—Himbro St.
College happened a long time ago.
The not-quite-a-man sat quietly outside a UPS Store in NW Washington DC, and scribbled in a notebook. The man was pale and skinny, having acquired a nasty booze habit at 14, and another nastier habit for cigarettes a year before, he was gaunt and pale, and not even abusing cocaine or ecstasy—his preferred party drugs. Now he sat, and continued to scribble in a notebook no one would ever see.
Earlier in the afternoon, the man had played some Sonic Sum, Galapagos 4, Anticon, Freestyle Fellowship, Typical Cats and Rhymesayers while rolling a perfect Phillie blunt he had cracked himself. It was one of the few things the man took a small measure of confidence in.
He and some friends scooted off campus and enjoyed the sticky-sweet odor wafting up into the ether at a local park.
They all wore backpacks, and were slim. Some sported LRG tees and baggy jeans. Others rocked a sideways cap featuring a crate of vinyl records. Vinyl dominated the proceedings on most nights when they were weren’t in the park or out on drugs, but it wasn’t because of any retro return to the record. It happened because a couple of them DJ, and a crate is a crate is a crate, as long as you find the dope beats on Beat Nuts record. “Torturing the fader, the Tech 12 freaka.”
Some of them shyly began a cypher of varying degrees of amateurishness, but they all enjoyed the pacifying effects of simply being away from the dry campus and overbearing Resident Assistants. It had gotten so they were all on probation or about to be expelled. Such is the life of a college student. Especially these college students that sweat THC and stepped on cocaine and swear “Scotch, neat” is the only thing to order at a bar.
Then it was time for work, and the man grabbed a notebook from his room, threw on his large headphones and sauntered over to the UPS store. He scribbled some more things, then “ripped out these few ghastly pages from” the “notebook of the damned,” and said hello to his boss.
In college it was OK to dream. Not anymore.
