Jewboo alerted me to this news item with just the words "Jesus Christ" before the link. Unfortunately, I wasn't all that surprised--not even after reading about Detroit resident Julia Brown.
The last time Brown, 73, called the Detroit police, they didn’t show up until the next day. So she applied for a permit to carry a handgun and says she’s prepared to use it against the young thugs who have taken over her neighborhood, burglarizing entire blocks, opening fire at will and terrorizing the elderly with impunity.
“I don’t intend to be one of their victims,” said Brown, who has lived in Detroit since the late 1950s. “I’m planning on taking one out.”
Although Julia "Throw Down" Brown is obviously related to T-Baby in some way, she is no match for my G-Unit. At 95 years old, G-Unit has been keeping a gun in her house since the Regan administration (hence her lovable nickname). When my cousins and I would play hide-and-seek in her house, she always warned us to "go anywhere but in the front room. That's where I keep my gun."
Having seen Boyz N the Hood and knowing we were already living on borrowed time as black youth in Detroit, none of us were stupid enough to actually look for the firearm, but we were obsessed with the idea of my grandmother having it.
"What are you gonna do with a gun, grandma?" My cousin asked.
"I'll shoot an intruder," she said, with her voice starting to rise. "Some fool tryna come up in here and rob me. I may be old, but I ain't no weak person! I made it this far and I ain't letting some dumb son of a bitch take me."
Ever the logical one, I had only one follow-up "If you shot him, what would you do with the body?"
What my grandmother said next is still emblazoned on my brain 20 years later. So matter-of-fact that she was almost dismissive, she replied, "I'd let the dog eat it."
Y'all! Ethel will leave your body as puppy chow if you try to start some ish! She's gonna make sure black folks can have nice things!
(I think this level of hardness is what makes me such a difficult woman to love. I come from take-no-prisoners Southern sharecropping stock.)
At the time, I imagined a body on the hallway floor with Toby (her dog) biting off bits of it. Even at 7 years old, I assumed there'd be a stench and wondered how Grandma would get pass the corpse to get to the bathroom every two hours, as she was wont to do. I was able to have such a detailed vision because I had no doubt in my mind that G-Unit would do it!
I blame Clint Eastwood. Gran Torino was practically a documentary and then there was that Super Bowl commercial (see below). I guess this is what he meant by "Motor City fighting again."
By "the roar of our engines," did you mean the sounds of caps busting in asses?
By "the roar of our engines," did you mean the sounds of caps busting in asses?
