Money Is A Language You Have To Know How to Speak

I never understood how Wu Tang Clan’s C.R.E.A.M. (1993) became the ‘let’s get this’ anthem. If you listen to the song—a tune for the ages—it’s mad depressing. It seems to have had a resurgence with the rise of LLC Twitter and all of their poor and sometimes dangerous advice. I’m like, damn! Have you actually listened to the entirety of the song and not just the chorus? This song was never anthemic to me, It always felt, and feels, like a very profound warning about the pursuit of money—the whole 50 Cent ‘Get Rich or Die Trying’ mentality. As a kid from a family of no means, who grew into a young adult with no means, fumbling through undergrad on a unicycle of scams to make enough money to eat and buy books, this song was (I admit) seductive. But my reality was: ‘Debt rules Everything Around Me (D.R.E.A.M.) I have no money/all these damn bills/y’all.’

When you come from a place of poverty, your relationship with and to money is all skewed. While I won’t make any generalizations—aside from our skewed relationship with and to money—Most of us suffering from poverty consciousness either over or undervalue money. We place too much importance on it, in either direction. On one end of the poverty consciousness spectrum we’re on that 50 Cent shit. On the other, we overthink or outright reject any financial windfall because we feel we’re unworthy. It took me a long time to reset my relationship with and to money. But I won’t front. I sometimes revert back to my scarcity mindset and make poor financial decisions. 

I’m not going to get too much into those decisions, but let’s just say I don’t have the amount of sneakers I do because I’m opening a store. Retail therapy is my maladaptive coping skill for when I’m feeling uneasy about money. Right before the pandemic shut down most of my ventures, I received a large check from a client. I paid off two credit cards, which was dope. Saw my credit score shoot up a few months later. But the money I earmarked for savings and the Roth? My family got presents everyday for a month. I bought more sneakers than I knew what to do with, and we went out to eat every single night for a few weeks. When I emerged from my spending fog, almost all of that huge check had evaporated. And I felt guilty. It was that same icky, you’re not worthy guilt feeling like when I overeat on things I have absolutely no business eating. But unlike most folks who are from the same social context as me, I’ve been lucky to have several mentors, financial geniuses, who took me under their wings to give me all the jewelry. 

In no way am I advocating capitalism or a money above all else ethos. But we live in a time and context where we need money to survive, live, and thrive. And just like a weapon, I’d rather have it and not need it instead of needing it and not having it. 

Money/It’s a Gas

Immediately before writing this, I was calculating the costs for our daughter’s college education. Based on what she wants to major in and the school she wants to attend, we’re looking at a pretty steep six figures. While my wife and I have some cash in her 529, but after doing the following equation: Time Until College x Monthly 529 Contributions = We’re Going To Have To Quadruple Our Monthly Contributions. And we live in California, so we’re already out $50 as soon as we wake up. This keeps me up at night. Financial planning for our daughter’s future—a future that seems to be in more and more jeopardy because of a subset of people who seem determined to ruin society—makes me question the necessity of saving for something that is, at this moment, a want, not an immediate need. Once again, I’d rather have it and not need it, but still. Money impacts every facet of our lives—I wish this weren’t so, but that’s the moment we’re in and I want to be able to thrive in it. 

I’ve been poor. Really poor. I don’t ever want to feel that kind of stress again. I for damn sure don’t want my daughter to even know that kind of stress exists. As a parent, one of my jobs is to make sure that my daughter is better off than I was. She’s already so much cooler and more  comfortable in her skin, than I was or am. But I want to make sure that her mom and I set her up to the point that money is not her primary concern. Once the money monkey is off her back,  she’ll be freed up to build the life she needs and wants. 

My reconciliation with money started with a conversation with a former friend, Corey’s, dad. Bill Gillquist (R.I.P.) was an executive with the Honeywell corporation. He came from humble beginnings, became disabled because of polio, and went on to advance in his chosen field. They had a gorgeous home in South Minneapolis, a Porsche and Mercedes in the garage, and Corey had every single PC computer system that dropped—Corey is a genius computer forensic investigator to this day. This measly paragraph illustrates how a parent having money (and generously sharing with their children) will set kids up to the point where they can pursue their dreams, without deferring them because they cannot afford to do anything, except survive. 

I came over before Corey arrived and like always, his parents (Corey and Sylvia) invited me. Two of the most generous people you could meet. We used to eat them out of house and home, but they were always cordial and welcoming. Bill and I were sitting in their TV room when Bill, somewhat aggressively asked: “What the fuck do you think you’re going to do with your life? I know you’re in college, but what are your plans after that?”

Talk about feeling attacked. My dyslexic ad stuttering ass was trying to calm down before I answered, so I wouldn’t sound horrible out of place. I shrugged and tossed out something about wanting to be a filmmaker. “Well, you’re not going to the best college for that.”

Ouch. 

“What do your parents do?” This broke me. My mom only ever had odd jobs and didn’t have any real investment in my future and I didn’t know my father, other than meeting him seven random times. I then unburdened myself. Not sure how long all that was buried, but it came spilling out. I explained how the entire financial burden of university was on me, how I grew up poor and abused—how I had no idea what the hell I was doing and was utterly terrified and that I came over to their house to see Bill and Sylvia as much as I did Corey, because I wanted to see what functional and loving parenting looked like.

Bill was quiet, quiet for a long while. The embarrassment resulting from what I’d just shared began to sink in. I got up to leave. 

“Sit down, “ Bill commanded. “You have to change how you’re thinking about everything. I can’t do anything about your relationship with your parents. That’s fucked up. But I can give you something to think about in regards to money. How to make it and how to keep it.”

Why wouldn’t I listen to a rich guy? I was all ears. 

"You want to get rich? Hang out with people who earned every penny of their money. Hang out with people who made their wealth. Avoid people who inherited their money. I mean, by all means hang out with Corey, but he’ll inherit a lot. Honestly, he’ll inherit a lot but will also make his own with that computer shit. He’s a genius. So that’s a bad example. Most people who inherit their money don't know how it works. It’s always been there, they’ve always had it. There’s no process for them, just financial consistency—money earned and managed by someone else. It’s a fact, not an aspiration.” 

He dropped another one on me, something I've heard before.

“Money is a language you have to learn how to speak. If not, you'll never be able to attract it. What I mean is you have to understand the where, how, and when to go after it because it won’t come to you." And then, “Anyone who says, ‘money isn’t the answer’ is too broke to even ask the question.”

As cryptic as these were, they made complete and total sense to me. Not the words themselves, but the sentiment behind them: Stop being afraid of money, stop misunderstanding its utility, stop keeping my distance from it, and go and get me some. 

The conversation also forced me to reflect on how I routinely engaged in financial self-sabotage, mainly from not knowing (or advocating) for my worth. I don’t think I’m in the minority when I say that knowing how much I should charge for a service, or how to negotiate a raise is one of the most difficult things I ever have to do.l What is my labor worth? This is precisely why having open and honest conversations with your vocational peers is so important. To treat money as taboo is gives us no power in negotiating what we should be paid. Once there is radical financial transparency, most of us will become less afraid and getting our coins. 

Another heavy de-scaling of the eyes was when I switched from: advocating for what I was worth to getting paid what I deserved. Divorcing my worth from my earning power was freeing. I’m priceless, dammit. But you need to pay me this, for me to do that for you. It wasn’t an easy shift because so many things in our society link are self-worth to our ability to earn. For me, once I was able to make my earning potential and my self-worth separate things, I became more confidant. I was able to focus on my experience and my skill-set—I know what I can do, and what I can do is dope—and not have my self esteem rise and fall according to home much income I was making at a given time. Not to say that I don’t slip here and there, taking on an excess amount of stress in pursuit of money, but it happens less and less now than it did in my early 20s. 

So I was in a much better place to receive some more money wisdom, almost 29 years to the day, after I spoke with Bill Gillquist. 

I had just entered my favorite coffee shop in Berkeley and sitting in the back patio area was one of my favorite writers and thinkers. Of. All. Time. I’m not going to name drop because I don’t want to blow up his spot. Me? I’m the cold call champion of the world so I approached him, turning up my charm and extra twenty percent, and introduced myself. I told him that I taught two of his books to my undergrad students and that his interview on a recent podcast changed the trajectory of a book I was writing. I joked he was my mentor, despite my never meeting him prior to that day. He laughed really loudly. He was exceedingly nice and asked if I’d join them.

Damn the COVID. I collected my coffee and sat my happy ass down.

He introduced me to his coffee companion and he was also nice and eager to have a conversation. We talked about tech ethics, digital humanities, folklore, popular culture, why email is more intrusive than phone calls—one of the best moments in my life. And I have had my fair share of adventures. 

The we started to talk about money. Not money per se, but how it moves though and affects our lives and society. 

If my unofficial mentor was a certified millionaire, his companion was a certified billionaire. With a B. And with all my research, I don’t think he was on some "Le secret des grandes fortunes sans cause apparente est un crime oublié, parce qu’il a été proprement fait” Balzac shit.

He gave me all the free jewelry, but I’ll give you the points that impacted me the most:

• “The gulf between fame and wealth is enormous. There are a lot of famous broke people. The general public has no idea who I am but my kids and their kids and their will never want for anything. People seem t be chasing the wrong things.”

• “Getting rich is easy. If that’s your goal. The right investments, save more than you spend. But what’s rich? Rich ends. Wealth doesn’t. Wealth becomes a culture.”

• “Money doesn’t buy happiness, but wealth ensures security. Knowing that I’ll never be hungry, that I’ll always have shelter takes two of the biggest stressors off my plate and I can focus on other things. Being in constant survival mode will take years off your life.”

• “We can rail against money and how it’s evil all we want. Getting it can cause harm, but I’ve done more good with my wealth than I ever did screaming eat the rich with other people screaming the same thing.”

I was floored. Stunned into silence. It would’ve be easy to write of the proclamations of an incredibly wealthy white man, especially in the Bay, but his words hit me at the right time, that time being simultaneously taking care of elders, other family members, all while while saving for retirement and my child’s college fund. Not to mention just the general level of expensiveness living in the Bay Area.

Brutal truth: More money would make my life, and the lives of my family, better. No need for calligraphy around this. More money, fewer problems. 

This exchange was in conversation with what Bill Gillquist dropped on me decades prior. Comparing and contrasting the two allowed me to recognize and understand the following:

• Money is a real and tangible thing. It can and does provide security and stability. It moves you from survive to thrive.

• Money is a concept. It is a symbol, albeit one with positive and negative material impact.

• Money isn’t inherently evil.

• The worth of your personhood is not connected to how much money you have.

• Along this same note, I have to stop thinking about my age as some kind of ‘earning window.’ I’m writing this on my 49th birthday and I find myself speaking in those terms: “I have, maybe 6 years left before I start to look my age. I need t make all the money I can before I start to look old and no one will hire me.”

• Entrepreneurship is looking more and more desirable.

• The more money I have, the more people I can help.

• It is tempting to lose oneself in the pursuit of it. As the rich folks say, ‘The game of it.’ It’s crazy to talk to people who think money is a game when you’re a missed check away from losing everything.

• I need a lot more money.

My conundrum is how to get more money without abandoning my family and my values? I’ve worked in high-earning positions before and while the money was wonderful (ohmigod is was wonderful) but I wasn’t a very good person. I was short with my wife, absent from our relationship—I couldn’t turn off high-power-guy and he invaded our home. Let’s just say separation was on the table. I’m not that same guy, anymore. I’m a better husband. I’m a father, now. I’ve seen the world I want to live in, that I want my daughter to inherit, and it’s not extractive or exploitative. 

So I’m left with the aforementioned conundrum: How do I make enough money so me and my people are well-taken care of, without losing the person who’ve I become? A person who I actually like? 

The Inevitable Impulse to Change the World

For those who don’t know, Kinko’s wasn’t only a ubiquitous copy center from 1970 - 2008, it was  also the launchpad for so many young GenXers creative hopes and dreams. When you walked into a Kinko’s (now, FedEx Office), there was no doubt in your mind that this was a place to get work done. With an aesthetic reminiscent of a dystopian shopping center, this no-frills operation, with their computers lined in stately rows, their multifunction copiers—which looked like science fiction to a generation reared on mimeographs—and their helpful, yet vacant staff, it is no wonder that the creativity that was assembled within those walls got out into the world. 

But maybe I’m a little ahead of where we need to be. Let’s deviate a bit. I promise it will all tie together. 

I continue to find it fascinating that Generation X has been labeled as slackers, the disaffected; the invisible generation sandwiched between the more consequential Boomers and Millennials. I’m of the mind that Black and POC GenXers had a vastly different generational experience than white GenXers. There has been very little media that has captured the spirit, the sheer vibrancy of Black and POC GenXers. Of late, there has been an article hereand there, with the New York Times being particularly uneven in their coverage, but overall—shouts out to Chuck Klosterman—the slacker label has had a nigh indelible run. It is really time for a more thorough accounting of XersOC (Xers of Color). Yeah, anytime you attempt to label something that is diverse, it is almost impossible to craft something that both accurately encompasses the thing under review, and not be corny. I’ve failed on both these counts, but here’s the reasoning. 

 As stated, Black and POC GenXers (focusing just on the US as this is the origin of the discourse) have had very different generational experiences. Unless I’m mistaken and Black and POC GenXers identify with the characterization—I’m open to corrective feedback—we were in an entirely different lane. I’ll even go further. The “slacker” narrative hit first and had more money and social propulsion behind it that it became the dominant narrative. While I wasn’t fully immersed in white people and white culture, I’ve been the chip on the cookie plenty of times (undergrad, anyone?) and I didn’t know any slackers. And this is taking into account living in Minneapolis, Brooklyn, and London during my formative years. Folks seem to forget that hip-hop is a cultural artificial of GenX. While many of the originators are Boomers, it was GenX that turned hip-hop into the global cultural and financial powerhouse it is today. As my younger relatives would say: #ItBeFactsTho

 There wasn’t a GenXer I knew that was lazy. Ever one of them hustled. They were abundantly creative, motivated, and open to cross-pollinating with others. I’d argue that a characteristic of my growing up, my GenX experience, was the refusal of cultural silos. Of course, there was some pretty intense racial segregation, but if you were a non-racist creative, you rocked with whomever enhanced the creative vibe. Once again, I can only speak to and for my experience, but this was how we got down. 

Hip-hoppers, who inherited the culture from people who dressed like gender-fluid punk pirates who embraced the misuse of technology, didn’t really care too much for labels. This came later, with the rise of hip-hop journalism and the need to categorize the culture, and its exponents, to make it legible for those not part of the hip hop nation. We were the original remix culture. We didn’t just rehash, we reshaped. Reused. Reinterpreted. An entire folk culture sprang up from the ashes of Black and Brown poverty and reshaped the entire world. That’s super heavy when you think about it. While I’m over her harping on the virtues of hip-hop, we were also fed by the punk and hardcore scenes. Bad Brains. Black Flag. Minor Threat. JFA. These bands were just as important to some hip-hoppers as Run DMC. Hell, rebel skateboard culture is a whole other essay. An old graduate school professor of mine called GenX, “the smorgasbord generation. You bastards took and used it all, but it was never about appropriation. It was always about trying to find a clearer vision and paths for yourselves.” This is a verbatim quote. It struck me because of the transcultural nature of our friendships.  

My crew alone had Puerto Ricans (one half of me), Jamaicans (the other half), African Americans, Vietnamese, a lone Czech, a couple of Irish folks, and the Hmong homeys. We were family and you couldn’t tell us anything different. And just like a family, we all had our own styles and ways of being, albeit unified by the language and expression of hip hop. No one tried to act like the other—no one slipped in a random “nigga/nigger” to try and be too down. And unlike many families I’m familiar with, our politics were relatively aligned. Naive, yes, but aligned. 

We wanted to change the world for the better.

That’s it. Our desire was just that broad and unspecific. But the impulse to change the world was genuine, if a little earnest. 

But how? We were all project/poor kids with zero resources. What could we possibly do? What was being done? Hip hop showed us hood kids could rise up and out of their circumstances and affect the world. Maybe we should start rapping? Get a record deal (yeah, those mattered back in the day), go on a world tour, and then people would listen to what we had to say like we listened to Public Enemy and KRS. It’s kind of hard to start a rap group when not a one of us could rap, so we explored other options. 

One day, some of us were in a record store, I think it was a Tower Records, and right next to the magazines, there was this row of multi-colored books ranging in size from pamphlet to over-stuffed Reader’s Digest. Crude pictures, crap photographs, and misspellings made up the form of the thing. But the content? Whew! The content was revolutionary. 

Interspersed with information about all kinds of punk and hardcore bands (and a few covering science fiction) was information about vegetarianism, and feminism, queer power, and the straight edge (sXe) lifestyle. If Public Enemy and The Autobiography of Malcolm X awakened my Black political awareness in ways other things did not, these ‘zines awakened me to the possibility of not being so narrow-band with what I cared about. The expanded my politics. 

What also impacted us was that there were addresses on the ‘zines we could write to. Whether it was to contribute or to get something in return, that we had a direct line to people who were making themselves known, who were getting their ideas out into the world, touching people like me and my crew…it was heady. It felt as if anything were possible. 

 We pooled our money, bought a handful, and went back to Kuam’s apartment to plot and plan. 

 With research in firm hand, we were going to start a ‘zine. 

 What would our ‘zine be about? We cared about a whole lot. It had to be hip hop-influenced, that was a given, but it also had to speak to larger issues. Before word one of content was crafted, we batted around names. I wish I could remember all of them, but here are a few choice ones: “Boombox,” “Records and Pens,” Afrikan Dispatch.” What we went with was, “Mind Feast.”

 It was so bad. I know. 

 It took us about two weeks to create a first issue. Distribution wasn’t even on our minds. That we said we were going to do something and did it, that was almost enough for us. We had issue one of “Mind Feast” but didn’t have a single clue what were we going to do with it. Earning money from it would’ve been nice, even though that wasn’t our goal. But there was no way we were going to make money from one issue. We talked about sneaking into the library or teacher’s lounge at school and using the mimeograph machine to make more. But most of us were an incident or two away from expulsion, so we decided against it. Gordon (R.I.P.) said his half-brother worked at a place called Kinko’s that had machines that could make copies for us “super-fast.” 

 Other, more well-funded schools, had copiers. Not ours. We cranked and inhaled toxic ink on the regular. 

 When we decided to go to the half-brother’s Kinko’s it was like prepping for a religious pilgrimage. We checked and rechecked “Mind Feast” to make sure the pagination was correct. We made sure the scotch tape holding our poorly shot photos in place didn’t have any bubbles. We shared what we hoped would happen when “Mind Feast” finally hit the world—we were absolutely sure that our words, our photos, our crude drawings would fundamentally alter our collective reality. We were going to make a difference. Everyone would be touched by our nigh-holy fire. We were going to change the world. Distribution never entered our minds. 

 As we approached the establishment, the blue, lowercase letters with the red dot over the “i” was more impressive than it should have been. But to a group of project kids, anything not covered in piss and badly scrawled graffiti might as well have been a living Nagel drawing. 

 We all hesitated before I strained to open the heavy glass door, struggled while holding it for my crew to step across and through. Immediate 7-11 vibes, but without the multiple colors offered by snack and candy packaging. It was less mountaintop, and more like the waiting room of enlightenment. But still full of expectation and potential. 

 Machines everywhere. Machines we had zero context for. Rows of Apple IIc Pluses, their putty-colored exteriors brimming with possibility. Reggie, the half-brother in question, summoned us with the universal head nod and we obeyed, basically drifting over to him. He and Gordon dapped each other. I gave Gordon “Mind Feast” and Gordon ceremoniously handed it over. Reggie went through it a few times and I saw a change in his face. I couldn’t figure out what he was feeling, until he eventually said, “Yo, this is dope, B. For real.” He then got to work making copies. Not only did Reggie make us copies for free, he introduced us to the concept of the saddle stitch. In about any hour we had a box full of the first issue of “Mind Feast.”

 Before we left, Reggie was adamant that this was a one-time thing—making our copies for free—but he said he could give us a ‘bulk discount’ and then told us about a software program called Pagemaker. A program that could make laying out our ‘zine, “easy as a muhfucker.”

 Holy shit. 

 “Mind Feast” only lasted one issue. Gordon’s death irrevocably fractured the crew. In our communities (aside from the Irish homies) we were never taught or allowed to grieve in a healthy way, so we exited each other’s lives, figuring that not being reminded of his death was the best way to confront our traumatic loss. But that one issue? We showed it to Mr. Grier, our English instructor and he told us to not give it away for free, which was our plan, but to sell it. He encouraged us not to guide our gifts away for free, otherwise people will take advantage of you and never pay you what you’re worth. A lesson I continue to hold dear. That one issue sold for $2 a pop and made us superstar intellectuals in our school. Our peers couldn’t believe that these badass, always in trouble, frequent principal office visitors could do something like that. We had 60 copies and sold them all in a couple of days. We made $120 bucks and split it evenly. We never intended to make money, but it felt good to make money legally and not via the pettiest of thefts. This brief success set me on my current path of trying to live the life of a creative. I’ve been successful, more or less. Had some great highs, and some painful rejections. I’ve even had a very well-known global arts figure steal and profit from my work. Twice. Same guy. But whatever gets to the public’s consciousness first becomes fact. So, trying to reclaim my ideas looks like theft to those who don’t know. But all in all, I’ve been able to curate a creative existence. 

 But when I get down about my lack of success, or when my past traumas decide to take residence in my present, I give myself permission to access those feelings that Kinko’s instilled in me. That my words, pictures, and photos could be replicated and put in a form to be disseminated to others, in hopes of finding and linking with the like-minded. In hopes of changing the world. 

 When FedEx office bought out and took over Kinko’s, I had a very visceral anger. Their blue and orange created by corporate committee logo was more foreboding than the welcoming and unassuming OG Kinko’s. Fed Ex was short for Federal Express. No life. No story. Kinko’s, as the story goes, was named after the founder’s curly hair. Heart. Warmth. Human. Can’t go wrong with that.

 If there was an ultimate legacy bestowed by our times engaging with kinko’s is that things are possible. That you can dream, plan, and then execute. Ideas didn’t have to live in your head. They could be produced and replicated, stapled and disseminated. 

And it did not hurt to have the hook up.