If I could turn back time...

Supposedly, Spike Lee's got some new project up his 40 Acres and a Mule sleeve.

It's being reported that Lee _ who more readily specializes in revisionist history _ will take on a sci-fi film inspired by Robert Mallett's ground-breaking pursuit of a theory to explain a way to reverse time. Mallet reportedly was just 10 when he lost his father. The ensuing longing, and scientific study, led to a memoir,  "Time Travel: A Scientist's Mission to Make Time Travel a Reality," which Spike will develop for screen.

Variety quoted Lee saying: "Time Traveler is a fantastic story on may levels (and) also a father and son saga of love and loss."

Enough said.

We all know by now how harshly the lack of Black fathers in homes across the U.S. is felt. Kudos to Spike for sensing the need for a story that acknowledges it, and could potentially spur a remedy.

As for me, thank goodness a time machine like Mallett envisioned would be of little use. (Or, I admit I'd likely use it for no good.)

Going back 10, 20, even 30 years wouldn't change much about my ties to my dad; even though my parents split up, gradually, between my elementary and middle school years. He never talked much, but he always meant what he said.

He didn't live with us during my potentially disastrous teenage years; but he never lived more than a determined 10-speed bike ride away.

His efforts at parenting might not have consisted as much at times than picking up for breakfast at the downtown greasy spoon where cops ate for next to nothing; but he set an example for me to be patient and 'yes, ma'am' a lot.

He was a lousy husband. But he taught me people skills.

Since, I've set seemingly unattainable standards for myself, no awards for "Greatest Dad Ever" appear on the horizon. But I do try to instill lessons that the II will benefit from 10 years hence; whether I'm around (physically) or not.

Be nice to girls. Get a job. Take care of Mommy. Practice your left hand. Save money.  

That sort of thing.  

Whatever it is you believe, make sure to say it. There's no time like the present.

Nas is whipped!

I can see it now: Obama's standing stiffly at a podium in some cross-over state, trying to look all commander-in-chiefly to sway skeptical voters, when all of a sudden some hack of a reporter rises to ask his impressions of the latest Nas CD cover.

Insert: Pregnant, awkward pause.

For more than a year, the gifted rapper Nas has threatened to use the N-word as the title of his highly-anticipated, and often delayed follow-up to his 2007 anti-prophecy, "Hip Hop is Dead".


The backlash to the very notion of using THAT for a title is well-documented. So, instead, Nas revealed in a recent New York Magazine profile that he's going more stoic with the next CD's packaging. It'll just depict him with his name slashed across his back in the form of whip marks.

Now THAT'S keeping it real. A young and famous black millionaire can think of no better way to portray himself and his talent than referring to a slave-era atrocity that the poseurs he calls his contemporaries could hardly endure.

In the same article, by the way, Nas showed himself to be so careless and ill as to roll and smoke a blunt in the presence of a reporter wondering what's taking so long for his next "joint" to be released. He was also written up to be clueless as to who he'd be sharing the CD's production credits with.

Nas's next release may turn out to be an aural masterpiece. But it's marketing will prove to be another setback for father's trying to shield their sons from imagery that sends such an irresponsible and confusing message.

So pardon Obama, you hack reporter you, when you ask him to comment on Nas' CD cover and he goes into, 'Let me clear my throat' mode.

The BET AWARDS' soul redemption: Quincey Jones

The 2008 BET Awards counldn't have been further off our household's radar last night.

Mommy had to clock in with three or four girlfriends before she went back to work to sort out some files and then come back to make dinner.

Me and the II had to go and keep honing his basketball skills; at the playground two blocks away, the one mommy deplores due to how ghetto the action is. We got in a good 15 minutes of practice (impressive, I must add) before the hood rats to run full-court on the beat down indoor court we'd sought haven fromthe heat in.
Pause: Nelly and Jermaine Dupree. Grown men showing their underwear unnecessarily onstage.

Q _ as in quality _ has left the building.

NOBODY HAS TO STARVE WHILE I EAT QUINCEY QUOTING PUSHKIN


WHEN IT RAINS GET WET. LIVE YOUR LIFE AND LIVE IT WELL.


YOUCAN'T GET AN A IF YOU'RE TRYING TO GET AN F.

BET: Black Enanbler Television?

It's probably too late to apologize.

There's this special BET's airing this week that essentially pulls a scab off a wound the network itself played a large part in causing.

"Where did the love go?", indeed.

Let's just take a guess and say that the unstoppable slide of black men and women's levels of disrespect, scorn and manipulation of each other started some time around the time of Ja' Rules short-lived days of heavy rotation (give or take a few years). Suffice it to say the damage started long before anyone considered that a festering sore was born.

Thank goodness no one in our house grows weary of watching "The Wiz" on DVD and soaking in Quincey Jones' orchestrations and the phenomenal cinematography and mind-blowing costumes.

Funny, how a fantasy film can ground you, whether you're 4 or 44, in realistic principals far better than the rhythmic tales from the 'hood that the entertainment channel supposedly by and for us ever could.

But enough of my preaching. Time to TiVo "The Jeffersons", let the rest of Hugh Masekela's "Time" download, and think of other creative things to do with my wife and child while the question of how love got "lost" gets skewered as a lead-up to an awards show celebrating music that caused its disappearance.

Spare the rod?

The ribbons of irony that come with playing daddy to the tilt twist with irony.

I walk into work this morning with a younger brother who's around my age, but just seriously dating a woman with a grade-school-age daughter. He chides me about my only child winding up spoiled, because there will be no siblings. I pass him _ who has no clue _ off with platitudes dealing with college financing and age and energy and extra-curricular obligations.

I don't think he heard me.

Later, I meld with Dan-O accidently on a trudge down the Fairlie alley to the Korean store that sells good sunflower seeds in salted shells. On the way back, I related how the II had earned a few firm love taps on the bottom the previous night for acting out egregiously at a fairly nice restaurant.

We were there with the parents of his main pre-K squeeze and the two of them had shown out all through dinner, dessert and the long-ass good-byes outside. Mommy made me out to be the villain for swatting him in public. (Public being a make-believe "green" community of overpriced custom dwellings with chi-chi services and eateries sprinkled among them.)

Anyway: I read today that the Indiana State Supreme court ruled today that "corporate punishment" was not punishable by law. The ruling came down after a woman petititoned for the right to beat her son with belts and extension cords to punish him for stealing her clothes.

I risked getting whupped while growing up in the Hoosier state for infractions no worse than setting foot in my mama's pristine living room. I endured "corporal punishment" from the toddler stage through 12th grade, in many and bizarre shapes and forms. I got caught and suffered the consequences. In the long run, all those paddlings and spankings, I think, helped more than hindered my upbringing.

I wish all those I grew up with who wound up in jail or leading shiftless lives had been touched as many times by the cruel hand of love as I was.

It's almost comical to me that the sole dissenting voice in the 4-1 vote to allow whuppings in the Indy judiciary hails from my hometown, which has grown exponentially more violent since I left right after high school. In his opinion, an allowance for parents to whup their kids' asses undermines efforts to spot and prevent abuse.

There may be grains of truth in that argument.

But I remain convinced that a boy's better off learning that a S.W.A.T. operation could confront him at any given time.

 

Going with the flow

I'm no Earl Woods.

If I were of his caliber that I think I wish I was, the II would have gone to bed tonight with a Medicus gripped in his tiny, tired hands.

He'd be dreaming under a scaled-down painting of the 18th hole at Augusta; with the lights of his Titlelist Pro-V1 chandelier dimmed to a faint shine.

Instead, he's upstairs with an ice-pack on his head and a sweet vanilla soy milk pouch planted in his mouth because rolled off of the Lightning McQueen duvet on his new "big boy" bed. I suspect, that he might have been attempting an ankle-coiling cross-over dribble in his sleep, and took a highlight reel tumble off the side.

I've got the putting green in the back yard. He's got a near-complete set of Tiger's overpriced Nike sticks for kids; plus an off-brand junior set and plenty of second-hand clubs ready to be cut down to custom lengths for him.

But my boy wants to hoop, not chip and putt, right now.

Our evening routine centers around basketball. He'll rush me out of my work clothes into some version of the shorts/t-shirt/sneakers combo he's wearing. On easy nights we go out and clang on the 6-foot portable on our driveway. More often, he pleads to go out to the nearby public playground, or to its dank, adjacent inside gym if it happens to be unlocked and/or atteneded.

Tonight, at mommy's behest, we switched things up and went to the fancy new black YMCA, where the baskets crank mercifully down to 8 feet, and where foul-mouthed, n-word infused, malt liquor-fueled, saggy-pants play ain't allowed.

He had a blast. The winter-league coordinator took notice of his four-year-old dribbling skills - which are about as good as mine were when I was a JV scrub in middle school - and people shooting around on the other courts didn't seem to mind at all as he handle the ball all around them.

Stupid me: I started feeling like it was a wasted trip if he wasn't able to shoot high enough to score on the lowest rims in the cleanest environment I could find. So I kept prodding him to shoot from the one spot _ with bended knees and thrust and follow through - that gave him the best chance at a bucket.

After three tries he would have none of it.

"Daddy," he groaned, with a frown, "this is not practice. We're just playing."

I'd missed the point. All he'd wanted to do was taunt, "Come get me," and then dribble off. He just wanted another game pitting him (the Hawks) against me (the Short Barneys).

I get it now. Almost. T-ball season starts in four days, and he can't be bothered to practice fielding grounders. The footwork and toughness he showed during the soccer season that just ended makes me wonder if he should be exposd to that a lot more.

And, looking on the bright side, he said something very profound and encouraging as I helped with his post-hoops, apres-dinner poopie tonight.

"Daddy, read me a golf magazine."