The interior of my home, curiously, looks like a shrine to all things spiritual. Curious, as I belong to no religion and bow to no man. Don’t come knocking on my door with any pamphlets or bother trying to recruit me for your cult . Respectfully, I ain't the one. I go into full rigor mortis at the thought of such things. But ever since the Spirit of Christ slipped into my Civic that morning through a crack in the passenger side window, enveloped my entire being in his loving atmosphere, and as if by telepathy indicated that I needed to forgive all the selfish, sick souls who'd ever trespassed against me—that it was the only way I'd untwist myself from this burning kink of pain —I began, in earnest, collecting spiritual icons of various faiths in remembrance of my divine encounter. It was 2003 , and I was in my prime. I was also in the grip of a nasty addiction to drugs, alcohol, sex and crime. Before that miraculous morning, I never believed Christ existed. His followers
“When the indigenous and neoindigenous are silenced, they tend to respond to the denial of their voices by showcasing their culture in vivid, visceral, and transgressive ways. Like the indigenous, urban youth distinguish themselves from the larger culture through their dress, their music , their creativity in nonacademic endeavors, and their artistic output. In much public discourse, the ways in which they express themselves creatively are denigrated." - Christopher Emdin At least when I was a barista , the customer wanted what I was selling. These fiends would be lined up, wild-eyed like the living dead, waiting to be let in at the crack of dawn. But lo and behold, they'd actually thank and even tip us… cash money …for our service. As a public school teacher in America, conversely, my "customers" weren't the least bit interested in and rarely grateful for what I was peddlin' - information, ideas, facts, questions, concepts, devices