The need to say “I was here” is as old as slavery. The Romans carved graffiti on walls and monuments, with examples surviving in Egypt of Latin curses, magic spells, declarations of love, alphabets, political slogans and famous literary quotes, providing insight into ancient Roman street life. Disappointed love also found its way onto walls in antiquity:
Whoever loves, go to hell. I want to break Venus's ribs
with a club and deform her hips.
If she can break my tender heart
why can't I hit her over the head?
-CIL IV, 1284.
Over eight hundred years later, not much had change and I was sitting on the toilet at the Men’s Country in Chicago, trying not to touch the toilet seat looking at all the writings on the walls. Some guy named Derrick likes to get off on the smell of men after a long day. He writes in a red permanent marker on a gray wall that he “likes to pull yo clothes off and give you that head to toe lickdown after a long day or a workout. Hang those nuts in my face while i lick on yo dick after its been swingin all day. Hit me up.” He leaves his number and phone number. I laugh that anyone would be so horny to leave their name and number on a bathhouse wall. I pray that what I’m expelling doesn’t make a smell or cause attention. I try to be silent.
Why write on some gas station bathroom in middle of Nowhere, Texas with a ballpoint pen, “I was here.” Did the person forget? And who carries the specific permanent marker for such graffiti: maybe a John Doe that’s afraid no one will miss him if he’s abducted by aliens.
They usually leave their name and date. Sometimes they draw boobs or a man’s dick. It’s usually in those bathrooms where you only stop because you ate some bad “truckstop” tuna or Mexican food and it wants out. On the toilet, you bend down just far enough where the booty hole can aim correctly but your butt check won’t touch the seat. And in that awkward Yoga move between explosive convulsions, the eyes wonder especially focus on the cracks of the bathroom stale hoping nobody comes in like a relative or ex-lover or current lover or the newspaper or news team with cameras. Your eyes wonder and splattered all over the walls are messages. Somebody is looking for a dick sucking around 5 in the evening on Sunday and left their phone number. Somebody doesn’t like a certain gang. Somebody wants to get fucked with an umbrella. You chuckle thinking of all the freaks in the world. And then it’s that ubiquitous, “I was here, 6-17-1997.” You suddenly feel not so alone that somebody was there in the same position you’re probably in ten years ago with exploding Diarrhea.
I often wondered who those people were. What did they look like? Are they still alive? Did they find happiness? Did that guy looking to get his dick sucked finally get a phone call? And what would make them write on the walls? Is it loneliness? Is it that human need to record our existence even it’s a kinky need to get fucked with a canary yellow umbrella? Do anybody ever call those numbers. Does anybody care the Saprina Ellis is a slut/bitch and isn’t that a double negative?
I started writing on the bathroom walls “I was here” when I started to question if I could save myself. I was twenty five years old. I was drinking too much. I was partying too much. I was getting older and scared. I wrote on the every wall at bathhouses, bookstores, clubs, bars, that I was here. I knew eventually I be another ghost. I guess to say that I was once young, that I was horny, that I was lonely, that I was scared, that I was drunk and I once thought I would live forever.
And then there was epidemic of Graffiti in the city in the early nineties what some called the desperation of the ghetto for attention. Images or lettering scratched, scrawled, or more usually spray-painted on property that didn’t belong to the artist, and was often regarded by others as unsightly damage or unwanted vandalism. It was the name of gangs. The names of those shot down in the streets by gang violence. The artwork of young ghetto artist trying to make their mark on the world. I remember being on the train in New York and thinking why spray paint on the sides of the building when the “man” was just going to paint over it the next day. And some of the artwork was better than some crap I’ve seen museums. It spoke to me. It was my cousin Pookie, Ray Ray, or that guy I slept with behind that building on a musty New York Saturday night. It was my history. I had to understand, why say I was here when people would eventually forget.
I was born October 5th. The doctor slapped my ass and recorded the time. I was given a birth certificate with my footprints to prove I existed, an American citizen. And when I die, I’m also promised a death certificate and tombstone to say that I was here. But the real question, why was I here in the first place?
There was time when I started writing on the walls because I was really asking if I would feel good enough. I tried being a whore. I went to the gym five times a week. I slept with a different man every other week. But it didn’t’ mean shit. A condom in the trash didn’t mean shit. Hoping they remember or I remember meant everything. I wanted to carve into their bodies that “Michael Whitley was here” because I often I forgot who I slept with that drunk night but that would’ve probably sent me to jail or to a mental hospital. So I carved in into the trees, walls, on the floors. The real question was if I would ever feel good enough. I had to check the mirror so often. I wondered if the wounds of my childhood abuse could heal. I wondered if they abandoned child would ever feel good enough for happiness. Good enough to be a writer. Good enough to love myself. I asked the question. The universe gave me the challenge.
So I set out for physical response. I pushed in hopes that it would push back. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t some ectoplasm. I ain’t no invisible man. I guess vandalizing walls wasn’t enough for me. I wrote a book. I just wanted to be able to put my name in the computer and see it come up. To see Michael Whitley come up.
For two years I was the “shirtless writer.” An alcoholic drag queen named “Bing” gave me that name. She told me I could rule the world if I wanted. I believed her. Some people called me the “shitless writer” or “full of shit” writer. They didn’t understand. Some thought I was a hustler, a common prostitute or pathetic con man. I was all of it. For two years every week without fail, I wrote my weekly column about my pathetic life living in the city. I sold it at the local gay bars and clubs for one dollar. I still can’t believe I got away with it. I figured people gave away their money all the time. They gave it away to bartenders who made weak drinks. They gave it away to overpriced clubs. They gave it away to strippers. They gave it away to aging alcoholic drag queens. I figured why not me.
Like Graffiti I’d see on my comics on the floors of bathrooms, dance floors and parking lots. It would make me feel alive. I know “I was here.” Just in case I forgot. I wanted to be a lot of things in my life. My first break as a writer came in third grade. I wrote a poem called “mirror.” It was basically about how I was scared to look in the mirror because I was convinced the person behind it was trying to kill me. I thought he was mocking me. I showed the poem to my teacher hoping that she knew the ghost busters. In second grade I wanted to Valentine Day king. My teacher laughed at me when I raised my hand to nominate myself. She said nobody was going to vote for a nappy head snot nose kid, so I should just save myself the embarrassment. I didn’t care. I stood in front of the class wiping my nose as they voted. I told myself that I should do the politically correct thing and vote for the other guy, because I didn’t want to seem vain. When the votes were tabulated, I had gotten zero votes. I didn’t even vote for myself. That’s what bothered me the most. I didn’t even vote for myself. I vowed to never do that again. The next year I ran again and that time I not only voted for myself, I changed the votes. I won. When I was in fourth grade, I wanted the lead in the choir. I was told I couldn’t sing and that I sounded like God murdering a basket of monkeys with a toothpick. She said my vomit would sound better. The choir director told me I sang through my nose and it was always full of boogers. She said I should be happy being in the back, therefore nobody could see me. I didn’t stop singing. Actually I sang louder. I got kicked out of choir. When was in high school I tried to be an actor. My drama teacher told me I acted like Scarlet O’Hara with an obsessive compulsive disorder. I didn’t understand what that mean. I thought she was a bitch. In college I wanted to be a model. I was told I was too dark. Not too good looking. Too short. The first photo shoot I pissed on myself. I was wearing white Calvin Klein. The director told me the shoot wasn’t about waster sports. I didn’t find out what that meant until years later.
But the need to say I was here was still tormenting. It’s why I kept doing the comic every week. I didn’t care what they thought. I didn’t care if they gave me money or not. I was fucking h ere. “I so want you to succeed.” His name was Mike. He was more than a little overweight. He and Jabber the Hutt probably wore the same pants size. I liked Mike because he was a Negrophile, a barfly and every week he had a ten dollar bill to stuff down my pants. I knew he was in lust with me, had been saying he was trying to lose weight so that he could be with me. I was also sure he said that to all the young black boys with flat stomachs and a nice dick print. I was always happy to see Mike, mostly because he gave me money with few complications. Hearing him say that he wanted me to succeed made me feel so good, because it was hard trying to hold on to a slippery dream at twenty-nine years old. It was hard hustling the bar with my little comic that I put together at home. And it was hard wearing my heart on my sleeves for every pervert just to try and look down my pants. I only did it because I got to be a writer every week. I got to live my dream, and until I was discovered by the “powers that be” that write checks, it was all I had to look forward to in life. So I hugged Mike, put my skinny toned arms around his fat waist, and that’s when he whisper it in my ear again, “I so want you to succeed” but it didn’t sound so supportive anymore. It was more suggestive and nasty. He whispered it again to make sure I heard him, “I so want you to pee on me.” Needless to say, I let go of Mike’s fat nasty ass.
I was shirtless writer. I was here. And I was horny, often scared, trying to figure it all out, and trying to make myself feel good enough for happiness. I laughed. I danced. I sold a comic in the club for two years. I kissed. I sucked dick. I ate ass. Vice Versa. I sold jokes. I was in love. But most important, I lived.
Whoever loves, go to hell. I want to break Venus's ribs
with a club and deform her hips.
If she can break my tender heart
why can't I hit her over the head?
-CIL IV, 1284.
Over eight hundred years later, not much had change and I was sitting on the toilet at the Men’s Country in Chicago, trying not to touch the toilet seat looking at all the writings on the walls. Some guy named Derrick likes to get off on the smell of men after a long day. He writes in a red permanent marker on a gray wall that he “likes to pull yo clothes off and give you that head to toe lickdown after a long day or a workout. Hang those nuts in my face while i lick on yo dick after its been swingin all day. Hit me up.” He leaves his number and phone number. I laugh that anyone would be so horny to leave their name and number on a bathhouse wall. I pray that what I’m expelling doesn’t make a smell or cause attention. I try to be silent.
Why write on some gas station bathroom in middle of Nowhere, Texas with a ballpoint pen, “I was here.” Did the person forget? And who carries the specific permanent marker for such graffiti: maybe a John Doe that’s afraid no one will miss him if he’s abducted by aliens.
They usually leave their name and date. Sometimes they draw boobs or a man’s dick. It’s usually in those bathrooms where you only stop because you ate some bad “truckstop” tuna or Mexican food and it wants out. On the toilet, you bend down just far enough where the booty hole can aim correctly but your butt check won’t touch the seat. And in that awkward Yoga move between explosive convulsions, the eyes wonder especially focus on the cracks of the bathroom stale hoping nobody comes in like a relative or ex-lover or current lover or the newspaper or news team with cameras. Your eyes wonder and splattered all over the walls are messages. Somebody is looking for a dick sucking around 5 in the evening on Sunday and left their phone number. Somebody doesn’t like a certain gang. Somebody wants to get fucked with an umbrella. You chuckle thinking of all the freaks in the world. And then it’s that ubiquitous, “I was here, 6-17-1997.” You suddenly feel not so alone that somebody was there in the same position you’re probably in ten years ago with exploding Diarrhea.
I often wondered who those people were. What did they look like? Are they still alive? Did they find happiness? Did that guy looking to get his dick sucked finally get a phone call? And what would make them write on the walls? Is it loneliness? Is it that human need to record our existence even it’s a kinky need to get fucked with a canary yellow umbrella? Do anybody ever call those numbers. Does anybody care the Saprina Ellis is a slut/bitch and isn’t that a double negative?
I started writing on the bathroom walls “I was here” when I started to question if I could save myself. I was twenty five years old. I was drinking too much. I was partying too much. I was getting older and scared. I wrote on the every wall at bathhouses, bookstores, clubs, bars, that I was here. I knew eventually I be another ghost. I guess to say that I was once young, that I was horny, that I was lonely, that I was scared, that I was drunk and I once thought I would live forever.
And then there was epidemic of Graffiti in the city in the early nineties what some called the desperation of the ghetto for attention. Images or lettering scratched, scrawled, or more usually spray-painted on property that didn’t belong to the artist, and was often regarded by others as unsightly damage or unwanted vandalism. It was the name of gangs. The names of those shot down in the streets by gang violence. The artwork of young ghetto artist trying to make their mark on the world. I remember being on the train in New York and thinking why spray paint on the sides of the building when the “man” was just going to paint over it the next day. And some of the artwork was better than some crap I’ve seen museums. It spoke to me. It was my cousin Pookie, Ray Ray, or that guy I slept with behind that building on a musty New York Saturday night. It was my history. I had to understand, why say I was here when people would eventually forget.
I was born October 5th. The doctor slapped my ass and recorded the time. I was given a birth certificate with my footprints to prove I existed, an American citizen. And when I die, I’m also promised a death certificate and tombstone to say that I was here. But the real question, why was I here in the first place?
There was time when I started writing on the walls because I was really asking if I would feel good enough. I tried being a whore. I went to the gym five times a week. I slept with a different man every other week. But it didn’t’ mean shit. A condom in the trash didn’t mean shit. Hoping they remember or I remember meant everything. I wanted to carve into their bodies that “Michael Whitley was here” because I often I forgot who I slept with that drunk night but that would’ve probably sent me to jail or to a mental hospital. So I carved in into the trees, walls, on the floors. The real question was if I would ever feel good enough. I had to check the mirror so often. I wondered if the wounds of my childhood abuse could heal. I wondered if they abandoned child would ever feel good enough for happiness. Good enough to be a writer. Good enough to love myself. I asked the question. The universe gave me the challenge.
So I set out for physical response. I pushed in hopes that it would push back. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t some ectoplasm. I ain’t no invisible man. I guess vandalizing walls wasn’t enough for me. I wrote a book. I just wanted to be able to put my name in the computer and see it come up. To see Michael Whitley come up.
For two years I was the “shirtless writer.” An alcoholic drag queen named “Bing” gave me that name. She told me I could rule the world if I wanted. I believed her. Some people called me the “shitless writer” or “full of shit” writer. They didn’t understand. Some thought I was a hustler, a common prostitute or pathetic con man. I was all of it. For two years every week without fail, I wrote my weekly column about my pathetic life living in the city. I sold it at the local gay bars and clubs for one dollar. I still can’t believe I got away with it. I figured people gave away their money all the time. They gave it away to bartenders who made weak drinks. They gave it away to overpriced clubs. They gave it away to strippers. They gave it away to aging alcoholic drag queens. I figured why not me.
Like Graffiti I’d see on my comics on the floors of bathrooms, dance floors and parking lots. It would make me feel alive. I know “I was here.” Just in case I forgot. I wanted to be a lot of things in my life. My first break as a writer came in third grade. I wrote a poem called “mirror.” It was basically about how I was scared to look in the mirror because I was convinced the person behind it was trying to kill me. I thought he was mocking me. I showed the poem to my teacher hoping that she knew the ghost busters. In second grade I wanted to Valentine Day king. My teacher laughed at me when I raised my hand to nominate myself. She said nobody was going to vote for a nappy head snot nose kid, so I should just save myself the embarrassment. I didn’t care. I stood in front of the class wiping my nose as they voted. I told myself that I should do the politically correct thing and vote for the other guy, because I didn’t want to seem vain. When the votes were tabulated, I had gotten zero votes. I didn’t even vote for myself. That’s what bothered me the most. I didn’t even vote for myself. I vowed to never do that again. The next year I ran again and that time I not only voted for myself, I changed the votes. I won. When I was in fourth grade, I wanted the lead in the choir. I was told I couldn’t sing and that I sounded like God murdering a basket of monkeys with a toothpick. She said my vomit would sound better. The choir director told me I sang through my nose and it was always full of boogers. She said I should be happy being in the back, therefore nobody could see me. I didn’t stop singing. Actually I sang louder. I got kicked out of choir. When was in high school I tried to be an actor. My drama teacher told me I acted like Scarlet O’Hara with an obsessive compulsive disorder. I didn’t understand what that mean. I thought she was a bitch. In college I wanted to be a model. I was told I was too dark. Not too good looking. Too short. The first photo shoot I pissed on myself. I was wearing white Calvin Klein. The director told me the shoot wasn’t about waster sports. I didn’t find out what that meant until years later.
But the need to say I was here was still tormenting. It’s why I kept doing the comic every week. I didn’t care what they thought. I didn’t care if they gave me money or not. I was fucking h ere. “I so want you to succeed.” His name was Mike. He was more than a little overweight. He and Jabber the Hutt probably wore the same pants size. I liked Mike because he was a Negrophile, a barfly and every week he had a ten dollar bill to stuff down my pants. I knew he was in lust with me, had been saying he was trying to lose weight so that he could be with me. I was also sure he said that to all the young black boys with flat stomachs and a nice dick print. I was always happy to see Mike, mostly because he gave me money with few complications. Hearing him say that he wanted me to succeed made me feel so good, because it was hard trying to hold on to a slippery dream at twenty-nine years old. It was hard hustling the bar with my little comic that I put together at home. And it was hard wearing my heart on my sleeves for every pervert just to try and look down my pants. I only did it because I got to be a writer every week. I got to live my dream, and until I was discovered by the “powers that be” that write checks, it was all I had to look forward to in life. So I hugged Mike, put my skinny toned arms around his fat waist, and that’s when he whisper it in my ear again, “I so want you to succeed” but it didn’t sound so supportive anymore. It was more suggestive and nasty. He whispered it again to make sure I heard him, “I so want you to pee on me.” Needless to say, I let go of Mike’s fat nasty ass.
I was shirtless writer. I was here. And I was horny, often scared, trying to figure it all out, and trying to make myself feel good enough for happiness. I laughed. I danced. I sold a comic in the club for two years. I kissed. I sucked dick. I ate ass. Vice Versa. I sold jokes. I was in love. But most important, I lived.
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