it was the mid eighties when I was roughly 16 or 17 when marijuana (weed) was the big and profitable drug of choice. Business was a booming success and continued to excel. In and out the customers would come. One part of the housing projects was a unique section where most of the business was conducted. This horseshoe shaped area was a convenient spot to do deals, sort of like a drive through at a McDonald’s. It was next to a church. I guess one can say that the church paid the game no attention and the game paid the church no attention. When your eyes are closed to reality you never see the big picture. The only picture I was seeing was the almighty dollar. The volume of traffic was at a fast and high rate, which meant there was more then enough money for everybody who was hustling on that block. So I started off as a mere nickel and dime dealer. The money came at an okay rate. In a days hustle, I made more than enough to buy new Jordan’s; I would buy every color in the store. The latest trends that were in the mall, I would buy the entire rack. But gradually, I graduated to bigger and better things. In my younger years, I was accustomed to the poverty part of life but now I was reaping the materialistic things of a fast buck. No more sleep for dinner nights and no more of one pair of shoes in a year’s time. This, I felt in comparison to my prior aspiration of wanting to do something more legitimate in life such as college or the military seemed to be an acceptable trade off to anything legitimacy had to offer. I never realized the extent to which my whole life would be changed because of these events as well as others that would follow. The weed business had started off just as I said, fast and quick money. For a minute I thought I was a business man in a sense. The hustlers in the neighborhood didn’t care if I hustled on the block just as long as I was buying weed from them. I was okay with it until I found :: 11 ::
out I was getting pimped. That is one thing about the game it plays so many parts. But by this time, my clientèle was in the streets. I was purchasing an ounce from the neighborhood hustlers at $80. So I found a cheaper connect for $50 an ounce from an older cat. The old coon basically watched me grow up in the projects. He also watched me hustle as well. He was a cool dude who had been around for a long time and was well respected in the streets and in the neighborhood. One day he stopped me at the corner store and told me to come see him. I took him up on that offer and never looked back. He made our relationship short and straight to the point. He was about business. He tried to school me to some real hustling tactics on how to carry myself, how to keep a low profile, and save my money. In a nut shell, nothing I wanted to hear. After seeing how he was eating, I wanted to be in his shoes. I wanted to be the man. What I purchased, he fronted, and that’s when my money graduated. Once the purchase was made, I then bag it all up into nickel bags into small brown envelope, and then hit the streets for my profits, taking no shorts. I loved living by that creed, but it was only mere greed for the dollar. My daily agenda was to make money nothing more, nothing less that was the bottom line. I went from ounces to pounds in a matter of days and the other neighborhood hustlers watched. At 18, I thought I was running things. I had my crew of captains rolling with me; my money was coming in daily.
The only picture I was seeing was the almighty dollar. The volume of traffic was at a fast and high rate,
Photo: Robinson / Spangler Carolina Room PLCMC
