Excitement definitely in the air in downtown Brooklyn as we approach the holiday weekend. As the weekend before the big week unfolds, with, of course, the virtually back-to-back holiday celebration of the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the inauguration of the 44th Preident of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama, there is palpable excitement and energy in the winter air. The opening of Notorious, which despite the cold, has lines outside the Regal Cinema on Court Street, just adds to the energy and excitement.



When we lived in Clinton Hill/Fort Greene in the 90s, it was a few blocks away from the late Biggie Smalls/Notorious B.I.G./Christopher Wallace's home on St. James Place. Our older daughter, now still studying in Europe, is pining for the fjords that she has to miss the premier of the film. As one of her teacher's said years ago, when another kid was trying to "explain" to our daughter some hip hop reference, "You don't have to explain that to her, Danielle grew up in the 'hood." Sort of. Not exactly. But, so it goes.



The late Christopher Wallace had brains, talent, and charisma to spare. Before he broke through, he survived the streets, drugs, and Brooklyn. He had a strong mom behind him. But I guess he couldn't survive his fame. The killing of Tupac Shakur was big news. But you could sense the murder of Christopher Wallace hit Brooklyn kids really hard with a heavy punch. If Barack Obama represents one story of remarkable success for Black Americans, the path taken by the late Christopher Wallace surely represented another. Rap, hip hop, or whatever you want to call contemporary Black music, has taken the world by storm. Wallace, yet another achieving kid from Brooklyn, made his mark.



I love these lines from Notorious:





Sean Combs

: Yo, he got sex appeal like LL?

Wayne Barrow

: A little bigger than that.

Sean Combs

: What, like Heavy D?

Wayne Barrow

: He's a little darker than that.

: He look like Wesley Snipes?

Wayne Barrow

: Oh, he ain't Wesley...



President-elect Obama is trim, vibrant, healthy, athletic, a brilliant writer, supremely self-confident. B.I.G. was big, robust, pleasure-seeking, a brilliant writer, and supremely self-confident. They each took their own path, both tinged with pathos and the blues, and each forged his own unique, individual brand.

Although President-elect Obama, clearly a brilliant, remarkable, charismatic, strong family- values-rooted guy represents a more familiar, comfortable model of success, America will always have room for and produce the creative, visionary, and healing artist, no matter how much that talent skirts with realms of danger, self-destructiveness, and violence.

Sean Combs: