So I Joined a Cult Today – Hey!

(Lyrics by Rougebuddha – there is a melody I have in mind but I’m not trying to get sued. So I won’t say. I have a friend named “Trevor Kanbay” and the melody I’m thinking of rhymes with his name. If you can guess the melody feel free to sing the song in your head…you can’t get sued for that yet, right?)

Stress and strife in my life
La-la-la-la-laaaaaaa
Thought prayer was right
Prayed with no hope in sight
So I joined a cult today –hey!

All day long they come and they call
for me to get others to join
They have to keep their numbers growing
‘cause people keep going
But I joined a cult today – hey!

My dearest loved one died
La-la-la-la-laaaaaaa
Felt lost and alone
No place was home
So I joined a cult today – hey!

All day long they come and they call
For me to get others to join
They have to keep their numbers growing
‘cause people keep going
But I joined a cult today – hey!

My job was outsourced
La-la-la-la-laaaaaaa
No paycheck for me
Can’t buy grocery
So I joined a cult today – hey!

All day long they come and they call
For me to get others to join
They have to keep their numbers growing
‘cause people keep going
But I joined a cult today – hey!

Today-ay
I joined a cult to-day!

I won’t go!
I won’t go!
I won’t go!

Limp Dick

I watched the Dick go limp right before my eyes and I enjoyed it immensely!

Never have I uttered those words before but I look forward to more opportunities to say them. Just to be clear, the Dick I’m talking about is the “illustrious” Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley.

“Dick” has bare handedly manipulated the city of Chicago as the undefeated mayor for 20 years. Urban legends allege he even paid the two Black candidates who ran against him in the last election to split the Black vote and secure his seat in the 5th floor office.

But on Friday the International Olympic Committee said, “Nope – we’re not the ones”, when they eliminated Chicago from the possibility of hosting the 2016 games during the very first round of voting. Woo hoo!

Maybe now Dick can muster as much time and money as he did trying to secure the Bid, for trying to secure Chicago.

City crime is up and Chicago is on the way (if she hasn’t arrived already) of claiming the ill-distinguished title of Murder Capital of the Country.

Just this past month the brutal video taped murder of 16-year-old honor student Derrion Albert made national news. What did not make national news are the high numbers of similar crimes occurring in Chi-Town on the regular.

Since September 2008, 36 Chicago Public School Students have been murdered, by school-aged killers. Most of the murders have been executed by drive by shootings, however 16-year-old honor student Derrion Albert was beaten to death and this past May 15-year old Alex Arellano was beaten, shot and set on fire!

Dick wanted to light an Olympic torch when there are people in his city lighting children on fire… Is it just me or are the priorities a little askew? Now I get it when Mother’s remind their sons, “Baby, don’t think with your Dick.”

While Dick was busy romancing the IOC a Chicago Catholic Church has been flying it’s U.S. flag upside-down (an official signal of distress according to the U.S. Code of Laws regarding how to fly the flag) in hopes of getting more attention and more action allocated to solve the city’s gun violence problem.

Then there is/was Michael Reese Hospital – a once giant force to be reckoned with, in the ranks of renowned trauma centers. Today sits under the wrecking ball. Dick pretty much offered up it’s prime lakefront land to build “Olympic Village” – luxury housing for the 2016 Olympians and such, to be turned into UN-affordable housing once the games ended. Translation: Let me complete the final phase of gentrification in the once predominately mid to low income Black community (Bronzeville) and further push out of the city anyone who would mobilize to push me out of city hall like they mobilized in the early 1980’s electing Harold Washington who would still be mayor of Chicago today had it not been for his sudden fatal heart attack, then I can give the jabillion dollar construction contract to my brother-in-law’s construction company Walsh Construction ‘cause they get to build almost everything in the city and they know who to call if you need to make an airport disappear in the middle of the night!

Now that Dick has gone limp as he was about to thrust deep into the 2016 Olympic Games, he will have time to lube and stroke every number of Chicago pandemics. If he rides is just right using all the stamina he used in hopes of securing the Bid I’m confident Dick will bring a satisfying resolution to the things that real Chicagoans tell me they care about. Oh I don’t know let’s say things like:
Rising Crime Rate
Gun Violence
School Aged Murder Victims Killed by School Aged Murderers
The Chicago Public Schools
Is the expensive and imported Police Superintendent Jody Wiess a cy-borg – he doesn’t look real – maybe that’s what’ up with the crime rate
Is Ron Huberman your secret love child – he gets all the good city jobs
Unemployment
Homelessness
Highest National Sales Tax 10.25%
Parking Meter Fiasco
Chicago Transit Authority
Stop the Wrecking Ball and save Michael Reese Hospital
Diamond and Tionda Bradley are still missing

Dick, if you put your back into it and sweat it out I know you can make it all come together.

There will be menthols on the nightstand when you are done.

The Lotus Sutra vs. Elmore Leonard

This past July I began re-reading the Lotus Sutra.

The Lotus Sutra is what some schools of Buddhist thought proclaim as Shakyamuni/Sidartha Gutama Buddha’s highest teaching. Other schools beg to differ.

 

My first official socialization into Buddhist culture (albeit a wonky one) was said to be rooted in the Lotus Sutra, though I was never encouraged to actually read or study it. In fact, during my earliest days as a budding Buddhist when I asked what the words we recited as lengthy prayers twice daily actually meant, I was told I didn’t need to know – I just needed to say them.

 

When I continued to ask I was told “the words tell a story – they are in a BIG book – I don’t have one – but I’ll try to find it for you.”

 

That was in 1983. No one ever got me the book. Or maybe someone did, after I had decided they were mostly nuts and left the sangha. It wasn’t until 2006, when a bout of my own nuttiness lured me back for another go, that I purchased my own copy of the Lotus Sutra as translated by Burton Watson.

 

I read it from cover to cover rather quickly for its depth. Then I put it down and thought, okay I see why I was never encouraged to read or study it.

 

The Lotus Sutra is complex in places and simple in other places.

Some parts are reminiscent of Christian Bible parables. Other parts resemble Endora and Aunt Clara’s book of spells. I doubt that anyone from the sangha had even read it in 1983 and for sure didn’t want to have a real dialogue about it, even as they were programming me… I mean teaching me that it was from this very Sutra that my newfound Faith was based.

 

After reading it for the first time I had an egocentric sense of accomplishment but no profound enlightenment. It was more like a school yard I –read – book- you – didn’t – read –Nah –Nah –Na – Nah – Nah!  It was nice to put some key phrases into perspective. Phrases like, the Nyo ze so. Nyo ze sho. Nyo ze sa. etc., in triplicate, business and the often quoted but rarely understood at all times I think to myself how can I cause living beings to gain entry into the unsurpassed way and quickly acquire the body of a Buddha?

But other than that my initial reading did not change me in the profound way I thought/hoped/expected it would. And after reading it again and again, of all 28 chapters I’m still unsure why chapters 2 and 16 are the only chapters that have morphed into daily prayers for some Buddhist practioners?

 

So this July, fueled by a discussion on another blog (Thanks Joe. Thanks Nancy.) I attempted to re-read it once again. It is now September and I have been stuck “middleway” all summer! The only thing I’m clear about is that I’m not clear.

 

Is the Lotus Sutra Shakyamuni’s highest teaching or is it a story about his highest teaching? Or is it a story about the moments leading up to his highest teaching?

 

Is everything (Life. Death. Fire. Famine. Love. Joy. Envy. EVERYTHING) all nothing but an expedient means to/for something else? How expedient are those means anyway? They all seem to take a long time…

 

And what’s up with the demon daughters? No, really?

 

At the end of the day/book how do we arrive at the common denominator of nam myoho renge kyo? I don’t mean the semantics of it – yeah – yeah, I get the whole Japanese translation of the Sanskrit title, but what I don’t get is how do the 28 chapters of this one Sutra translate into an entire Faith based on reciting 4 words over and over and over and over again? I used to think I did. I no longer do. Like I say on my about page, “I thought nam myoho renge kyo was the answer then I forgot the question.”

 

Since I embarked on my summer re-read I have finished 3 Elmore Leonard books, (Pagan Babies, Tishomingo Blues and Mr. Paradise – I enjoyed Pagan Babies the most. Obviously, right?) while my Lotus Sutra sits book marked “middleway”.

August…

Hurricane Katrina – New Orleans, LA. Worst unNatural Disaster in U.S. History. 

Get some rest Teddy Bear… we’ll take take of that National Health Care thingy.

 

Happy Birthday

Enough with the Sandwich Already

I was 6 or 7 years old the first time I met a homeless woman.

My best friend and I were playing in the park while our mothers’ visited their friend Mary Catherine’s newest apartment. Mary Catherine moved a lot. Now that I’m an adult I wonder was all the moving because homelessness was chasing her? Hummmm? I wonder.

Of course my playmate and I didn’t know the woman was homeless. We had no concept of homelessness. We were kids in 1970something. Our lives were effortless – then.

All we knew was that the silver haired white woman resting beneath the shady tree was friendly, she had a cat and she didn’t mind us talking with her. Kids know when adults don’t want to be bothered with them. Remember, we were in the park while the grown folks were upstairs. Wow. Remember when you could safely leave your kids across the street in the park? I think that day was the beginning of the end of that.

The memory is nearly 40 years old and the details are sketchy, but somehow I recall my best friend and I rushing upstairs to ask for a sandwich. We were going to give it to our new friend. Maybe she asked for one. Maybe we offered one. Not sure which.

No sandwich for us. We were going out to dinner soon, we were told.

We persisted. Persisting only went so far with our 1970something black mothers before their raised voices smacked us across the ears with something like, “ENOUGH WITH THE SANDWICH ALREADY! WE TOLD YOU WE ARE GOING TO DINNER SOON!”

We confessed. The sandwich wasn’t for us. It was for a lady in the park.

“What lady?”

“Out there, by the tree. Look!” Pointing out of the window.

“What did we tell you two about talking to strangers? Huh?”

We answered silently by looking at our shoes, and that was that.

When we all finally left for dinner we had to pass the park to get to our car. My friend and I waved to the lady, “the sorry we tried” wave with shrugged shoulders. Our mothers just stared at her. Then whispered to each other things like, “Has she been out here all this time? … Was she here when we pulled up? … You think she lives in that park? … Could be. …Naw…”

Overhearing this I wondered who would live in the park? At 6 or 7 years old I wanted to stay in the park longer than my playtime, but eventually I wanted to go home. Watch TV. Eat supper. Play with my toys. Who would live in the park? Where do you use the bathroom? Where do you put your clothes? What if it rains? I remember first being disturbed by those thoughts nearly 40 years ago.

40 years later, in the same trendy, campus neighborhood, by the lakefront I have befriended another homeless lady. Carrie Beth.

I noticed her a half a dozen times before I realized she was homeless. She didn’t fit the stereotype. She appeared clean and groomed. She wore colorful rubber rain boots similar to a pair I wear. She sat under a viaduct (as many do while waiting for the bus) reading from a file folder. She had 2 portable file boxes on wheels full of other neatly stacked files and books, by her side. She was pretty.

Weeks later, as the weather changed, her boots did not, except the toes had been cut out.
This was my 1st clue.

After it became apparent this woman was living on the street, one afternoon I purchased a fast food lunch to offer her.

She asked me my name. I told her and asked her hers’. I told her I hope you like what I chose to eat, but if you’d like something different there are a few dollars in the bag too.
She thanked me and fixed her gaze on my eyes. Not knowing what to do or say next, I turned to walk home. I wanted to glance back. I didn’t. I wanted to ask her what happened to you? How did you get here? Where is your family? I didn’t.

It’s a touchy subject. What can you really do? Especially if you are a rent check away from the same streets yourself.

I didn’t see Carrie Beth after that until months later on a cold snowy wind chill factor night. She was laid out on top of cardboard, covered with a blanket, beneath a different viaduct – not waiting for a bus.

I got a hot chocolate, a sandwich, some fruit and the picnic blanket I keep in my trunk.

“Hi Carrie Beth. These are for you.”

She pushed the blanket away.
She took the hot chocolate and the food.
I was a little offended she didn’t want my blanket.
Then I was embarrassed that I was offended.
Then I was confused.
Then I went home.
I cranked my thermostat up to 80 degrees and I watched the snow, fall outside my window.

My monkey mind began swinging from tree to tree.

Maybe I could rent her a room for the night at the hotel down the street…
What help would one night be? …
What if she trashes the place? …
Why would I think that? …
Why wouldn’t I think that? …
I can barely afford the cost of a hotel room on my credit card…
I need to be trying to keep this roof over my own head…
If she wouldn’t take the blanket what makes you think she’s going to take the room? …
Just like I don’t know her, she doesn’t know me either …what would I do if I was her and some woman in the middle of the night said, “I rented you a room?” … Shit. What if that was me? … Maybe she’s not really homeless… Maybe she’s a tactical officer working deep cover…

I couldn’t let it go.
Homelessness is my biggest and quietest fear.
It’s the thing that happens to other people – not to you, or to people you know.
It happens to crazy people or lazy people or drunks or drug addicts, but not to you or to the people you know even it they happen to fit any or all of those descriptions. Then there was Carrie Beth. She looked like me, or you, not crazy or lazy or drunk.

I continued to wonder, only now I wondered how did this particular patch of karma become mine? How does any?

I wondered why did I happen to befriend that lady and her cat, in the park 40 years ago?
What if it had been raining that day and my friend and I couldn’t have gone to the park? Would the lady still have been there? Would I have met her on another visit? Of all my forgotten childhood memories, why do I remember that one? Can my present struggles be traced back to a sandwich?

Enough with the sandwich already!

I saw Carrie Beth sitting in the park a couple of evenings ago, just as it was starting to get dark. The park is right outside my window. Last night around 11 O’clock I heard the police announce over a bullhorn, “The Park will be closing in 10 minutes.” I’ve lived on the outskirts of the park for 15 years. I’ve never heard that announcement before last night.
.

Sain, Sane or Insane?

SAIN (pronoun), Family name, surname; like Jones, or Smith or Ehlmann.

SANE (adjective), Mentally healthy. Reasonable.

INSANE (adjective), The opposite of sane. Very foolish. Absurd.

Here’s a quiz. Answer the baker’s dozen of questions below with one of the above definitions.
Then ask yourself, are there really any correct answers?

1.If you join a cult but don’t know you’ve joined a cult, are you: sain, sane or insane?

2.An Armchair is: sain, sane or insane?

3.When you begin to notice you may have joined a cult and start asking questions are you: sain, sane or insane?

4.An Armchair that writes poetry is: sain, sane or insane?

5.When your cult leaders berate you for sharing useful non-cult sanctioned information with the other cult members, does that make you: sain, sane or insane?

6. A comfortable Armchair is: sain, sane or insane?

7. People who join cults are: sain, sane or insane?

8. An Armchair that just doesn’t fit in is: sain, sane or insane?

9. I would never join a cult because I’m: sain, sane or insane?

10. Needing help from your friends sometimes is: sain, sane or insane?

11. Not always knowing who your friends are, is: sain, sane or insane?

12. An Armchair at a bowling club is: sain, sane or insane?

13. An Armchair dying too soon is: sain, sane or insane?

Thinking of you today Kathy Sain (aka Armchair) 1950 – 2009.

The Painting

One winter an old friend moved away.
As he packed his art collection to load into the moving van, I asked for one of his paintings.

I selected his favorite one.
Not so much because it was my favorite, but because I knew he would miss it the most.
The way I would miss him.

No doubt, fueled by the guilt of leaving, he obliged, giving me his favorite painting.

A weeping willow tree…
Near a pond –
Colored by autumn…
Three little birds…
Sturdy wood frame…
Iron inlay…
Velvet border…

So, not my style.

The first few weeks after his move, I kept the painting propped against a wall in my living room – just to feel closer to him. It seemed to work.

By summer, I could no longer stand to look at the thing and put it behind my bedroom wall unit. I didn’t need the visual symbol. My friend and I talked regularly, writing and emailing even more regularly.

We made plans to visit one September. Nothing went as planned. This was a good thing.
Several tiny travel glitches kept me out of airports on Tuesday, September 11, 2001.
(Who says Tuesdays are the best travel day? – Someone does say that, right?)

As the buildings collapsed around our plans I knew I would never see my friend again.
No, no – he didn’t die in the towers. He moved to cowboy country, but the events signaled the end of an era for us. It was. We stayed in touch, but by year three the years had done what years do. The distance had done even more.

Then a few months ago I got the most bizarre craving to see that old painting. I tried to ignore the craving, because stashing the painting behind the wall unit was much, much easier than retrieving it would be.

But that’s the thing about cravings.
With stepladder and contortions in tow I retrieved the painting. I dusted it, and propped it back against the same wall where it had rested years ago.

I played a few bars of, “Send Him an E-mail”, only to be upstaged by the, “He Hasn’t E-mailed Me So I’m Not Emailing Him” overture.

Greed, anger, or stupidity – Sometimes all three.

Note: When someone crosses your mind, especially someone you don’t see or hear from regularly, contact the person.

My old friend died this year. Around the time I was creating this blog. Around the same time I got a hankering to look at his ugly old painting.

If I wanted, I could find many reasons to cry – instead, I will follow his immortal words and, “Shed No Tears”.

The Gong Bath

Always on the quest for spiritual pursuits, I recently discovered the Gong Bath.

Heard of it?

I hadn’t either until a couple of months ago when my neighborhood yoga studio began offering them.

It’s described as a sound meditation. It is!

The Gong Bath begins similar to a yoga class, with some stretching and breathing exercises done seated on the mat. After which, you recline comfortably while the instructor plays a Paiste® gong for several minutes.

 

It feels like a water-body-massage. Waves of sound crash over you leaving you relaxed and refreshed, just as any good “bath” does.

It’s hard to believe how one little gong and one little mallet, played by one person can create a symphony of various tones. During the first one I attended, I kept thinking (as I relaxed with closed eyes) how did all the other dozen or so gong players come into the room so quietly? But when I opened to sneak a peek there was still only one little gong, played by one little woman creating one infinite sound containing all sound. DEEP.

Our physical bodies being composed mostly of water are influenced by the reverberating sound waves of the gong. Who knew?

I attended one this past weekend with 5 of my friends, whose yoga knowledge spans each end of the continuum. There was everyone from a 7-Day Adventist practioner to a Vinyasa instructor in attendance. Each described a unique experience during the “bath”.

One friend added a petite girly snore to the sound waves, as the gong lulled her mentally and physically exhausted body softly to sleep. Poor baby was really tired, and a little embarrassed when she realized she had fallen asleep, but her snore was to the gong player what a hearty belch is to a chef!

The Vinyasa instructor, who is 20something and Russian, (perhaps that matters) said it was not her style and unfortunately laid on her mat in torture during the several minutes the rest of us reclined in bliss. Oh well, there’s always one in every group.

If you have not experienced a “Gong Bath” find one in your community immediately and check it out. Ironically, the noise of the gong quiets all the chatter of the monkey mind.

Sat Nam

For Entertainment Purposes Only

I first heard that snippet of legal jargon years ago when listening to the syndicated Tom Joyner Morning Show radio broadcast.

One of his cast of weekly regulars was a woman named Miss Dupree, whose segment was called, “Miss Dupree’s Winning Numbers”. The radio character was a voodoo priestess from New Orleans who would tell listeners how to select a 3-digit lottery number. Her advice was silly and made for some harmless yuck-yucks during morning drive time.

For example, if the 4th of July weekend was approaching, she might say something like, “count the number of people who show up uninvited to your holiday BBQ – count the number of people who get arrested with illegal fireworks and count the number of red, white and blue outfits you see at church Sunday, then play these numbers straight and boxed for the week. These are Miss Dupree’s winning lottery numbers.”

At the end of each segment Tom Joyner would announce, in a way that was part of the bit, “This is for entertainment purposes only.” Miss Dupree would balk something like, “Yeah right.” And that would be that. I never took her tips to my neighborhood lottery terminal but I did get a few laughs each week during her segment.

This week I was goofing off in my neighborhood big-chain-bookstore looking for a music CD. I came face to face with the reality that there are no music stores anymore. This big chain store’s logo still says Books-Music-Movies-Café, although they no longer have a music section at their store in my neighborhood. So I piddled around looking at the stuff they did have.

I stumbled upon a “Buddhism Kit” for $7.99. The kit contained a DVD and a book featuring “practical Buddhist principles”. Being the “buddhaphile” that I am I grabbed it. On my way to the checkout I saw a “Chakra Meditation Kit” for only $4.99. I purchased that instead. I figured I already knew more about Buddhism than I knew about chakras and since neither was what I set out to purchase I opted for the lower price point.

My Chakra Meditation Kit contains: 7 colored candles – one to represent each of the 7 chakras, 7 colored chakra cards, a guided meditation CD and an illustrated guide book about meditation and how chakras work (giggle – cheap gift idea for the “new age mystic”).

Any “New Age” mystic worth her salt knows the in’s and out’s of chakras. I’m not a New Age mystic so I had no idea what to expect. The kit didn’t really hit the spot for me, but then again I wasn’t expecting to levitate or bend spoons with my mind (I already know how to do that LOL – just kidding).

The guidebook did suggest and I quote, “If you are ready to make positive changes in your daily life and your overall well-being, then our Chakra Meditation Kit is for you.” I knew I picked the right kit, hell, who doesn’t want to do that (still LOL)?

Without finishing the book I played the CD and examined the other trinkets in the kit. Everything seemed a little bland, but for $4.99 so what. As I finished reading the 48-page guidebook it ended with (and I quote again) “A Gentle disclaimer” – [The Authors] may seem to have our heads in the clouds, but our feet are planted firmly on the ground. The possibility of people misusing our Chakra Meditation Kit is as real to us as chakras are. For this reason we are required to inform you that our Chakra Meditation Kit is for entertainment purposes only.

Furthermore, never use any information contained in any of the various pieces of our Chakra Meditation Kit or that you have received from within yourself during your chakra meditations as a substitute for the advice of a doctor, lawyer or other trained and licensed professional who you know and should have come to trust. We don’t, and we want you to know that you shouldn’t either” (end quote).

While rolling on the floor laughing my ass off I got to thinking, why isn’t the same “gentle disclaimer” required at churches or temples or sanghas? Is it because pastors and rabbis and monks have been “ordained” and are included in the “trained and licensed professional” category (smirking with distain)?

No TV evangelist is required to say “For Entertainment Purposes Only”, when telling you to plant a thousand-dollar seed into his or her ministry at 2a.m. or to tithe 10% of your earnings and God will meet all your needs according to his riches in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:19).

No Rabbi has to tell you “For Entertainment Purposes Only” when he says that fasting for 25 hours on Yom Kippur will erase all the fugged-up stuff you did all year – I now pronounce you cleansed!

No Soka Gakkai practitioner was ever required to tell people “For Entertainment Purposes Only” when telling them chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo for 2 hours everyday is the mystic ingredient for happiness.

No Zen master is required to by law to inform you that sitting in the lotus position for hours and hours will not only make your legs fall asleep, but that it is also “For Entertainment Purposes Only”.

Come on! Isn’t it all for entertainment purposes only? I’ve been to churches, temples and sanghas and they all have been pretty gall-dang entertaining!!! I’ve seen grown men and women running around arms flailing shouting what I was certain were the same words Chucky shouted when he was trying to transfer his soul from the Good-Guy-Doll in the movie Child’s Play.

I’ve seen a casket on an alter, but not because there was a funeral but because it was New Year’s Eve and the casket was for people to put in all the stuff they did not want to take into the new year.

I’ve seen men wear teeny tiny hats and what looked like big giant beach towels on their heads and it all reeks of entertainment purposes only.

So if someone out there thinks that unblocking their red root chakra is going to make positive changes in their daily life and in their overall sense of peace and well-being, why does Johnnie Cochran (may he rest) have to get involved? Any attorneys out there? Whatcha got on this one?

I’m going back to Big-Chain-Books-No Music store today to get the “Buddhist Kit”, just to see if it has a “gentle disclaimer” too. After which I will be selling both kits at a low, low discounted price since they both will have been opened and I did light one of the chakra candles.

Any buyers?

James Crow Esq.

I remember a story my Mom would tell, when I was a child about a switchboard operator position at the telephone company, she interviewed for in the 1970’s, but did not get, because (she was told) her arms were too short.

I don’t recall her ever saying if her arms were actually measured during the interview but I wonder what was the required arm length for a switchboard operator in 1970something?

I especially wonder because although my Mom was a petite woman slightly more than 5 feet tall, she had to have the sleeves of every garment she purchased, lengthened. It was a running family tease. My Grandfather was a stately man over 6 feet 5 inches tall and my tiny Mom most definitely had her Dad’s arms! Fugging Phone Company.

That was then. It was a time of “progress”. The days of having to count the number of bubbles in a jar of suds in order to be allowed to register to vote in an election were over. Thanks to the 24th constitutional amendment adopted in 1964. Old Jim Crow seemed to be retiring, but actually he was sitting a little more quietly while he groomed his distinguished son – James Crow Esquire.

Fast forward to now. We are surrounded by the false comfort of seeming equal opportunities for everyone. Woo hoo! The President of the United States – land of the free and home of the slave – is a Black man. Anyone can live anywhere they wish…sit at any lunch counter or in any available seat on any public bus. We can even work at any job regardless of the length of our arms or the color of our skin.

Or can we?

My closest friend has spent the last 15 years working in the billion-dollar retail cosmetics industry. No bank teller ever fainted when cashing her paychecks, but she earned a decent living. She never set out to work in the retail cosmetics industry. She just sort of ended up there. The year she turned 35 her W-2 said she had earned $42,000 that year. The year my Mom turned 35 she had not earned even half of that (damn those long short arms).

A few months short of 10 years into what had become my friend’s career, her mom got gravely ill. My friend abruptly quit her job for two reasons. The first reason was to take care of her sick mom and the second, to cash out her 401K savings to live on while doing so.

As her mom got better she began picking up freelance work in the billion-dollar retail cosmetic industry. It was easy for her. She had a 10-year reputation in the field. She knew every account executive and they liked the way their clients would seek her out over the years for lots or repeat business.

This was a true Win-win deal. She got to keep a flexible schedule and still be available to care for her Mom and Estee got to launder more money from the lipstick drawer.

Two years later her Mom died. There was no longer the need for the flexible schedule and the 401K was long gone. My friend assumed getting another pair of golden handcuffs (as she often called her job) would be as easy as getting freelance work had been.

Someone from one of the retailers where her freelance work took her was in need of a full-time counter person. It was the same job she had been doing for the last 12 years paying $52K per year. She met with the company account executive, who was delighted to have my friend join the team. The retailer’s cosmetic manager was once her account executive during her 10-year tenure before quitting to care for her Mom. She gave my friend a stellar recommendation. She was only one more “formality” away from her new full-time job.

The Credit Check, which my friend now calls “The New Jim Crow”.

My friend had never had perfect credit for a variety of reasons, but what was less than perfect quickly turned bad during the time she cared for her Mother. Remember this woman had no job and was living on her savings. Having no idea how long it was going to have to last, whatever she could not sleep in, drive or eat did not get paid. Combine this with the hundreds of dollars of prescription drugs her Mom needed every month and there was a recipe for credit-rating destruction.

If you haven’t figured it out by now, my friend never got that job or any other job and it is now 5 years later. Today the retail industry is in the toilet with the recession. Nearly all of the people she once worked with have since been fired or have had their salaries restructured to near minimum wage. If you didn’t know some commissioned cosmetic sales associates were earning 6 figure salaries doling out lipsticks (I know, right?). Now they are asking my friend if she can help them find freelance work.

Meanwhile, while my friend was getting turned down for the $52K full-time job because of her bad credit, she learned that working on the very same sales floor she was refused, worked a convicted felon, another woman who could not read English, but had an enchanting foreign accent that folks who buy expensive face cream seem to think make the cream work that much better, and a man who arrived for work every morning at 9:30am wreaking of the massive quantities of alcohol he had consumed just hours before and who also spent his lunch hour at the corner pub consuming more.

So what did these employees have that my friend did not have? If your guess is good credit well then you are not a very good guesser. Guess again. Yup.

Jim Crow may have died but his son James Crow Esquire is alive and well and still measuring our arms by a different (red) tape measure.

How much does it matter that you can live anywhere you like if you can’t afford the rent? So what if you can sit at any lunch counter if all you can afford is water? How much can you actually benefit from attending a school if you have to dodge bullets to get inside? And what does that sign that says we are an equal opportunity employer honestly mean?

The President may be Black but don’t get all cozy Jim Crow is back.