Basketball…In Memory of Mr. Payne

This was written April 28, 2020. With the recent passing of my former basketball coach, Mr. Payne, I felt compelled to share… I had a rough day. There was a lot on my mind, and it thwarted every attempt I made to work. The words did not flow from my fingertips to Microsoft Word at […]

Life Lessons I Learned From Boxing

Listen along while you read: Read It Because I Wrote It Podcast “You’ve got to make people respect your jab! You’re big and strong and your [right handed] straight [punch] will put someone to sleep. But if you don’t extend your [left] arm and throw more than just a decoy jab, no one will respect […]

Resolving the Great Millennial Debate: The Tupac Rule

My friends and I found ourselves at Katra Lounge on Bowery on a February Friday night in 2013. Our whole collective was out and about, as we celebrated the release of our brothers’ mixtape Till Death, by FCF, hosted by DJ Fatfingaz, who was on the turntables as well. It was also our friend, K-Starr’s […]

My Ode to Self-Care 48: “Rich is Gangsta”

“Last night, I had a dream about you. You were older. You were driving home from work, in a very nice car, to your very nice house. The sun was setting and you were able to look back at everything you’d been through and say to yourself “I made it.’” Timile Brown told me this […]

My Ode to Self-Care 46: “Perfect Timing”

This is another one of these where I am simply writing whatever comes to mind, how it comes to me… One of the idiosyncrasies I have picked up from my experiences is hyperawareness of time. I view almost everything through a lens of everything is finite. I could be having the greatest experience in the […]

My Ode to Self-Care 44: “Hold Tight”

I hit a wall today. If I were to include this essay, I have eight more prompts and an epilogue before this four-month excursion is completed. Towards the end of all projects, the creative mind feels depleted; the easy solution is to stop and begin the next one because it is already on your mind. […]

My Ode to Self-Care 42: Right On Time

Dozens of essays ago, I wrote about my college roommates, Devin and Walter. In 2005, Walter was a recent seminary school graduate, was 11 years our senior, and worked as an administrator at Morehouse College. Despite our difference in age, the three of us got along. One night, the three of us sat in our […]

My Fall Rewind: An Ode to Self-Care 40-“Pups”

For a solid year, I have watched my nephew tilt his head and stretch his neck, to measure how much more he had to go before he stood taller than me. At the start of the summer, I still had him by a half inch. By the time July came around, the roles had reversed, […]

My Fall Rewind: An Ode to Self-Care 38-“The Feel”

Solo with the braids used to get busy…with all the humility in the world, I can assure those who knew Chad Milner throughout the first decade of the aughts would tell you the previous statement is a fact. This is the name I am referred to with affection by those who were well acquainted with […]

My Fall Rewind: An Ode to Self-Care 37-“Kush:

It’s been long-forgotten and oft-considered forgettable; but I love the first single from the oft-rumored, oft-delayed, and never to see the light of day, Detox. “Kush” came and went because it was formulaic: Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg tag team for another big record, with piano keys on fortissimo; but the 2010 version, so we’re […]