Black history month is over and believe it or not... I am still Black! This particular Black history month meant so much to me. Last year was a HARD year to be Black. I do not need to go into detail with why, because you all already know. Despite it being particularly hard this year, that doesn't mean there weren't moments of Black joy. In the year of 2021, I want to remind myself every month to focus on Black joy and the parts of being Black that mean the most to me, from my most current years and my childhood. I want to tell a story from a time in my life where my Blackness was seen as different and how I leaned into it for comfort. I present to you one of my favorite memories...
I’m going to tell you the story of my tattoo. On my right hip in lowercase are the three letters “ddm” with four tally marks underneath. It’s a friendship tattoo, but the story behind it deserves to finally see the light.
It was my junior year of high school and I finally had a group of solid friends, a group consisting of most of the other Black girls in my grade. It was five of us, and we all were very different. Christian and I grew up in the same neighborhood and commuted to campus every day. It was shocking we had never met before we attended Campbell Hall considering we lived 5 minutes away from each other and had several mutual friends. Lauren lived in the neighborhood down the hill from us and I had known her since I was 9 years old as we had attended the same elementary school. We were both young for our grades and our birthdays were just two weeks apart. Even as our friendship ebbed and flowed over the course of several years we always stayed in contact one way or another simply because we grew up together. Chelsey and Aeriel (who was lovingly known as Skiddle) were both valley girls from Chatsworth, otherwise known as “Porn Valley”. At the time they were attached at the hip. Christian and Lauren were the most comfortable with themselves, even when we were teens they were the bold ones. But they still didn’t fit into the average demographic of the kids at our school, and they dealt with it in their own way. Aeriel and I were trying to fit in amongst the Chaos of high school, and Chelsey was always smiley and sweet.
At the time we didn’t discuss how much our Blackness brought us together. We were just happy to have found our people in such a transformative time in our lives. But underneath the typical experiences, we shared as teens navigating friendship, we knew. None of us were poor but we never had as much as our classmates, they were the children of generations of multi-millionaires and billionaires. Our parents were the ones that “made it out”. We had access to more than many of our extended family members, but we would always have to work to maintain the lifestyle our parents sacrificed for us to have. We often lived double lives in our respective neighborhoods, or even in our own homes. And as much as we pushed ourselves to fit in anyway we can, even when we were successful we would never be able to keep up financially. We all knew this, and yet it was all unspoken, “shared anxiety” between us.
We discovered Pink Dollaz on a Wednesday. It was a long lunch so we could go eat off-campus. A friend offered us a ride to eat and we immediately jumped in the car. I don’t remember where we went to eat or what we did, I just remember the ride there. As I leaned my head onto the window of the brand new Range Rover, our friend, one of the few Black students in our grade who was rich rich, turned the volume up, told us to hush, and announced that this was his songggg. The speakers blaring, I took a moment to listen to the music “SO YOU WANT A LAP DANCE, SO YOU WANT A LAP DANCE”. I was suddenly extremely interested in what these screaming, passionate women had to say. As Pink Dollaz screamed their words over the jerking-era beat I suddenly felt inspired and empowered. I looked to my girls on my left and we all were grinning. The demands, the sexual prowess, the fun yet dirty lyrics, the fact that according to one of the verses of the song she proudly rocked her A cups while my 16-year-old insecure self wished every day for my boobs to grow. And most importantly the Blackness of it all. The song was everything. Everything I could not be, everything I wanted to be, and everything I knew I shouldn’t be. I wished I could speak like that without being considered uneducated or being looked down on. I wished I could express myself sexually without being considered fast as I was growing into my teenage sexuality. I wished I could vocalize my crazy feelings, be heard, live in my Blackness without the respectability, curse when I wanted, dance how I wanted. I felt as though every day was a performance. A performance of perfection for my parents and family, a performance for my classmates and school. I wanted to perform something that I got to control for once. When the song was over I looked to my left once again and we just knew. It was at that moment we all realized we wanted to be a rap group.
I do not remember how we came up with the name or if we voted. I just know by the next day we had declared ourselves as DDM. An acronym representing “Doo Doo Mammas”, or “Da Dinosaur Monsters'' when white people asked. We had until the next week to write our verses so we could begin practicing our debut single. The song would be called “DDM” and the hook was simple “ I’m a Doo Doo Mamma” over and over to a jerk beat. We created stage names for ourselves. Christian was “Curly C”, Chelsey who knew she couldn’t rap was our DJ/MC known as “C-Moody aka the Giant”, Skiddle was “A-Scott aka Tiggol-Biddies'' and Lauren was “Big lipped Betty”. I was none other than “Mixed chick”. We had five terrible stage names and a hit chorus! All we needed was a song. I wrote my verse in 20 minutes. I sat in the back of my math class and pretended to take notes in my school planner. I could not wait until the next week to present my art to the group. When Monday arrived we anxiously awaited lunchtime. We had all agreed to meet at the seating area in the elementary school but in our excitement ended up huddled in the adjacent parking lot. No one outside of us five knew why we were meeting and why we were huddled there in the parking lot of our $28,000/year high school where we spent so much time desperately trying to be a part of an institution that didn’t care for our best interest. In that circle of young women, we were transported to somewhere safe and happy where our expression was valued and uniquely ours. “Alright y'all, we ready?”, Christian stated. C Moody aka the Giant began her intro. And DDM was born.
...Black Music, Black Milestones, Black Joy.
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