great toll on me. My blogging and my web presence suffered greatly, and burnout seeped in. I had blogs planned from Nicki  Minaj to Azealia Banks to Bill Cosby(again), but gotta take care of home first, meaning my personal life.Maybe call it dogged determination or faith, but I'm still at it. Just wanted to brief you on what's going on in my life, and the blogs will keep coming, God Willing. There's always something to blog about.

The above piece was a  12 x 12 that I went over in black about a couple of weeks ago. Didn't want to, especially with the texture, but I'm finding my art needs more space, and this was one of those pieces. I don't think I can define clearly what I want to express on a 12 x 12, so hopefully for future ideas, I'm keeping the photo.

Take care, more to come.

All I'm asking....R-E-S-P-E-C-T!!!

Peace all,

Hoping that this blog reaches everyone in great health and spirits. I know it's been awhile since blogging, but all of my social media has suffered as well, especially Twitter and Blogger. In reality all of this networking became a serious burnout and a source of depression for me after releasing some of artwork to the public to little or no response. I felt that I was doing something wrong, and that people weren't getting what I was trying to convey to the public, as well as people were being somewhat finicky and sometimes downright disrespectful in my work. Take for example last month a "fellow artist" came to my local library, saw my work and loved one of my pieces, and wanted to purchase it. I made the mistake of asking how much she thought it was worth, and she replied that she didn't want to disrespect me, but told me $100. This was for one of my prize pieces that everyone seems to like and related to. I felt disrespected, but regardless I asked could she pay $200(which is STILL lowballing) and she stated she would have to save up. I told her no problem, gave her a card, and tried to make it accessible for her to purchase it. She emails me a week later saying she can't do the $200, and tried to negotiate again for $100. With that I refused to reply to her at all. Lesson learned... I'm realizing there is more to this thing than meets the eye, but I won't go into it right now. My spirit is now starting to rejuvenate to the point where I'm enjoying what I do again and go out to just shoot pictures and do more artwork. This was not a positive summer to say the least, but I hope things will pick up for me. This coming Sunday some of my work will be on display and for sale at an art fair in Dallas. I won't be present due to other priorities, but someone is going to display it for me. I hope that I will spark some type of interest when it's all said and done. I hope to be back real soon to talk about my next exhibit and the meaning behind it, so stay tuned family. Take care! Luv Ya!

Which Comes First?(Peepin' the Game)

Peace all...

Just a little heads up on the next upcoming exhibit while I'm at it...The new name of the exhibit will be Grey Matters...Don't ask me now why I want to give it such a name, it's very long and extensive trying to explain it all right now, but believe you me, I thought long and hard on how to approach this next exhibit. The initial date was set for sometime in February in commemoration of Black History Month, however me being the person that I am, always trying to find something different, decided that my project will not actually fit in Black History Month, although it is dealing with issues pertaining to race in America and African Americans in particular, more on that later.

Right now I'm pressed with another issue, as tonight there is a meeting in my local library concerning route changes in the Dallas Area Rapid Transit system, this area will be affected as well with a proposal to eliminate the express bus in my area by early Summer of this year. Those who used to ride the express bus which takes one who lives in my area directly to downtown during the rush hours via the freeway will be inconvenienced instead in going to the nearest train station and taking a train to downtown, which takes MUCH longer and causes much more of an inconvenience for those who just need to go directly to downtown. Without any real reason given on the brochure this decision is made, which again affects an area which continues to see nothing of any good coming this way from City Hall except junk and increased police presence. One look at the brochure clearly shows that the focus is up north, or the newly gentrified areas of Dallas, with elaborate depots being built near downtown, express buses being shifted to the West Plano area, and a 35 million dollar trolley being built which will service the Trinity and "old, resegregated" Oak Cliff areas.



The question I have is does Q finally step up to speak his mind or continue to lay in the cut and continue to make an impression in the community? I mean even if I speak my mind tonight and begin to let these people know that everyone here does not accept what's clearly going on here, and that their gestures only add to the speculation of ghettoization and gentrification here, City Hall is not going to give two cents of concern. The only thing they will do is put me in a "troublemaker" database, and spend their time trying to isolate and incriminate me or anyone in the area who openly opposes the tactics of the greedy, and continue to misinform the community about what the real deal is. C'mon now, I wasn't born yesterday, OK? Anything tonight is only a ceremonial gesture of my support of this neighborhood and human beings' welfare in general. You don't really think these people will change their minds, do you? I've had too much recent experiences on these plantations to know the people in charge will not do ANYTHING...



But do I also continue to lay low and continue to make an impression on a community that is nothing short of lethargic, whose main concern is "husslin' and stayin' alive" or even worse, preoccupied with some of the most self destructive mechanisms of self hate, conspicuous consumption on this side of the globe, pointing fingers at the supposed high level of crime that they claim keeps the "good" grocery stores and businesses from thinking of setting up shop over here, and agreeing with the corporate media, who justifies the growing police presence, so called gang units, and helicopters flying consistently over my area as if a person can't walk the streets alone here? I mean I walk the streets here DAILY and have rarely come across any hostilities here, but what can one Black man do when the major media outlet in Dallas comes to his area and broadcasts a scene featuring 20-25 police cars, two helicopters, all over one dude who jumped out of a bus after shooting another passenger on the bus? I guarantee you this type of stuff doesn't happen at the other side of town...



Either way, Q will make a statement, God Willing....Stay Tuned...