Read Who I Was Starting Davidson here
When I was 18 and writing this poem - I was even cockier than I am today. I would imagine that I would die before 20, and people would discover my poetry, proclaim it genius, and I wanted to leave little clues that connected different poems - so that future students would have something to write about in their poetry analysis. So, this pre-amble very much references another poem - "This Is Not Light" that I had written when I was 16 at Stanford.
However, it sets the tone for everything that would come after in the poem - the love and hate relationship with the city, the idea that things aren't always what they seem, how you can get lost in reality, and how it is so hard to leave your past. Probably the most emotionally resonant line is "it hurts, to laugh and smile sometimes" - because there are just so many times in my life when I am expected to be happy, be awesome, be inspiring, be a leader - and I just feel like crying, but I just laugh and smile instead.
But it was so true that North Park at that time (before the expansion) was a very preppy mall - everyone really did wear polo and khakis. So the first stanza of Dallas is really a memory of a specific day in my life. My best friend, Danny Garcia, was playing with his band at North Park (which felt like a really big deal at the time) and he was doing great, and there was some art opening at the MAC that night and I wanted to celebrate. So, it is really the introduction to this almost glamorous life and lifestyle that was combining the arts and people who had money and prestige in Dallas, that I had wandered into through education and talent.
So, we would wander from place to place, and there was this excitement that we were all going to be somebody special one day - because we had been told how great we were since forever. And we were constantly exposed to cool things - my good friend Matt Whitenack whose mother Nancy owns the leading contemporary art gallery in Dallas, Conduit Gallery, well she was one of the first residents when Southside first opened. I remember running around there with Matt, and they working on renovating the inside of it, and Matt was a hot shot young artist and so he had his own studio on the roof of the coolest loft space in Dallas at the time, with these beautiful views of the skyline, and just this sense of freedom, of having your own space, of being awesome and artsy, that was incomparable at 17.
So, there was definitely this sense that we were a bit more awesome than everyone else we knew, because we were all doing cool things, winning awards, and knew cool, beautiful, rich people, and I was definitely a part of all of that. Definitely believed entirely in this idea of sangfroid - that everything we did we should make it look effortless, that this was all just our birthright - however it wasn't, and I think that is where a lot of the sadness came from.
My good friends at the time were all sorts of screwed up. Behind this beautiful facade - I grew up thinking that it was normal to personally know at least one drug dealer (I knew several) and that it was just part of the high school experience. I did have friends who had tried to kill themselves. And in general we were just all incredibly reckless - this was a time period in my life when my normal driving speed was 100 mph - everytime I got into a car I would break a 100 if I got onto a freeway. There was a definitely an utter recklessness and disregard for rules - so I completely had Gwendolyn Brooks poem "We Real Cool" in mind, especially her ending of we die soon, because that is where we were all headed, and not surprisingly a year later one of us would get there, and it was only by the grace of God that the rest of us are still alive.
One of the big parts of my life during this time was driving - I lived far away from where all the action was, so I was constantly in a car. And it would often be when I was driving from Dallas to DeSoto where reality would set in about my true emotional state - the glitz and glimmer of the city would be behind me, and I was left with just a sadness.
I had this idea that I had already peaked at 16. That I would never be cooler, more alive, more intelligent, more vibrant, than I was at this age. I felt that I had already lived life and really DeSoto is almost my proof for why I felt that way. I had gone to Stanford to write and had met this beautiful girl named Courtney Hopen, and she was the first girl I really enjoyed kissing. And it was a miracle for me to go Stanford, my family didn't have the money, they had offered a partial scholarship for the program, I had raised some funds, but I was still short. A few days before the program started my Dad found this saving bonds they had put away for me when I was a kid, and they had all just matured and was the exact amount of money to the dollar that I needed to go there. Add to this I finally learn how to write poetry while I am there, and I meet all of these great young writers from across the country, I fall in love with the campus and the place, and riding bikes everywhere, and now there is this beautiful girl, who is sitting with me under a tree, and we are making out and reading poetry to each other, and it is a sunny day, and I hear the lyrics to Semi-charmed life "When Im with you I feel like I could die/ And that would be all right, all right", and it is just the happiest moment I had had in my life.
So, I contrast this super happy moment with the grittier reality of Houston, TX - which for me was always where I felt most black growing up. My mother is from the inner city in Houston, and so that is where we would go when we visited (about 5 times a year) and my uncle owned these row houses in the roughest part of town - 5th Ward. So, you would have this prep school kid going to this totally different world, where people looked like me, but we had nothing in common, yet it helped expand my own experiences - and was exceedingly valuable, and perhaps most importantly at that time was something that my peers in Dallas didn't have.
I continued my case by citing some of the books I read that were really influential to me. There were some geniuses in my class, and they could beat the pants off of me in most subjects, but reading was one thing I felt I could compete with them on. I will never forget we had this Russian literature arms race, and I kicked it off by reading War and Peace. Then everyone else read War and Peace and started on Anna Karenina. Then I had to read that, and somewhere around there everyone read Crime and Punishment - but I started reading The Brothers Karamazov - it was a very competitive thing, but the point is at 16 I read some of the best novels ever written, had all of these great cultural experiences (chitlins), had won lots of awards, gotten standing ovations for my poetry, and was simply depressed by it all.
Because I was smart, I was able to pick up on patterns and have always been interested in human behavior and fancied myself a student of human nature. At this time, I would use my knowledge to manipulate other people and play games - especially with girls. And it all seemed so boring and pointless to me - I was just starting to have my first episodes with Bi-Polar back then, but I didn't understand any of that. I just knew it was weird to have all of these great things going on in my life and to still feel so crappy.
I continue my case for great life experience at 16 by listing these opposite things that I had done. I had this great experience in Houston where I stole a wheel chair with a friend of mine from a hospital, and it was the first real thing I had stolen, but I was also an Eagle Scout (which you wouldn't expect to steal things). The Door was this christian club in Deep Ellum and I had gone to concerts there but was very much in love with hip hop both commercial and underground. In fact, my mother hated the fact I would constantly listen to hip hop because of the profanity but I loved it. So, all of these contradictions that were and are my life, the entire poem, was really just a giant lead-in to the penultimate stanza.
I had struggled for a long time about how to write about trying to commit suicide. I didn't want to glorify it, because there is no glory in it. However, it felt dishonest not to mention it - because by nature it becomes one of the important parts of your life. Most importantly, I knew that no one knew or could really believe that I would have tried to kill myself. I was the kid who had it all. When I applied to college I was accepted to Stanford University, Washington University in St. Louis, Rice University, University of Texas, Plan II program, Davidson College, Austin College, University of South, Emory University, and even got a nomination to the Air Force Academy. I got scholarship offers from every school - clearly whatever you were supposed to do in high school, I had done it just as well as anyone in the country.
Yet, I had tried to kill myself. And it would take another few years before I could reconcile that, but the truth was I felt worthless, I felt like I had nothing to live for, I felt that I had done a lot, so I didn't feel all that bad about ending my own life. The most important part was that no one knew I was dealing with any of these emotions in high school, no one knew I was depressed, sometimes suicidal, it was nothing I could talk about with my parents. All everyone saw was the lakes calm surface, the very talented, accomplished, outgoing, and well-spoken young man.Yet I think it is a powerful (and perhaps familiar) story that the most talented can end up the most lonely, the most depressed, and the most hopeless.
However, I was not 16 when I wrote this poem, I was 18. And I wasn't dead. And the last stanza is really about why and where I was a couple years later, going to college. And there was this girl named Mariana, and she was my first love, and she talked me out of killing myself once, and I will always love her for that, because I might not be here if it wasn't for her. Although, the fact that she was so far away added to my general angst. But I have already written about her in much greater detail elsewhere.
The last thing I want to talk about is The Great Gatsby. When I first read this book it was like reading an autobiography. To this day I still often think about certain lines in the book. But there was/is this idea of some far off, marvelous thing, that I am so desperately trying to get to, but trying to get to it is much more important than actually getting there. So, it is important to me that the poem does end on a very hopeful and redemptive note - because ultimately I think that was my high school experience and life experience. I have had moments of intense sadness but I have also had great joy and triumphs and friendships and lovers and unfortunately my periods of normalcy and happiness will always be interrupted by times of sadness and depression, but I don't let it stop me. I am trying to become whomever I am supposed to be, reach my potential as soon as possible, and in truth, I haven't slowed down yet.
"I care about the things I witness and how they resonate with me" - Bill Simmons, The Book of Basketball
I have had the privilege to listen to great music performed in houses for relatively few people. I have seen amazing assortments of talented musicians who form a band for one night, make angels come down from heaven, and never play together again.
Being young in Dallas, TX and part of what you may describe as the underground arts scene is an exhilirating feeling. The scene isn't underground out of any intellectual or snobbish reasons. Nor is it a result of a backlash against a repressive art establishment
The scene is underground simply because no one knows where to go and artists are constantly finding each other, then losing each other, then buying into the ridiculous notion that Dallas can't ever be their home.
Young artists in Dallas don't want to be here. They have this idea that fame, truth, lifestyle, money exists for them somewhere else - Austin, Chicago, Portland, and always, New York. So the best of us - leave - but they also come back, a few days in town here and there, and they are like ghosts, rumors, whispers, lightening in a bottle that can be caught at some friend's house, in the corner of some dive bar, perfectly anonymous, talented as hell, and constantly in motion.
My best friends are like this, and it disgusts me. I came to Dallas because I think it is the most exciting place in America to be part of the art community. Everything about the city screams potential.
The arts in Dallas is all bones - state of the art facilities, a few well-run organizations, a group of seasoned veterans - a skeleton that might burst to life at any moment if we attach flesh to her.
Art scenes in other places, Austin, Boston, Chicago, New York - they are more mature, more established, they have less flexibility for someone young to come in and matter. The gift of the Dallas art scene is that you - as a young talented artist - matter here. You become a breath of fresh air, a sign of hope, a bit of blood threatening to pump through the veins of this cities art infrastructure.
And how important it is to be relevant! For your existence to matter to somebody. Dallas offers this in spades - what better place to plant roots and make a name for yourself?
When I first returned to Dallas in 2008 - knew very few people in the arts community and sent blind emails to many gallery directors and arts administration professionals at large non-profits (Dallas Museum of Art, Office of Cultural Affairs, Big Thought, etc). And these people who had never heard my name - responded to me - were willing to sit down for coffee - listen to my ideas - give me advice - and introduce me to other people.
What more could you ask from an art scene than that it embraces and nurtures the young?
Yet, my peers give up on Dallas without really trying to understand her. They don't try to delve beneath the cliches that Dallas offers in abundance - a land of $30,000 millionaires - and find a vibrant core of like minded individuals who hide beneath the surface and create a sort of shadow economy of desire.
However, even though most young artists aren't brave enough to approach the gatekeepers, hat in hand, the gatekeepers do not devote hardly enough time or energy to provide infrastructure to keep young artists here.
Even though young artists leaving Dallas is a big reason the Dallas arts scene is underground, the other big reason is that no one knows where to go. Young artists who came of age during the first decade of the millennium found a Deep Ellum that was in shambles and intellectually bankrupt, didn't find a cultural scene in Uptown, was confused as everyone else by Victory Park, were slow to find the Design District, and although noble, Southside wasn't enough.
In the last year you had the success of the Bishop Arts District, Centraltrak and Amsterdam (yes, always, but if there could be one place that was an anchor - Monday night at Amsterdam is the closest thing you have), and a re-emergent Deep Ellum. You also had an economic recession kill arts programs, shut down non-profits and galleries with equal abandon - while two new multi-million dollar buildings open up - shining, new, glorious, and completely out of touch with the young artists who live (and don't live) in the underground.
Given this background, perhaps it isn't surprising why so many young artists live in Dallas for a while and then despair. It takes energy and certain type of personality to sketch out the underground. To find the little of pockets who, from time to time, valiantly come together for nights of artistic defiance - who validate, in secret, that Dallas is a viable city for the arts and for young artists.
And maybe the only reason I have so much faith in the future of the arts in Dallas is because I go to so many of these underground events - things advertised only by a facebook event invite, an email, or a text message - if at all.
I see so many talented artists creating all kinds of great art, 4 to 5 days a week, week in and week out, and rarely at an "established" venue or art space. I make friends with these artists, get to know them, and time after time, I watch them decide to leave, attend their going away parties, and then force myself to head back to the shadows, praying that I will find someone who can decide, like I have, to make Dallas their home.
Orginally posted at A Decade Of Excellence
