It’s a cool late February night on Staten Island and my main boy’s on the phone with one of his homies discussing the latest sad tale of how he got played by a hot bitch who promised to come over to the crib and chill. Would he get a little action finally from one of his hottest customers who’s with someone else?

Instead, her evasive details screwed up his plans to bring over Giant and finish mixing some tracks they’d worked on. This is how it is with women who have you by the balls literally at times. She is a good customer who has never given him a problem since last Fall. She even showed for the New Year’s Eve party leading him to believe he’d get some. But with the clock ticking on this Thursday with 32 minutes and counting, it looks like her promise to return will go unfulfilled.

Such are how things can be for one of the working kids you ever knew in this area of Shaolin where there’s not much to do on a night except hangout with friends and stay true to yourself. Over the past year since the sad death of his loving Mom, I’ve grown closer to the dedicated young man who has remained very close to my brother when the two grew up together. Nothing can faze him. Even the untimely passing of his Mom who he was extremely close to. It only forced him to clean up the house getting it redone with plans to rent out the other two rooms for a decent price. People pop in and out of this place all the time smoking blunts, freestyling to beats and playing NBA Live 09 on the state of the art Samsung big screen bought a couple of months ago.

When thinking back on what the living room looked like before last summer and how it looks now, you’d think it was an entirely different place instead of at the same exact address in VG. No longer is there an old rug and 1970’s style couch like when his family first moved in during a different more relaxed era which I can certinly relate to having been raised here. Let’s just say it was less crowded and a lot more laid back and fun without every possible square root legal or illegal having houses built.

Fast forward and here I am sitting on a chair facing one of two couches purchased along with a much more ideal wooden floor with plenty of space between it and big screen that also works double by blaring out the unknown rapper’s favorite selections including some recent stuff he worked on with a talented cast of characters who added their freestyling prowess.

Amazingly, when listening to the shit they worked hard on, it’s easy to notice the talent each possess allowing me to even picture them shooting a rap video for the songs they created. There are so many unknowns in this game which becomes apparent everytime the unknown rapper kicks it. He clearly has the God given ability to do this for real but sometimes, I wonder if it’ll ever happen. He wants to turn the front of the house into a studio. A novel idea which I can definitely see. But like in any business, it’s who you know with a bit of luck. Something, this aspiring writer knows well from a couple of stints living on my own in Bristol, Connecticut working for ESPN.

On one side of the couch sits a spiral notebook filled with many lyrics he wrote. On one page lies the words I wrote about my brother and how hard he battles everyday with his own unique challenge. This place is like being somewhere else far far away from any problems. Life’s never dull often dealing you blows you never saw coming. It’s the ability to pick oneself back up and fight through it that determines where you wind up.

For the unknown rapper who works in advertising for a close friend’s Dad, he is fully aware it’s not dependable despite having done it for three years. He went almost all of December home due to how poor the economy remains. Can the new President Barack Obama really fix the worst depression since before World War II? Will the bailout work? If you’re him or even me, you can’t worry about it just doing the best we can everyday. However, his situation is far worse minus a Dad like mine who has always given me great support to carry on with my career.

Does he really have any choice other than hustling? Before, I never fully grasped why people deal marijuana in the streets. A lot has happened since that has made me understand why sometimes, you gotta do what you gotta do to survive.

It turns out all that stuff Tupac talked about in the song Changes was true. Do whatever you can to survive.