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Howdy and Greetings* Thekwiesidavis!:
Thekwiesidavis* my name is *Martha Freddiks* and i am in awe with your
record the "Grandma Song" and i was awarded the gift of seeing you and your
grandson perform at Trent Part here in Las Vegas about a few months back.
First let me tell you a little about myself, I am 79 years of age and
former Holocaust Survivor and i am currently suffering from Breast Cancer,
Both my father and Mother were killed and i grew up with my
grandmother and my youngest brother. My grandmother taught me so many
marvelous things and instilled all the right qualities in me and i can see that
you have done the same with your grandson. It really brings joy to my
hearts when i see young people such as your grandchild do good
and positive things in the world and try to make difference while they are
here. Sadly i lost my only grandchild Thomas to a freak car accident back
in 2005, But I am strong Believer in Jesus (Even Though i was raised
Jewish), but if you may i would to share a bible verse with you: Proverbs
16:31 says That Gray Hair is a Crown it is gained through a righteous life.
Psalms 145:4: says that one generation shall commend your works to
another, and shall declare our mighty acts.* With that being said, i am a
strong believer that if we do right by our children or anyone God will
continue to bless us in all things we do and hope to do. It's good that we
as grandparents may see our the fruits of our labor. I wish I could right
more but i have to go to surgery:(. I wanted to write you while i was up
and in my right mind if your right me back please be sure i will also right
you back, just please be patent i am old hahah, MAY GOD BLESS YOU AND ALL
FROM THE COTTON FIELDS TO THE ENTERTAINMENT FIELD!
My grandmother, Varie Davis, raised me until I became too inquisitive. They called it bad. I called it inquisitive. Because I wanted to learn things, and with her selling illegal (corn liquor), and having all those men over on Saturdays and Sundays, because she had a lot of girls, I felt important. Men in the neighborhood and/or so called gentlemen would come around and buy the liquor and would pay me to dance. Boy, I could dance and I knew I could. So it was a delight every time weekends rolled around for me. Further on Down the Road, I Pited a Fool, Don't Cry No More, by Bobby Blue Band, Wang Dang Doodle were all heard in my grand mother's living room as she had one of those very old timed "record players." The front porch became a club and I was the star of the show. Week end visit from those neighborhood drunks were a speciality for me. At least I could earn a nickel, quarter and maybe even fifty cent, just to dance. I loved it...I could do things with my body that no other young girl in the vinicity could do. I could dance but I could not sing. Varie, use to laugh at me when she would see me roll my stomach muscules and drop to my knees and lay all the way back until my back touch the floor. Yes, I was and still am limbled enough to stretch my body muscles to the point it would put extraordinary smiles on people's faces.
Although, my grand mother was a share cropper, she did whatever it took to make ends meet. I remember her making a broom to sweep her floors with, out of brush from the field. At some point she married a man, Jim Moody, who put "lye" down on the floor when I was a child, to kill the flies/roaches. I was a child crowling around on the floor, so one day I ate the lye, and when they saw me, I was foming at the mouth. The lye left me with a big huge burn on my tonge that is visible to this day. God saved me then and he is saving me NOW!
Across from my grandmother's house, there was a school called Algoniona. They use to have the best cookies and pies sold there. One day, I over heard my grandmother say, that the school "algoniona" was closing. In my mind I thought it would never open again. It was closing for the Summer as schools always do. Me, with my leadership skills that hadn't fully developed, when across the road, I say road, because we had no streets, just roads during that time and I took out all of those window panes out of the windows, and took them back to my grand mothers and showed her, thinking she would be proud, when in actuality, she was horrified. Varie became so upset with me, until she called my mother and told her to come and get me. I was too bad. Researchers have found out that when a child is clever as I thought I was, they are looking for guidance. With all that was going on in my grandmothers house, my teenage aunts, mother and grandmother, who was also very young at that time, needed to have and be with a man. So all of their attention was on dating. and looking good (the best dresser).
When my grand mother enrolled me in Holy Child Jesus School, in Canton, MS. I thought I was the best. Me and my aunts would walk a mile to the main highway for our ride to and from school. I looked forwarded to paying that seven cents my grandmother would give me for cookies and chocholate milk everyday for lunch and being away from the house was a huge plus.
One day, after my enrollment in school, I came home, my dog my daddy bought me "popeye" had been up to a neighbor's house and she claimed my dog came in her kitchen, anyway, she poured "hot grease" on him and when I got home he was under the porch. I had to crawl under the porch and recuse him. He was so severely burned. The hot grease the Ms. Truton poured on him took off all of his body hair and skin, later he died from phemonia....I cried, cried cried......My grand mother said that this lady was the most miserable/mean woman she'd ever met! Yet, she appeared to be nice.
It is my belief, that a grandmother should not start off raising the grand children and in the interim, give the child back to the biological mother to finish the job is a HUGE mistake. Because the grand child is not use to the mother, or her ways of living. Biological mother can be neglectful sometimes, especially when they have an addiction. This living environment causes, their children to become bitter, mean, and unreasonable to deal with. Especially where there is a step man invovled. A step man is a man who wants to be the step-father, but instead he is the step-man. Because he causes havoc between the mother and her child in the household. Wanting to have sex with the daughter. when the mother is not around. This is the kind of dysfunctional family I came up in.
When I started maturing and developing into a teenager, I didn't know I was being looked at as if I was a "sex sandwich." l later found out that if you and your mom are not close this is what happens sometimes in the household when there is a "step" father invovled and are over girls in the household. I am a victim of sexual abuse from my mother's step man and my so called step-father. The name changed with the computer. They are now called "step-men." Because a real ste-father would be a pedifile, and could not be a pedifile because he is a man first, and he can control his sexual appetite. Don't you agree?
Growing up in rural Madison County Mississippi, in those cotton fields was the hardest thing a young girl as I was, had to endure at that time. Working in the cotton fields, bending your back, watching out for those stining worms, boweebles, snakes and occasionally finding a small watermelon among the rows, surely quenced thrist and made the day a delight. Not only did we pick cotton for ourselves, we were hired as cotton hands for the whites and Blacks.
When I got caught with marijanna and a load gun on December 15, 1990, my whole life somehow flashed before me. At that moment, I thought, "I am done." On June 7 1991, six months after the initial incident, I was found guilty and sentenced to six years in the Illinois Department of Corrections. What a blow! I turned and asked my lawyer, "did the judge say I was going to prison," my attorney said "yes" knodding his head. I was immediately taken back to look up. The first day, in prison I was thrown into quarantine along with another inmate. It was so very hot until I slept most of the time. Until one hot afternoon I was awaken by my cell mate crying. As she was peeping through the peep hole, and turned towards me, I could the see tears running down here cheek. She looked at me and said,"How can you sleep in this hot place?" I said to her, "Honey, I haven't slept in two years, it's time for me to sleep, and you may as well stop that crying, those guards are not going to bring you any cold water. you are in prison." Turned over and went back to sleep. From that day, i saw a lot a fights over "ice." Something we take advantage of while people in prison fight for it. Yet, prison life influenced me by helping me to come from the bottom to the top. I only had a high school diploma when I went to prison, and every day I was there, I learned to love my self as I was raised in a dysfunctional family in rural mississippi, where there were lots of sexual, physical, verbal and emotional abuse. In June 1992, I enrolled in Columbia College downtown Chicago and not only earned a BA in Liberal Arts, but also a MA an Art Entertainment and Media Management (AEMM). I am presently promoting original copyrights written, arranged and produced by me. You can see me in action at www.jad-productions.blogspot.com or ww w.kwiesi or YouTube when you type in "thekwiesidavis." Today, I am a catalysts for grandmothers who raising grand children, partucularly boys, because I am raising a boy. So the 'goog" influences I given him, he shown his appreciation with the infamous grandma song on Youtube. I was presdestined to have gone through what I've gone through in my life, because it made me the famous grandma I am today.
KWIESI & JOE ANN DAVIS
THE INTER-GENERATIONAL, EDUCATIONAL, MOTIVATIONAL AND INSPIRING PERFORMING ARTS TEAM
After serving all of my time including my parole time, and in my last semester of Graduate studies, which was in October 1999, my daughter got caught in Huntsville, Alabama, by authorities, taking and using people's credit cards. I didn't know to what extent, until one morning I was awakened by a lady with a southern accent saying, "Ms. Davis, it doesn't look good for KK. Can you come and get the children." Instantanously, I was taken back. Heart palpitations were emmient as I could feel my "blood pressure" rise. Yet, later I learned she had eleven felonies and the judge gave her 18 months at a work release center, downtown Huntsville, AL. As ironic as it may seem, I was satisfied with the outcome of of my daughter's sentence and happy with just knowing I'll have the kids for 18 months. It hadn't sunk in, as to what I was going to faced with later, when I got the two kids (a boy and a girl) back to Chicago, IL., with two different personalities. However, two days later, I was booked for a show with the Insititute of Science Education and Science Communication (ISESC) under world renown Dr. Zafra Lerman and the Chicago Teachers' Workshop. Students from the Chicago Public School District was bused in for this special event, and it would be the highlight of my grand son's focus on becoming an entertainer. After the performance, Dr. Lerman, asked, "Who in the Science Lab had learned what an atom was? My grand son and grand daughter raised their hands and they were only six and two years of age. Dr. Lerman laughed at the small hands up after the question.
THE READING SKIT
JOE ANN: Why are you always rading those books?
KWIESI : Grandma why are you always asking me the same questions over and over again? And I keep on telling you the same answers over and over again, that when you can read, you can learn how to spell and write, which means I can write my own song some day.
JOE ANN: Are you serious?
KWIESI: Grandma reading will help you get a good solid education. If we can't read, we won't know things in life.
JOE ANN: Things like what?
KWIESI: Your name, your telephone, if you are a boy or a girl, or even hyow to dial 911 if there's an emergency.
JOE ANN: I never thought of that.
KWIESI: If we can't read, we'll be lost grandma!
JOE ANN: Well, I am glad I can read.
KWIESI: No you can't
JOE ANN: Yes, I can read!
KWIESI: Well tell me this grandma, if you can read, why is all your mail stacked -up on the front porch, and why do you always ask me to tell you what time it is, so you can take your medicine?
JOE ANN: Well, can read a little..
KWIESI: Grandma, you got to read a lot, enought o get three degrees.
JOE ANN: Three Degrees! What are these three degrees.
KWIESI: A high school diploma, a Bachelors degree and a Masters degee, and if you are smart enough you can get a Doctorate.
JOE ANN: I never thought of that. So what is the name of the books you been reading lately?
KWIESI: I read a book on "Air Pollution," and I wrote my own song on "Air Pollution."
JOE ANN: Air Pollution! Where is this "air pollution" coming from?
KWIESI: Air Pollution comes from CFC, Automobiles, manufacturers, cigarett smoke, garbage, dumpsters.
JOE ANN: Air Pollution doesn't come from all of that, does it?
KWIESI: Yes!
JOE ANN: Well does it causes any diseases?
KWIESI: Yes!
JOE ANN: What type of diseases?
KWIESI: Ear infections, sinus infections, breast cancer, stomach cancer and guess WHAT!
JOE ANN: WHAT!
KWIESI: It destroys our foods, plants and animals.
JOE ANN: Air pollution doesn't do all of that. Does it?
KWIESI: Yes
JOE ANN: Well, what do you suggest we do about all this "air pollution."
KWIESI: Educate the people in the world?
JOE ANN: Educate the people int he world. How are we goign to do that. There are so many people in the world.
KWIESI: By singing a song.
JOE ANN: A song! What's the title of the song?
KWIESI: Try to Stop the Air Pollution.
JOE ANN: Can I try to sing it with you?
KWIESI: Yes, if I can stop sneezing.
In November 1999, I introduced both of my grand children to the library in Harvey, IL.. Part of my studies was going to the library consistantly for research and to use the computers. I'd also bring my grand children along. They enjoyed it. They were introduced to how to use the computers and probably read more books then they themselves wanted to. To this day, Kwiesi always tell me that I am the first to introduce to a McDonald's hamburger, and pizza. Travelling back to Chicago on Highway 65 North, I told them, I was happy that they were coming home with me, and that we weren't going to be hungry or cold never ever. I knew some way we were going to make it some way some how.
Soon after our arrival back to Chicago, I knew I had my job cut out for me. First and foremost, I had to establish legal guardian for both Kwiesi and Kalah, otherwise I could not enroll them in school. Being that I was already an ex-con, I had contacts to a non-profit organizations called CLAM, Chicgo Legal Aid for Incarcerated Mothers." They helped me to draw up legal papers for guardianship, per my daughter's consent to get my grand children enrolled in school. After I got them enrolled in school, graduate school for me was a piece of cake. I was even awarded scholarships from the management department for two semesters.
College performances is what drove me to completion with Graduate Studies. I needed, I thought to myself I needed to drive me. In fact, all of my ambition was laid out on the table. I'd realized, that what I like to do, is what I will be good at doing. Untimately, I wanted to learn music theory. How to play it. Harmonize it. Sing it. Arrange it. Produce and promote it. Music takes away life's pangs. Pangs we all butt heads with in life. Some of us survive these pangs. Some of us don't.
NIGHT SCHOOL - A MANUSCRIPT:
Everybody knows that when you are in graduate school, most of your classes are at night, very seldom classes are in the day time. This means I needed a baby sitter to watch the children while I attend classes. Well, I had just stop seeing an ex-con about two months before I got the call to come and get my grand children from Huntsville, AL., and I realized I needed him to look after my grand children at night. So I hired him. I thought I knew him, but it turned out after the fact, I didn't know him at all. Items in my house started coming up missing. Later, I found out he was a "crack cocaine" user and it took an ex-con who was an old heroin addict to tell me so during one of his "heroin" fix me up tandrum. This old "heroin" user shouted out to me, "Joe Ann, you don't know what you are doing.. I need to find Robert so that I can get my money. Apparently, a crack cocaine user owed a heroin user. Yet, I could hear the sickness in his voice as he walked limped toward my back door. His whole disposition changed towards me. I didn't care though, because I lived up stairs and he was down stairs. He could not come into the house unless I walked downstairs to let him in. And I was not going to do that. There was another man with him.
Just so you'll know, life to me is a learning process. If you open your eyes in life, you will see. That is if you are sober enough.
In November 2006, after relocating from Chicago, to Las Vegas, I felt as if I was still on a mission that God had appointed me to do. Our very first performance was the Plaza Hotel and Casino for the GrandParent Salute Red Carpet Ball. We were amazed at how quickly fame came. On the night of the performance, I'd coordinated our performance wardrobe. I wanted something that would stand out.
On June 7, 1991, I was sent to Dwight Correctional Facility in Dwight, IL. I felt like all the filthin this world had been poured out on me, and I'd felt this way all through my teenage years, because my mother use to call me bad names and constantly she would tell me told me that "I was not going to amount or be anything in life." I never thought for one moment that being incarcerated would help to turn my life ALL the way around.
However, the first two weeks I was in quaranteene, I slept every day. While I was asleep, I could hear my cellie crying out through the "peep whole" hoping that the correctional offercers would bring here some "ice" for a drink of cold water. As she looked back at me, while I was lying in bed, and said, "I don't see how you could sleep in this hot place." I told here that I hadn't had a good night sleep for two year, due to smoking marijanna and crack cocaine combined (primo). What an addication, and that she should stop crying, because those correctional officers weren't going to bring her any ice for a drink of cold water. Because she was in prison.
After being released form quarantine, I would hear other inmates say, "This is my second bit. this is my third bit, or this is my fourth bit. So, I befriended a white lady named Virginia, who knitted al the time, and I asked her, "What do they mean about "bits?" She said, "it's their second, third or even fourth time being incarcerated and/or prison. Instantly, I became frigthened. I ran to my cell and fell on my knees and asked God, not to let me out of prison, if I've got to come rite back. I thought, "I am flesh and blood just like they are." Yet, what frightened me the most is something we in the free world take for granted, and that is "ice." Inmates fought over ice every time ice was issued out in Dwight. However, after ten months of being locked up in a correctional facility, I felt I'd learned a "lifetime lesson." A lesson the whole world should hear about.
While I was one of the first twenty women recruited for a new facility in Kankakee, I noticed that more women were coming to prison at an alarming rate, until the state of Illinois had to open up another facility in Kankakee, in the winter of 1992. I learned a lot about myself, episodes in my life that happened just like the premonition I had when I was about eleven or twelve, where I knew I would go to prison and come out a scholar. However, while in prison, I met a lot of women who had interesting stories on how they landed themselves in prison.
After I was accepted in a Work Release Progam at Ma Houston Work Release 712 North Dearborne, downtown Chicago, I had to either find a job or attend school. I chose to attend school. So, I enrolled in Columbia College to jumpstart an educational curriculum. I enroled into a class titled from "Ozones to Oil Spills," a Chemistry class taught by world renown Dr. Zafra Lerman and Keith Kostock, at the Institute of Science Education and Science Communication (ISESC). In this class, students had to come up with a project related to their major. My major was that time, Music/Acting and English. At any rate, I thought, these younger students are going to come up with a projects that will kill mines, but that's not the way it happened at all. I wrote, composed and arranged a song through MIDI titled "Try to Stop the Air Pollution." and won an all expense paid trip to Princeton University and Indiana University to speak on my incarceration and to sing this educational piece.
As I was cultivating and/or shaping my career, I thought that if I'd work at being all that I coul be, even if it took me another twenty years, I would make a difference in the lives of so many people. I just didn't know how big of a difference. I'd performed at a lot of venues in Chicago, but none like I'd done or did or do in Las Vegas, NV.
A MANUSCRIPT
Yet, on Octoer 30, 1999, and my last graduate semester at Columbia College, my grand daughter called me from Huntsville, AL, saying, "Grandma, Moma say can you come and get us." I thought, you just left me last month, now your mother wants me to come and get you both again. Before the children called, an associate of my daugher called and said with a southern drawn, "Ms. Davis, it doesn't look good for KK. We need you to come and get the children. Then it all hit me. That something serious was going on. This was surreal turning point for me in my ife. I was studying for a Masters Degree adn now I desperately needed to go and get my grand children, becauseI truly didn't want them in the "cruel system of what they call foster parents."I felth systematically, my home would always be their home too. Where I come from, this would have been the most loving thing to do. Since than, I have heard some grandmother say, "I have grand children too, but I don't want anything to do with none of mines, or girl, "how are you going to take care of two grand children and got to school?" "God will make a way, I would say." So I drove to Huntsville, AL , and got my grand children and brought them home with me. Supposedly, the children was only going to be with me for 18 months, I have had Kwiesi, who was two at the time and is now 15. Kalah was six. She is now 20. (See enclosed photos of Kwiesi and I performing at the Thompson Center downtown for a Mother's Day rally hosted by CLAIMS, Chicago Legal Aid for Incarcerated Mothers, a non-profit organization. Where he represented children wh are withougt their mothers on Mother's Day, and I represented the Mothers' in prison who were without their children on MOthers Day. (See May 2006 Street Wise Newspaper Article).
Consequently, when my daughter didn't come home that following April 2000, from a work release center downtown Huntsville, AL., as she had mentioned, and she didn't come hame for the third time to her children, I cried, literally. I felt so sorry for my grand son who had just turned three years of age. Using my childhood development skills, I sat himd down and toldhim, "your mother is not coming home to you for the third time, because she'd hit some guard in the county jail, and they are going to send her to prison now. But grandma is gong to create and/or develop somthing in the performing arts for you and her to earn a legal living, and that is what I did for some PEACE in my life.
HELLO PEACE!
Hello PEACE what took you so long.
I lived life andI never really felt anything was wrong.
Early years I fought against sexual, verbal, physical and drug abuse.
Back then PEACE, I felt life had no use.
Tell me PEACE how can I show my appreciation.
For PEACE you helped ME back into civilization.
Though, I've suffered and drained with life's bitter cups.
PEACE you've shown me how much life and I am truly WORTH.
So, sit down PEACE and stay a long while.
I love your company and characteristics of PEACE and its lifestyle.
And if by chance PEACE we loose contact.
I PRAY to GOD that PEACE will show me where PEACE is at....
by Joe Ann Davis, copyrights 1993
We are all mortal. One day we will die. What matters most is the legacy we leave behind. Did we become all that we were capable? Did we chase dreams although people thought we were chasing illusions. Yet, only those who chases dreams are the ones who catch 'em... By Philospher Kwiesi Devine Davis, Copyrights 2008....
"Be aware of deceptive people in your life. They bring negative "vibes." Hang around like minded people. People who are making a difference in the lives of other people........Share, because you care! Love like it's none! Live like it's no tomorrow and "Be Blessed" from here on!"
THE INCESTATION
My step father, use to bring my mother to town for groceries every Saturday, after a week in those hot cotton field. Whenever he took my mother to get groceries, sometimes he would double back to sexual abuse me. One Saturday, he brought his brother-in-law, Peter, and Jonathan, another one his drinking buddies to join in. Since incestation was now on a regular basis on Saturdays, I started to noticed the dust from the dirt roads, since we lived on a dirt road. Whenever, I see the dust and the color of car, so I rid mysself from the sexual harrassment made on me by these community drunks. I literally, would tak an Ajax or a Comet bath, to rid myself of that drunk smell the drunks would leave on me. \\Before I left Mississippi on January 7, 1971, relocating to Chicago, I had had one child, but I didn't bring her with me, (big mistake) so I left her with my mothr. I felt that she was too young for my step father to sexual molest. At any rate, it wasn't until she was incarcerated in October of 1999, at a work release center in Huntsville, Al, and sent to prison that she wrote to me in a letter saying, "Moma please watch my children, becuse when you left me with moma, Shaaaaaunt, use to whip us, me and Corey and make us perform orial sex on her. I can never explain the feeling that came over me. It was like I became bitter at the world. Since that time, I have confronted this first cousin of mines, but all she does is hang the phone up on me. I needed to know where did she get this type of behavior from, because she wasyounger than I and I, as a child had never heard of the word "oral sex," until I was almost 30 years old. This first cousin is younger than me, and I wonder if my grandmother's husband, which was my "great uncle" had been sexually abusing her. Something had to have gone wrong there, because she never wanted to visit her home after moving to Lufkin, Texas. Where she lives now.
While growing up in this dysfunctional home, I would be awakened by my mother cries for help, calling my name, "Joe Ann, go in the kitchen and bring me a knife, can opener. Whatever weapon she felt she would stop my step-father from beating on her. You could hear the punch, licks etc., when he was hitting her. This type of living environment is not at all good for a child. However, before my grandmother (Varie Davis, who was a sharecropper in rural Mississippi) asked my mother to come and get me, because I had become a little to hard to handle. I was only six years of age and very inquisitive. Although, I was enrolled in a Catholic School, (Holy Child Jesus) in Canton, Mississippi, I wanted to be and live with my grandmother. After all, I'd moved from a five room house with a back and front yard, I had to regress to a two room shack; and in that shack, you would know everything that went on. There were not hidden secrets. Whenever, they had sex, I would hear and see them, because we all slept in the one room and with all that sexual noise, who wouldn't wake up.
On June 7, 1958, my brother Terry Lee Hawkins was born. He must have been about six months old, when I was rocking him on the front porch in an old rocking chair, when one one of the slacks on the front porch broke loose, and we both went tumbling to the ground as I was rocking him. This to me was a harmless accident and even I knew this at age six, but my mother and because she was so upset and rent and got a Rose bush with the "sharp" thistles on it and began to beat me with it. This is when I found out that my living with my mother was not going to work out. Since I was the oldest of five children, with lots of household responsibilities i.e., cooking, washing dookie diapers on a regular basis and regular clothes for the whole family. It was hard growing up in an dysfunctional incest household, where I was called bad names and beaten almost every day for know reason. I later realized as I grew older, that my mother only disciplined me the way her mother disciplined her children.
Yet, there was a God fearing church going lady named Mrs. Zettie B. Bouldin. She lived about a hundred feet from us, after the old new shack was built. This lady use to always say to my mother, "This child is going to be someone of greatness one day." My mother showed no emotion and stopped me from going to this lady house. Ms. Zettie, bought me an organ, and I taught myself how to play it. Later, my mother became angry and stopped everything I like to do at this lady's house.
Before leaving Chicago, in 1981, I'd met a young lady named Michelle Mumphy. She was so adament about moving to Texas. One day, I over heard her say to one of my other friends, "I'm going where the money is. I asked, "where is that? Her response was, "Dallas, Texas." I thought to myself, I needed a change and began conteplating on relocating to Dallas, Texas.
In September of 1981, I relocated to Dallas, Texas. I had the time of my life. Man, life was so sweet. So sweet, until I had to call back to Chicago to ask one of my friend's mother, whose name was Ms. Doris Harris, " was I dying." Her response was, "no honey." You are just experiencing life. Man it was nice. I use to go out dancing and sometimes romancing. One of my associates h
HERMAN BROOKS (MY CLYDE)
After receiving a settlement from the AAFES, Army and Air Force Exchange Services, a division of the Department of Defense, I sought out to do drug trafficking. I took a flight to Dallas, from Chicago, to see if I could start something from myself. I became a "drug lord." Trafficking drugs two different states, Illinois, Mississipi, Missouri, Florida, and Kansas. So I took a flight to Dallas, since I knew I'd lived there and knew people who would acquaint me with other drug lords. Well, when I got there and stayed for almost a week, I became too afraid in asking people where I could obtain atleast 10 lbs of marijuana. With $10000 locked up in a suitecase at my cousin's house, I began scanning around downtown Dallas, to see who I could see to connect me. Well, I somehow got intouch with Owen, a past lover of mines, from Jamaica. He'd gotten married, and had children of his own and he was living in Grand Prarie, Texas. He picked me up and took me downtown to a Jamaican Restuarant. Man the food was so delicious. After eating, I wanted to go next door to the nite club ran by one other Jamaican I knew. While in transistion, I noticed the owner of the club Joe and another guy propped up against a car conversating. So, I passed by and spoke. The one guy I didn't know follwed me back into the restuarant and asked Owens who was I. Apparently Owen had told the guy that I was his girlfriend....So when I bought some food and sat down this guy named Herman, sat down at the table where I was eating and introduced himself. He asked me was I Owen's lady. I told him No!. He than mentioned to me that his band was playing next door at Joe's nite club, and told me that I didn't have to pay anything, just come on in....So when night time fell and the band was playing, I turned and went through the doors that led into the night club and I could see Herman watching me every where I walked. His eyes were on me. It was as if he
INCARCERATION:
On June 7, 1991, I was convicted an sentenced to prison for cannabis with intent to deliver. The first week, I arrived at Dwight Correctional Facility in Dwight Il., I felt like all the filt in the world had been poured out on me, and I'd felt this way all through my teenage years, because my mother use ti call me bad names and she constantly told me that I wasn't going to be anything in life. I thought now , I've landed myself in prison and now I am "so not" going to be anything in life for sure like my mother said. I didn't realize that prison would help to turn my life ALL around the way around.
For the first two weeks I was in quarantine, I slept evry day. While I was asleep, I could hear my cellie crying out through the "peep hole," hoping that correctional officers would bring her some "ice cold water. She looked back at me as I was lying in bed and said to me, "I don't see how you could sleep in this hot place." I told here that I hadn't slept for almost two years and and that it was time for me to sleep due to thos "primo crack cocaine" addiction and that she should stop all that crying, because those correctional officers aren't going to bring her any "ice for a drink of cold water. It was so hot behind those walls of bricks, bars and concrete
During my prison stay, I would hear other inmates say, "This is my second bit. This is my third bit, or this is my fourth bit. So, I befriended a white lady named Virginia, who was there on check fraud charges. Who knitted all the time, and I asked her, "What is meant about "bits?" She said, "It's their second, third and/or fourth time being in prison," Instantly, I was frightened. I rand to my cell and fell on my knees and asked GOD, not to let me out of prison if I got to come rite back. I thought, I am fllesh and blood just like they are! Ye, what frightened me the most is someting we in teh free world take for granted and that is "ice" to drink cold water or a cold pop. Inmates fought over ice every time ice was issuted out in prison. After ten months of being locked up in a correctional faciility, I felt I'd learn a "Prison Lifetime Lesson," one that the world should hear about.
While I was one of the twenty women who were the first inmates at Kankekee Minimum SEcurity Prison, in Kankakee, IL, in the winter of 1992, I learned a lot about myself. Episodes in my life and what had happened was only to patterened the premonition I'd had when I was about eleven or twelve years old and come out a Master of something. I knew I would got to prison at some point in my life, but I didn't know when or for what crime. However, I met a lof tow women wh had interesting stories on how the landed themselves in prison. Significantly aftter I was accepted into a "Work Release" program, where you I either had to work or attend school. I chose to att end sc hool and enrolled at Columbia College downtown Chicago. Where my career into the performing arts began. Feeling outcasted, I truly needed to situate my life where I was productive everyday, instead of existing and not living. While working on my Bachelors, I enrolled into a class titled "From Ozones to Oil Spills."
At the age of six my mother and step-father came and picked me up from my grandmother's house. It was a sad day for me, because I didn't want to leave my grand mother. I'd been living with her every since the tender age of birth. My grand mother who was a share cropper admired me and my talents in dancing. Men who loved to drink "corn liquor" and hang around my grandmother's house, because she had pretty young girls who were my aunts. On weekends the same men would come and gather around and me, I always wanted to be known and recoqnized. The best way I could do this would be to dance. Sometimes I would earned nickels, quarters, dime and even dollars after dancing for those old men. I remember, once seeing my grandmother digging up "bottles of corn liquor" from a muddy puddle she had in the yard. I never knew why that particular spot in the yard would always filled with water, until I saw her dig up the bottles with my own two eyes. Even then, I didn't know what was going on. It wasn't until I was almost 30 years old that I found out that my grand mother was "boot legging." What? Corn Liquor!
However, when I was enrolled in Holy Child Jesus, a private catholic school, in Canton, MS., by my grandmother, I thought I would graduate from there one day with honors. Just like my aunt Sadie who'd graduated and moved away North. I was only enrolled there for one year. My mother was visiting the school to get me use t o her. Later I found out that my grandmother asked my mother to come and get me, because I was too bad. I guess, this after, my grand mother's husband, put "lye." down for whatever reason, and I a crawling baby, crawed and was eating the lye. I have a scar on my tongue to prove it. I was a wild child. I did somethings to this moment I don't know why I did those things, but I did and those things I did, didn't make any sense, especially not now. Yet, when I was picked up to go and live with a step father, I never knew what was cut out for me. The abuse and bullying I would sustain, would be so mind bothersome until I just wanted to run away and/or hurt someone. Back then, people hardly heard of a child killing their parents because they abused them. Four aspects of abuse and I suffered everyone dramatically. Sexual abused by my step-father, and his neighborhood drunk friends. That slobbing drunk smell still lingers with me after all these years. Johathan, one of my step-fathers friend had big gigantic testicles and they rolled around down there when he walked. Then there was my step=f-father's brother-in-law. Peter was his name. This man was a cold blooded mess starter from the woods.
My mother, insisted that I cook for her low down husband every day. If I cooked something and act like I for got about "SAM." My mother would say, " Sambo don't eat that, you got to cook him something else." Then I become so irrated with that until I would just want to shout out to her, "That's your husband. not mines, why don't you cook your own husband something to eat." But back then, I would have been probably killed for even thinking that way. But the way I was thinking is the way I am think now as I write this book. Why put your responsiilities on your children?
One time Boosie, the little country club in rural Mississippi, would be filled with teenagers and our moms and dads. We would have dances, like the monkey, funky broadway, bare footing, the monkey, the funky chicken and more. We would sometimes hear people in the cafe saying, "did you see that gal getting down with that dance?" I've always wanted to be part of any talent show the school put on and/or had. But my mother would say every time, "you got to babysit." So many times I wanted to tell her and needed to tell her, that I had't had nawn baby therefore she should babysit her own children. It makes me furious when I hear, these young moms have an older child and put the younger children off on those older children. This is not a good thing to do. Because when that child grows up, he or she is not going to be interested in having childlren AT ALL. I know, because, this is what happened to me. Nor did I ever wanted to be married, because my mother even put all of her "responsibilities' on me as her husband's wife. It is sickening and I am scarred for life.
Mostly ever weekend after moving with my mother and step-father, my mother and I fought every weekend with my step-father. No child with natural instincts, will never ever sit and allow anyone to beat on his her mother. Luckly, one of those children was me. Unlike most children, I dreaded when the weekend came in rural Mississippi. I rather have been in the cotton fields. Why? Because, my step father was a whore. While some his whoring around I didn't know about until I was almost 60 years. My mother told me that one of the ladies daughters who lived down the road from us and where we use to hang out to wait for the school bus when it was cold, was Sambo daughter. I asked my mother how did she know this? She said because the mother told her. Then I began to think back and found out that my step father was sneaking around with this woman for almost 53 years because my sister Cindy is 52. The lady claims that Cindy and her daughter Minnie Pearl look alike. WoW!
At any rate the sexual abuse I suffered from my step -father and his drunk friends and the physical, emotional, and verbal abuse I was suffereing from my mother was a bit too much for me to bare. By the time I was 15, I'd had enough. So, I started "running away from home." The song "Runaway Child Running Wild, by the Temptation was on the charts then. I was so tired of being a sexual girl slave who was beaten, sexually assaulted, talked about and scornned. It was so bad that my step cousins would say.."I heard your moma call you bald headed and ulgy." They were right. These are some of the not so nice names she called me, compared to the other ones. Some of them are to horrific to repeat. One would wonder how could a mother say that about her child.
"Be aware of deceptive people in your life. They bring negative "vibes." Hang around like minded people. People who are making a difference in the lives of other people........Share, because you care! Love like it's none! Live like it's no tomorrow and "Be Blessed" from here on!"
Copyrights July 2012
WHEN I WENT TO MISSISSIPPI TO GET MY GRAND SON...
Our names are Joe Ann & Kwiesi Davis. Together we make up a very very creative and talented inter-generational, educational, motivational, and inspiring performing arts team. We'd like to to come to NYC and resolve a conflict with my daughter, who went to prison, while I was in my last semester of graduate studies, and I had to drive to Huntsville, AL from Chicago, IL to retrieve my grand children, one is a boy 2 years at the time and the other, a girl, 6 years old. I didn't want them in foster care. My daughter asked me to take care of them until she do her time. Which was 18 months. Well that 18 months turned in to 3 years. All along, I became very attached to them. So I asked GOD, "what am I going to do, when she comes home and wants her child back?" The spirit came to me and said, "give him back to her, if she doesn't do right, you can go back and get him." Yet, when my daughter was released from prison in February 2002, she came to Chicago to get her son. He was so happy when he saw her. So I just stepped back and allowed him to love his mother. I allowed her to take him to Mississippi, without court orders. I didn't know at that time that I could have gotten in trouble for allowing my grand son to leave the state of Illinois with court orders. So I allowed him to. Well, after he was there for a while, my daughter's father called me one afternoon and said, "Why did you give Kwiesi back to KK. I said, "That is his mother." He then said, "You need to come back and get him." My blood pressure went up high, because she came to get him and said she would bring him back. This all happened in June of 2002. She had taken him to Mississippi and didn't allow him to call me to come and get him. But she kept asking him, "Do you want to go back to Chicago to Live with your grandma Joe Ann," He said, he kept tell her, "yes." But then would say to him, "well you are not going." This little child went through pure those few months he was away from me. He left in JUne 2002 and I didn't hear from until August of 2002, at which time, his mother called, and I asked could I speak with Kwiesi, so she put him on the phone. Immediately, I said to him, "Kwiesi say yes or no! Do you want your grandma to come and get you?" He said, "Yes, grandma, come and get me." Again, I drove a long distance from Chicago, IL, to Canton, MS to get him." Mind you, before I went there, my guardian/mentor, told me to fax the necessary court papers to the Department of Welfare Office, before you go there." I did what she asked. I also, did a follow up call. The case worker's name was Ms Nixon. I called and asked Ms Nixon if she received the necessary court paper for me to come and get my grand son. My mentor didn't want me to go there and start trouble for myself, so she advised me to do it legally. However, when I called Ms. Nixon, I asked if she received the paper, she said, "yes." I asked her, "So when I come there to get my grand son, am I going to have any problems? She said, "No." I also said to her, "if I have any problems, can I get the police involved? She said,"Yes." So I rented a car and drove there. I guess she thought I was not coming. Before I decided to go, I would call down there( and asked where was he (my grand son staying. Avoiding my mother who was not suppose to be involved, but serviced herself to get involved. As I arrived I saw her in the okra patch, gathering okra for whatever her reasons were. Either way, I feel my mother, who is my daughter was so very wrong for "dipping" in mine and my daughter's business. I am going to attached the rest of this story in an attachment, because the email should not be this long."
Howdy and Greetings* Thekwiesidavis!:
Thekwiesidavis* my name is *Martha Freddiks* and i am in awe with your
record the "Grandma Song" and i was awarded the gift of seeing you and your
grandson perform at Trent Part here in Las Vegas about a few months back.
First let me tell you a little about myself, I am 79 years of age and
former Holocaust Survivor and i am currently suffering from Breast Cancer,
Both my father and Mother were killed and i grew up with my
grandmother and my youngest brother. My grandmother taught me so many
marvelous things and instilled all the right qualities in me and i can see that
you have done the same with your grandson. It really brings joy to my
hearts when i see young people such as your grandchild do good
and positive things in the world and try to make difference while they are
here. Sadly i lost my only grandchild Thomas to a freak car accident back
in 2005, But I am strong Believer in Jesus (Even Though i was raised
Jewish), but if you may i would to share a bible verse with you: Proverbs
16:31 says That Gray Hair is a Crown it is gained through a righteous life.
Psalms 145:4: says that one generation shall commend your works to
another, and shall declare our mighty acts.* With that being said, i am a
strong believer that if we do right by our children or anyone God will
continue to bless us in all things we do and hope to do. It's good that we
as grandparents may see our the fruits of our labor. I wish I could right
more but i have to go to surgery:(. I wanted to write you while i was up
and in my right mind if your right me back please be sure i will also right
you back, just please be patent i am old hahah, MAY GOD BLESS YOU AND ALL
IN PORTMORE ST. CATHERINE KINGSTON JAMAICA, WEST INDIE
On March 11, 2013, I took a flight out of Las Vegas to Jamaica on what I thought would have been a four week vacation. When I arrived at the air port and weigh in my luggage, it was overweight. The clerk, a man told me that I had to take somethings out of the luggage. I thought out aloud, "Oh, no the food." I said to him, "I will take out the food." When he saw that I was serious, he said to me, "Put all of it back in the bag." I looked up at him, as if to say, "Are you serious?" He knodded his head "yes." I should have known then that this vacation would be a "divine" order of the Almighty God."
It was my intentions to go to Jamaica, learn the culture, i.e., different foods the West Indian people prepare, the different fruit trees, ways they cooked, the seasonings they put in their foods, the way the West Indian people wash their clothes. I didn't want to visit a tourist area. Living closely with the regulars gave me more knowledge and the way the Jamaican people do things. I first had to learn the currency. Because every item it seemed was $100. You'd think you have a lot of money as it breaks down, but no. How frustrating it was for me, so for two weeks, I just sat back and relaxed myself, because I didn't want to look like the idiot I was, for not knowing the currency. The family I lived with was so very nice, kind and considerate, even their next door neighbors. To be honest, it was so very nice to be called a "foreigner" in another country. I would say this when I see "foreigners" in America. Before leaving Las Vegas, I thought, what must I take along with me. So I called ahead and asked Lorna, what did she want me to bring. She said for me to bring a laptop, and two cell phones. Her request was granted. I even added some necessities like, toilet paper, shampoo, watches rings, miscellaneous item and of course food. I had too much food, until when I weighed in at the air port, they clerk said luggage was overweight. I stood there and thought out aloud, "you mean I must take the food out!" So when I began pulling the beans, rice peanut butter out and how many packages of these item I had, his heart softened and he said to me, "put it all back in there." I said, "are you serious?" He said, "yes." So my vacation was a blessing from the start.
After arriving back in Las Vegas, I realized, I had to do some "soul searching." I'd become a star over night in a foreign land and I loved the feeling. First thing's first and that is for I and Kwiesi to do a photo shoot, and head to the studio to do "A Blessedth Day," as a single. We need to get this piece marketed asap. People need this piece for motivation and inspiration. We've gotten so very many good compliments on "A Blessedth Day." Also, while in Jamaica, I connected with a "gospel mix" radio station, 91.7 and 91.9 FM/JA, host Wyatt Davis. Vacationing in Jamaica, makes me feel as if my performing arts work, and years as a singer/songwriter and performing at different venues, was not not in vain. Not only did I receive a spiritual retreat, I spoke. Speaking is something that I very rarely do. But being led by God made it so significant for member at POF International Ministries. The aesthetics of it all i.e., facial expression, the sincerity, movements etc., showed another natural and awesome side of me, that I didn't know existed. My facial expressions are truly a reflection of my true story, as I was potraying it in my speech. Yet, I realize I have more to do, before returning to Jamaica next year, hopefully for Portmore and Claredon's "Earth Day 2014" festival.
While I was entertaining radio, television and a congregation of church people in Jamaica, my grandson were entertainined Las Vegas city's elites. Some of whom know us as the inter-generational performing arts team we are....
I sit here today, listening to the media on the Trayvon Martin's murder trial. With the verdict being "not guility" for George Zimmerman, who was the allege shooter/murder, it brings back memories, on when I was a little girl growning up in the backwoods of Mississippi and how afraid I became, after the killing of three civil rights workers in Phildelphia. HIstory is truly repeating itself, when the Blacks were not allowed to do, go and be certain things. I associate myself with Josephine Baker and Nina Simone and all of those other performing artists who left America and fufilled their dreams in foreign countries. Zimmerman's trial, according to the media, will bring changes to the Civil Right Laws in this country. As a performing artist, and as I see it, what is happening rite now, after the Zimmerman was found not guility will bring serious consequences in this country. First there was an all white women jury, no Blacks. How bias is that, "no Black juror." Remember "We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against power, against rulers of darkness in this world, against spiritual wickedness in higher places. Ephesian 6 V 12.
THE FIRST TIME:
On July 4, 2013, I was invited to a so called mic nite at the Orleans in Las Vegas. I was told to arrive around 8:00PM. I did. One of my associates, and her grand son dropped me off around 8:00PM to be exact. When I arrived in the Irish Pub, there were very few people there. So I chose my seat. After which some lady who was hosting around at the time, and whom I hardly paid any attention to, wanted all the front seats reserved for her antrouge. I complied with her, and moved to another section of the pub, near the entrance. Shortly thereafter, this same lady walked over to me and asked me my name. I said, "Joe Ann Davis." She said, "Oh, you're Joe Ann Davis." I said
Greetings:
Our names are Joe Ann & Kwiesi Davis. Together we make up a very very creative and talented inter-generational, educational, motivational, and inspiring performing arts team. We'd like to to come to NYC and resolve a conflict with my daughter, who went to prison, while I was in my last semester of graduate studies, and I had to drive to Huntsville, AL from Chicago, IL to retrieve my grand children, one a boy at that time 2 years at the time and the other, a girl, 6 years old. I didn't want them in foster care. My daughter asked me to take care of them until she do her time. Which was 18 months. Well that 18 months turned in to 3 years. All along, I became very attached to them. So I asked GOD, "what am I going to do, when she comes home and wants her child back?" The spirit came to me and said, "give him back to her, if she doesn't do right, you can go back and get him." Yet, when my daughter was released from prison in February 2002, she came to Chicago to get her son. He was so happy when he saw her. So I just stepped back and allowed him to love his mother. I allowed her to take him to Mississippi, without court orders. I didn't know at that time that I could have gotten in trouble for allowing my grand son to leave the state of Illinois with court orders. So I allowed him to. Well, after he was there for a while, my daughter's father called me one afternoon and said, "Why did you give Kwiesi back to KK. I said, "That is his mother." He then said, "You need to come back and get him." My blood pressure went up high, because she came to get him and said she would bring him back. This all happened in June of 2002. She had taken him to Mississippi and didn't allow him to call me to come and get him. But she kept asking him, "Do you want to go back to Chicago to Live with your grandma Joe Ann," He said, he kept tell her, "yes." But then would say to him, "well you are not going." This little child went through pure those few months he was away from me. He left in JUne 2002 and I didn't hear from until August of 2002, at which time, his mother called, and I asked could I speak with Kwiesi, so she put him on the phone. Immediately, I said to him, "Kwiesi say yes or no! Do you want your grandma to come and get you?" He said, "Yes, grandma, come and get me." Again, I drove a long distance from Chicago, IL, to Canton, MS to get him." Mind you, before I went there, my guardian/mentor, told me to fax the necessary court papers to the Department of Welfare Office, before you go there." I did what she asked. I also, did a follow up call. The case worker's name was Ms Nixon. I called and asked Ms Nixon if she received the necessary court paper for me to come and get my grand son. My mentor didn't want me to go there and start trouble for myself, so she advised me to do it legally. However, when I called Ms. Nixon, I asked if she received the paper, she said, "yes." I asked her, "So when I come there to get my grand son, am I going to have any problems? She said, "No." I also said to her, "if I have any problems, can I get the police involved? She said,"Yes." So I rented a car and drove there. I guess she thought I was not coming. Before I decided to go, I would call down there( and asked where was he (my grand son staying. Avoiding my mother who was not suppose to be involved, but serviced herself to get involved. As I arrived I saw her in the okra patch, gathering okra for whatever her reasons were. Either way, I feel my mother, who is my daughter was so very wrong for "dipping" in mine and my daughter's business. I am going to attached the rest of this story in an attachment, because the email should not be this long."
Words are cannot explain what I was feeling while I was there trying to get my son. I should have just left the day, I told my daughter to lets go up to the school and get Kwiesi. Instead, I hung around for another day. Because I wanted to see my mother. Before I traveled so far, I called ahead of time and spoke with Kwiesi’s grandmother on the other side. I told her that her son and my daughter came to Chicago, and got their son, and promised to bring him back, but they didn’t. I also told her that if they didn’t tell me where he was, I was going to tell the authorities. This lady went off, talking bad about my daughter. I told her, Maylee, I can say a few things about your daughter too, but at this point and time, it is very unnecessary. Then she said to me, “Ree know where that child is.” But what she didn’t know, I wasn’t trying to call my mother for anything.
When I arrived in Mississippi, I found my daughter and kwiesi, living in a snake infested, house. An old house where my daughter was born, and where there was holds in the floors, no running water, no stove, no toilet, and no food. I had to sleep on the floor. Mind you, this is the house where one of my sisters moved out of because her children saw snakes there. Later, I learned that my mother had thrown my daughter of the trailer near her house, because of my daughter’s bad habits (stealing from my mother).
I visited my mother’s house. I noticed, that a truck was there. It was my brother, in his work truck. When I entered into the house, my brother asked me, “did you speak to my mother, I said, “did your mother speak to me. Mom was so very upset with me about, something I said to her, and she began to argue with me. So, I began to leave her house, she followed me out arguing with me about nonsense. I drove back to the dump. Later, my mother came over and I don’t know what she said, to my daughter.
Since there was no running inside of the house and I had to go outside to brush my teeth or take a bath. So, I drove to my sister’s house. Who lived directly across from my mother. Shortly, thereafter, my daughter came in the truck with my step father. I asked her, “why didn’t you come over here with me!” She said, “Crazy.” So, I just looked at her. Then she said, “moma, I came over her to talk with you.” I said, “let me hear it!” She, said, “You said bigmon don’t like Kwiesi and I looked at her.” Bigom said he didn’t want to give the money to come and get Kwiesi and bla bla bla…Instanteously, I jumped into the rental car and drove to town and rented me a room, because now I see, I am about to have some problems retrieving my grand son. I went to one court house. They had no information on the child. They informed me of another court around the corner from them. I went there. When I walked into the court house, there was a man who say the stress in my face and he asked, “maam, who are you looking for? I explained, the situation. He said go into that door there and ask the Clerk. I went into the court room where there was clerks and explained my situation. It seemed that everything was so far fetch and I could not get my grand son. Nobody seemed to have any idea on what to do. I certainly didn’t, but I kept praying. I drove back to the hotel and walked and prayed near field near the hotel. Once I finished praying which was about 30 minutes. I went back into my room, and called Ms. Nixon. I said to her, “Ms Nixon, didn’t you tell me that when I come down here to get my grand son, I wasn’t going to have any problems. She said “yes.” I said, didn’t you said that I could get the police involved if I did have problems. She said, “yes.” Then I asked her, “do my mother have anything to do with this?” She said, “yes.” She doesn’t want you to take the child back to Chicago.” I said to her, “thank you.” Then my spirit said to me, “go back up that court house.” I went back up the court house, and I said to the clerk who, without a glimpse recognized me. I said to her, “I need to speak to someone in authority.” She than gave me the telephone number to the judges chambers. I was so grateful. I hurried back to the hotel room, because I was running out of time and money. While I couldn’t wait to dial the telephone number, on the first call, the line to the judges chambers was busy. I called out to GOD again, as I was so anxious to speak to this judge. On the second call, Judge Avis picked up. Then, I began to say, “Judge Atvis, my name is Joe Ann Davis. I allowed my grandson, whom I have guardianship papers from the court, to come down here with his biological mother. I faxed court papers to Ms. Nixon over at the Welfare department about two weeks ago, and did a follow up call. I asked her did she receive the court papers. She said, “yes.” I also asked if and when I come to get my grandson was I going to have any problems. She said “no” and if I have any problems, can I get the police involved, her reply was “yes.” Now my mother has gotten involved and doesn’t want me to have my grand son. The judge said, “give me 20 minutes. Within 15 minutes, Ms. Nixon was knocking at my hotel room’s door. She knocked so hard, until I thought it was the police. When I opened the door, she fell in, saying, “she got to give you that child.“ I thought to myself, I know she does. She then said to me, “I got to do a home assessment.“ I said, No you don’t, I have it all on video. She yelled, “I can’t take this.“ I thought to myself, why is she acting like that. The spirit said to me, she’s acting like that because you have her job on video. I then said to her, “Ms. Nixon, I didn’t come to get you or anybody else fired from their job. I came to get my grand son. She said, I am going to get him. I said I am following you. She said, do you want you’re your grand son. I said,“yes.“ She said well let me go and get him. I didn’t care about her authority, because at that point it was obvious she hadn’t done her job. Before my mother got involved, my daughter would tell me, “moma you take Kwiesi back to Chicago with you until I have this baby. It appeared that after her prison stay, she went back to Mississippi and got pregnant from the same man. Yet, she is not with the father of either child.
Before I videoed I had no earthly idea, that I would have to use it to keep Kwiesi. I actually did the video to do a documentary on my life, but I could never get my daughter and her grandmother to believe that. However, on the day I got him. I sat him down in the car, and said to him, “Q” I didn’t come to take you from you mother, if you want to stay with her. But I’ve got to get back to Chicago to take care of bigmon. So if you wan to stay with you mother, “grandma” is not going to be upset with you. I made it clear to this child, how it was and how I felt and I also let him know that I respected his decision, if he wanted to stay with his mom. Then I said to him, “now what do you want to do.” He said, “I am coming with you grandma.” Then we left the rural part of canton, MS, and went to the town where I had gotten a room and some food for him to eat the day before and put it into the refrigerator. Because I knew he would be hungry. Early the following morning around 5:00AM we were on our way back to Chicago. What a story.
My daughter had another boy child in January 2003. Last summer my mother told me he was going around asking for me and about me. Wanting to know what family member looks like me. (this brings tears to my eyes, because I am not in the predicament to see him financially and the psychological problems behind all of this makes me sicker). I would like to be part of his life, but how can I when my daughter is not only not letting me see him. It‘s like she doesn’t‘ these two biological brothers visit each other or talk to each other over the phone. They both have the same mother and father.
After not hearing from her for almost 7 years, finally on September 17, 2012, around 9:am she called. I didn’t recognize the voice. So I asked, “Who is this?“ She said, “kk.“ I said, “hey honey.“ She called saying she needed some money because “people” (the government) was taking $700 out of her check for child support. I was shocked. Not shocked that she had to pay child support. I had to do what I had to do. Had I know gone to the welfare department for help for her “first” son, I don’t know where we would be.
I have worked hard with my grand son. First, because I didn’t want him to be a statistic for jail and/or prison. He told me that his mother had him braking in house at 2. Once she put him in a window and asked him to unlock one her friend’s apartment door, to let her and the woman’s boyfriend in, and told him it was a game. They went in he said, and busted holes in the lady’s wall, stole her jewelry, and credit cards. He is forever and often thanking me for rescuing him, because he says he would have been a juvenile. That same very day, he said, it was on the local news that someone had broken into a lady’s apartment and busted up her walls etc. He tries very hard to be someone in life and not become a young man who has a criminal record. When we left Chicago in November 2006, and moved to Las Vegas to pursue our performing arts career, he asked me to home school him. I said, “boy you better get on that bus and go to school.“ He said, “grandma” if you home school me, you don’t have to worry about the teachers calling stressing you out like they did in Chicago, “saying I hit someone.” You know I will hit them back if they hit me grandma. It is the natural thing to do. So, I home schooled him and he finished high school at 13. His mother or his father never commended him for that, and this saddens me.
When she did visit him in Chicago, she would see us practicing as we are an inter-generational, educational, motivational, and inspiring performing arts team. Yet, when I allowed her to take him to Mississippi, she enrolled him kin a retarded class with other children, and this child is by no means SLOW. He said it was for her to get a check. Rite then and there I became so angry. I wondered to myself how could she belittle him like that. He’d thrived so hard all could be and his own mother was going to deprogram” him, as she said.” I have this information in my possession. Nothing I’ve written regarding this story, is untrue.
Although there is more to this story, I am just not up to typing it all. Yet, before any of my grand children was born, I was sentenced to 6 years for a gun charge and drug trafficking. While incarcerated I enrolled into an Art School downtown Chicago, “Columbia College.“ I not only earned a BA in Liberal Arts, but also an MA in Art Entertainment and Media Management (AEMM). Since that time, I’ve gotten a write up in the Educational Section of the New York Times, Performances at Princeton University, Indiana University, a speech and performance at the Second Presidential Awards of Excellence of Science and Mathematics Mentoring Conference at the University of Kentucky Membrane Center in Lexington, McDonalds, Libraries profit and other non -profit organization. After Kalah’s father took me back to court and fought for his daughter, and won, I became depressed, because the kids are now separated and their mother is in jail.
Yet, as Kwiesi’s grandmother and after retrieving him and his sister from Huntsville AL., after working on my Masters, and on the go for the last 14 years, pursing our dreams as the inter-generational performing arts team, that we are, I myself need a long long very long vacation, because it’s been a whirl wind of one stressful episode after another in my life, every since my daughter got caught up.
Around 2005, I assume my daughter came to her senses and wanted to me to sign the court papers to release Kwiesi back to her. I wouldn’t do it. So when I we went to court, the judge said, “I see you are not wanting to give her back her child.“ I said, “I gave him back to her once and had to go back and get him.“ She said, OH.“ lets see what is happening here. So they started to investigate me as I had the video that I had taken when I went to get him from Mississippi to prove the deployable conditions my daughter was living in, in Mississippi. Plus, Kwiesi kept telling his attorney, he didn’t want to go back with his mother. He said to me, “grandma, now I know how annoying it is for people to be asking you the same thing over and over again. I said, “why do you say that.“ He said, ‘because my attorney keep asking me if I want to stay with you or go to live with my mother, I kept on telling her, I want to stay with you. I told him, that his attorney wanted to make sure every thing was in your “best interest. And she need to be sure, you knew what you wanted as a child.”
My grand daughter who was 6 at the time is now 21 and in College at Savannah State in Georgia. She is studying for a nursing degree. My grand son as you will see on the YouTube link is Breaking into Hollywood soon. This our story. Please not, that my grand son and I are now making a difference in the lives of grandmothers and/or grand parents raising grand children. By chance if you choose us for your show, please allow us to perform the famous “GrandMA” song and our “Try to Stop the Air Pollution Song” if possible. Attached also is an email a holocoust suvivor, who has breast cancer commending me on what a great job I’ve done raising my grand son. I am forever getting compliments, even from strangers at groceries stores, community centers. Our very first performance here in Las Vegas was for the GrandParents RedCarpet Ball at the Plaza Hotel and Casino, the City of Las Vegas, profit and non-profit organization.
MY STEP FATHER SEXUAL ADVANCES:
My grand mother, Ms. Varie Davis-Robinson, raised me. However, when I went to live with my mother, all hell broke loose.
"I see the WORD, to read the WORD, allowing me to speak the WORD. Speaking the WORD, as I meditate on the WORD, so that I may live by the WORD.. for "In the beginning was the WORD. The WORD was with GOD, the WORD was GOD." John Chapter 1 verse 1" So, I am made in His image, so I am the WORD." Copyrights October 16, 2013.....
On November 25, 2013, my grand son, angelaa, and I was going to get our thanksgiving turkey... Low and behold...my grand son just told me about a conversation he had with his mother. He said she asked him, "Do Joe Ann have you doing all this and that." He said he texted her back and said, "It is structure." He just turned 17. Now I know why she resented everything I asked her to do. In return, my mother was teaching me structure as well, and I rebelled. Yet, but look what not having "structure" or resent "structure" do to you...My daughter and I both went to prison, not because we weren't taught "structure." But because, we resented it, not wanted to accept responsibilty for making the right choices in life. If we are "structured" and or "instructed" than we become "destructive." It's the truth.
JAMAICA:
When I took a "retreat trip" to Kingston, Jamaica in April 2013, after one of my dogs died, I had no idea my career would take off for the better of that country. I only wanted to go to Jamaica to see what happened to my girlfriend, Margaret. But while I was there, I began to tell her sister that my life was all about. She said, Oh" we must get you to the church, we must get you to the radio station, we must get you to the television station. All of the above was in my favor, because not only did she schedule me for a "testimonial speech" at the Power of Failth International Ministries, but also as a guest on "the Susan Show." The only motivational and inspiring television show in Jamaica. HOwever, after that year's visit, I received a call back in January 2014. It was apparent that the tapping I did for the Susan show would be airing on January 12, 2014. What a joy! To promote myself farther in that foreign land, I called the INstitute of Jamaica Museum's Director Dorsia Brooks, and proposed to her, a "try to stop the air pollution" for her 2014 EARTH DAY festival downtown Kingston, Jamaica. Students and instructors from all over the Island were in attendance. ONe instructor, Tera Rankine, became very close. For every audition, talent competition, she would always call me and ask,, if I'd like to participate.
Significantly, from April 2014, through July 2014, I had the opporutnity to be on Jamaica's JCDC competition. Something like American's Got Talent. This competition took me all the way to the Big Stage in Spanish Town, Kingston, Jamaica. There the audience gave me a very hot welcome, for my performance on "Bring Me Some Flowers." This took place Sunday, July 13, 2014, on the Big Stage in Spanish Town. It was a pure delight. "Trust in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart." I believe to receive.....
Before all of this happened, I'd cancelled my flight back to the states, because I felt, that I didn't have enough time in Jamaica to promote myself as a performing artist. I was due back in America on May 18, 2014, but I called the American Airlines, and cancelled my flight until a later time. What nerves! Than I said to God, "It's me and you now!." I needed to be out in about in the Kingston's neighborhood, as I'd been, but this time using my performing arts' mode. Mykalia, a ten year old, who lived in the house with her auntie, who was my host and I went to the mall to purchase a few personal items. Upon leaving, we noticed a van with radio logos and call letters, a big stage, and vendors... I said instantaneously, "I am going to be a part of of this." and I was a part of it. I won the dance contest, and when it came to singing Bring Me Some Flowers, he host had to, by the audience recognition" she had to find me something, as all of those people were chanting out "give her something" "give her something." God only knew, how this made me feel. I threw my hands up over my head in disbelief." The crowed were chanting this. I could not believe it! As time went on.
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YOUR DOINGS!*http://dallas.craigslist.org/dal/tfr/3282301345.html
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www.jad-productions.blogspot.com
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