The truth of the matter is, I wanna start my own business one day, ’cause I got some 100 percent guaranteed invention ideas which—if I do it right—could make me some real money. Hell, I got a garageful of ideas but I have to keep my mouth shut, ’cause people in a better position will steal your shit right from under you and call it theirs. I know how to go about getting stuff patented, but it cost money. And of course don’t nobody in my family wanna hear about my ideas. They think I’m talking off the top of my head again. “Get a job first,” Paris always says. “And try keeping it long enough to get some health insurance,” Charlotte is guaranteed to throw in. Shit, when you got a pre-existing condition, it’s kind of hard to get insurance. “I hope you’re not getting high or drinking that hard stuff again, Lewis,” because Janelle thinks everybody who takes a sip is a alcoholic, or if you smoke a joint every now and then you’re on the road to being a drug addict. Mama seems to be the only one who wants to believe in me: “You got good sense, Lewis, I’ll just be glad when you start using it.” And Daddy, the man who don’t never like to take a stand: “Do whatever you can, Lewis. As long as you stay outta trouble, it’s fine with me.”

They don’t even know me. They remember me. They look at old pictures and think I’m the same person I was twenty years ago. Well, I’m not. My family don’t have a single solitary clue who I am today, what I’m going through, what I’m feeling inside, and I don’t think they care all that much. They don’t respect me, because I ain’t doing as good as they are. This shit hurts. But they oughtta take a long hard look at their own damn lives and stop wasting so much time trying to solve the equations of mine.

I’ll be frank. Paris—even though she’s the oldest and I love and respect her and everything and she’s got a successful food business going and her life is on track—she sees life like it’s a straight line. Ain’t no room for no detours in her world. You either are or you ain’t. It’s hard talking to her on the phone. It’s like getting a pop quiz when I call her. Plus, she don’t have no patience. She don’t like to listen, and she think she know everything. Yeah, she smart, she got degrees from two colleges, but she don’t know everything. Just ’cause you a success don’t mean you perfect. It don’t make you flawless. She doing a good job with Dingus and everything, but she likes to put me down ’cause I ain’t the kind of father she thinks I should be. You think I need her to remind me? She the one up there in the Bay Area in a big house with nobody to love. I don’t have no problems finding somebody to love me. I can get just about any woman I want. Well, maybe not any, but most of ’em. It’s some desperate women out here, all you gotta do is learn how to spot ’em. And, believe me, it ain’t all that hard to do.