NY State Of Mind

It drops deep as it does in my breath/I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death/Beyond the walls of intelligence, life is defined/I think of crime when I'm in a New York state of mind

Track 2: NY State of Mind

(This was written under the influence of Benadryl, so excuse me if it seems rambling.)

February 1st, 1986: Spring Valley, New York

The day of reckoning was upon me. I had known for months that I was leaving NY. All my stuff was packed, all goodbyes had been said, nothing left to do but hop a plane and head down south. I was 11 years old and flying dolo on Delta. I can't remember why, but my mom, sister and brother weren't coming until the next week. I also can't remember what airport I went to, but I do remember that it was snowing. I had the red and black lumberjack with the hat to match, (that's the truth, not just stealing Biggie lyrics) and I was carrying my boombox. In the deck, I had UTFO's first album. I had the vinyl, but I had just recently converted over to a Maxell cassette tape. In the pockets of my bomber jacket, I had other tapes, mostly stuff I recorded off the radio including "Rock The Bells", a song I was obsessed with. After a brief layover in Charlotte, I arrived in Savannah, Georgia and was greeted by my grandmother. The first thing I noticed was the heat. Son, it was 85 degrees down there and I was rocking the lumberjack and long johns. For real, the game switched up on me for real. I was in for a major culture shock...

Growing up as a Yankee in the south, I kept my NY State of Mind. I proudly proclaimed "I'm from New York!" when asked where I came from. Sadly that didn't mean too much to the other kids at DeRenne Middle School. I was an outsider, but for the most part I didn't mind. Besides, I didn't really understand half of what these kids were saying anyway. Their southern slang was so much different than my northern slang. When I would say something was "def" they would look at me like "huh?" or when they said they were gonna "box me" I didn't know until too late that meant I was about to be hit. I'm playing, nobody ever hit me. But you get the point, we were just different. I would say "youknowwhatI'msaying" after every one of my sentences, and they would say "Iknowdatright" after every one of theirs. Eventually, I learned how to communicate with them and incorporate the down south talk with my New York talk.

There were times where my NY State of Mind got me out of trouble. For example, in 7th grade, I had invested in a candy selling biz with a classmate. I was the financing, and he was the salesman. I should put his myspace page up here to put him on blast, but I wont do that, although if you go to my page and look for the only guy on there, you'll know who I'm talking about. LOL .Anyway, one day we were in the gym taking a standardized test (not sure why we did this in the gym) when some other kids started stealing the candy out of homeboys book bag. Son, they were messing with my money, so I had to step in. I'll be damned if 4 of the meanest, most delinquent ass teenagers at the school wanted to fight me over some candy. They caught me and Fred outside at lunch. I was holding on to the bag and refusing to back down. Fred literally left me holding the bag (although he denies that he jetted on me). I couldn't punk out though, I'm from New York. I don't play that shit. Thank God my bravado worked. Them fools actually thought that I could fight. My NY State of Mind got me through that one.

As I got older, I maintained that NY swagger. I walked like I saw the rappers walk on Yo! MTV raps. I emulated the slang I heard in the hip hop music. I rocked the baggy jeans like I saw the New York cats wear. Remember when Africa medallions and X hats were big? I had them joints. You couldn't tell me I wasn't still from New York. I tried to turn brothers on to that NY hip hop. You could find me rocking my GangStarr tape, or my PE, or Tribe Called Quest, or some Boogie Down Productions. When they would ask me why I listen to that crap, I would proudly proclaim "I'm from New York, boyeeee!!!" Even down south, I kept that NY State of Mind throughout high school. But then something happened that changed all of that...

I went to college and met people from all over the country. I realized that I don't really like some people from NY. I mean, I liked the idea of them, but the actual people were kind of... annoying. I mean, they were cocky and rude and arrogant. Always talking about how shit was gully (what da hell does that word mean anyway? I missed the memo on gully) in New York. And everybody I met from NY had a tough guy act that I was beginning to be able to see through. It was like they were herbs up north, but came down to Savannah and acted like they ran the projects. Half them cats never even saw the projects. I wondered, is that what I sounded like all those years ago when I moved from New York? Did my NY State of Mind turn me into an arrogant jerk that thought I was better than everybody else? I think it did.

So now when people ask me where I'm from, I don't yell out "I'm from New York, kid!!" That was 21 years ago; I can't claim that anymore. But occasionally I still have my NY State of Mind moments, particularly when I'm listening to some horrible rap song inflicted on my ears by a Southern artist. I'll find myself thinking "We don't do it like that in NY. We actually write lyrics" before catching myself. I'm not from NY, and some NY cats (cough Jim Jones cough) are just as wack as these ATL cats. Besides, my man Rakim told me back in 87, that "it ain't where you from it's where you at", nahmean?

Next Up: Track 3: Life's A Bitch