A YO Big Virg!

Dr. King and the Drum Major Instinct…

I never really followed the whole situation with the building of the Dr. King Monument but now that it is up I have mixed emotions.  It is very necessary that Dr. King be memorialized more than just an epitaph on the stone steps of the Abraham Lincoln memorial but a stone statue perhaps not…

The paraphrasing issue brought up by Maya Angelou is also an important point… they say paraphrase, I say misquoted… and in stone too.  If you understand the whole Drum Major Instinct speech then you would know the paraphrased quote is completely out of context… A champion of the people knows what he has done and knows what he will do and to stand before a crowd and trumpet those achievements is always looked down upon by the same people that champion may be fighting for… I would not guess what Dr. King’s expectations would be for this memorial… I only know him as most scholars do through lessons and reading and listening to his many speeches.  I would not be able to say if Dr. King would be proud or hide his head in shame upon this memorial, all I can say is what I get from the memorial and what I know and learned from the lessons of Dr. King.  If anything stands the highest in all of Dr. King’s teachings is love. Love in all aspects.  Stone to me does not represent love.  Stone does not represent hope or change. Stone is cold, never changing, and rigid. All the things I cannot find any similarities to Dr. King.  The memorial of Dr. King should have been water, like a river. Forever flowing, love has no end and is limited in capacity by how much a person is willing to give to another.  Like water is to life, love is necessary to the people. It is the root to understanding, it is the common goal, love is what builds dreams.

I appreciate the memorial to Dr. King and we can not expect any better especially since it is truly the first memorial on the mall of our nation’s capitol that is attributed to peace or a peaceful struggle for civil rights and not towards war.  And for that I will make my way to the memorial and celebrate the life and times of Dr. King and I will always continue my lessons, readings, and listen to the speeches that will come from others who have listened and loved Dr. King as much as I have.

Summer Reading list

I just noticed that since I checked in to the Chateau Paradise Valley Hospital back in March my Summer Reading List became a 2011 reading list. I still watch tv and movies… but my new addiction are these books… Some I just read the parts I want to… others I get in too deep and read in one sitting… most I digest sometimes slowly and am actively turning the pages every now and then… they sit in my car or in a backpack, laptop bag, messenger bag, some are stacked neatly on my bookshelf, while others are just there when I can’t sleep…

So I’m just going to list them out and say where I’m at with them…

1. “Strength to Love” Dr. Martin Luther King, JR. unfinished in the middle of ch. 8

2. “Everything I’m Not Made Me Everything I am” Jeff Johnson finishing up part III but not really interested in finishing the book. I got what I wanted from it.

3. “Writings and Speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King” Im not really reading this one cover to cover but I got two earmarks, the first one where Dr. King explains Love and the power of non violence and the other the speech - “I see the promised land”

4. “The New Marketing Paradigm” Various authors Also not reading this front to back… this is just one of the books that I am canvassing for information.

5. “Paper Towns” John Green finished… yeah Im a youtube fan…

6. “Pimp” Iceberg Slim finished. Great fucking book.

7. “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” Truman Capote finished the Breakfast part. Not really interested in reading the other stories. Just read it because the film director Blake Edwards died. Also, I was reading this at the same time I was reading “Pimp”. 

8. “Never Drank the Kool-Aid” Toure I started reading this in college. Every now and then I see something on tv that reminds me of something in this book and I reread it.

9. “Live From Death Row” Mumia Abu-Jamal Finished this one back in college but actually I like rereading this every now and then including his other book.

10. “All Things Censored” Mumia Abu-Jamal finished but I keep going back to it also.

11. “This is NPR” various authors just picked this up from borders got a sweet deal on it. Its hardcover for 5 bucks.

12. “Decoded” Jay-Z same sweet deal too. Hardcover for 5 bucks. Just skimming through it for now. It actually delves real deep into the heart and thoughts behind some of Jay-Z’s songs. Not necessarily all the hits but the ones that have a real history behind them.

13. “High Voltage Tattoo” Kat Von D One of the few books that I use just to study the pictures. Havent done that since art school.

14. “Bayan Ko” various this book details a photojournalists perspective of the 1986 People Power movement. I read parts of it here and there. Biggest accomplishment to date? I got it signed by former Philippine President Fidel Ramos.

15. “When the de la Cruz Family Danced” Donna Miscolta Just started this and in the first 30 pages Im taken back to 1980’s National City… 

16. Langston Hughes reader An entire collection of writings… Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair… This is one of the few books I read like the bible… Reading only verses and chapters that go to the heart and soul.

17. “Growing Up Filipino II” various authors Finished the first 3 stories. 

I’ll stop here for now but there are still more that I have at home on my bookshelf and desk that I haven’t opened up yet and a few more that are on my amazon wishlist. Plus I downloaded some free-use books from Kindle that I can only read on a computer.

In my Kindle collection I started these but did not finish (because it isnt the same as reading a book. I need to be able to turn the pages, write in the book, and not stare at a screen)

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Chess Strategies, and Aesops Fables.