Thomas Lorenzo Reynolds

There are times when only written words can express how I feel about my emotions. I've never figured out a way to speak them, but through writing I've been able to tell stories about when the Romans came to capture me, and I saw them bear arms. So I perplexed them permanently by pushing pyramids from my palms.

But before all the pyramids and Roman conscriptions, there was a blizzard. Worst blizzard in years on the east coast. Forecast was 6"... What we got was 36 inches. Somebody lost their job that day.

How do you shovel three feet of snow? With a snowball fight. Schools were closed, jobs were closed, the world stood still as adults transcended their business suits and ties to the adolescence they left behind.

A snowball fight. Every kid for blocks on their street with teams and forts. And when 1/4 mile of road didn't cut it for territorial boundaries; when every backyard was fair game and that didn't give us enough to work with, we moved a block over. It seems the next block over shared our strife.

Pleasant Avenue Warriors versus the Nishuane Road Bandits. The battle grew. The playing field became Nishuane Park. Forts were fortified, ammo was in full supply. Those brave men, woman, girls and boys waited. Who was to make first strike. Reinforcements were arriving from foreign armies. Soldiers from as far as Orange Road, Union and Gates Ave. And than, as it has been written, a child shall lead them... Bezerkers. They came screaming and wielding snowballs, not a care in the world.

This was the battle to end all battles. We waited impatiently as the sounds of what could very much be the end of our great fortified city drew near. From history to antiquity, we almost met Troy, and we waited as Troy did. The first snowball crossed our bourns. Hearts pounded. The moment was here. Knees trembled. The moment came.

We launched our counter-attack. The opposition took our counter-attack on these rebels as a direct attack on them. And as the sky rained balls of white; at home my mom was preparing hot cocoa.

The Annual CGI trip. To DC of course. The trip where I have meet some influential minds. Justice Antonin Scalia, Justice Clarence Thomas, Secretary Janet Reno, and Under-Secretary James Jeffords.

These are names you may remember, names you may want to forget. But of all the people I've met, the NAACP's Chairman of the Board of Director's Julian Bond, I believe, was most influential. He spoke words of protest, words of detest, because it only took three minutes to attack Abner Luiema, to gun down Malcolm and destroy Hiroshima.

Julian Bond spokes words that forever resonate in my heart. I wish that they were recorded. I wish I recorded them. He spoke honestly, plainly and simple. He charged us with his own Holy Crusade. After all his charge and mission, his disapproval of wrong messages and information omitted in history, he gave us our charge:

"Keep on, keepin' on."

That night this heavens were reformed as told by John. The skies opened as in revelations, and we sang a happy song unto the Lord. Charged and being charged, we went on to our play. Every act sorted, practiced and re-practiced. "Keep on keeping on." And we did so, slowly but surely. I heard words so beautiful that angels stop their choir to listen.

It was our Holy Crusade. Our mission was clear enough, I began.

Boy Scouts, summer at Camp Rodney, a merit badge class not worth remembering at a time not worth forgetting. A simple bridge building exersize. We've done similiar. And we were a bit behind on our part. Before time was up for us to leave, we had one lashing that wasn't tight. "Keep on keepin' on," so I told my group of buddies "I'll make it work!"

Tightly we grabbed the rope and pulled it taught.

We made it work with blisters on our hands, strains in our backs and sweat trickling down our faces...

and down our faces ran the tears from the loss of a friend. Near and dear to us. A man of character who died of a massive heart attack jogging. In full boy scout uniform I stood at the graveside, after shedding my first tear in years on the shoulder of a girl I never thought cared. Pam Markovich. I always had a crush on her.

I remember when I first met her. Algebra I, 8th grade, at Mt. Hebron. We shared the same class, with “Momma C” teaching. Momma C was what we called our teacher Ms. Cerciello. She was our Italian mother and we were her only children, so I would like to believe. I would walk into class every day and she would come in after me with this smile that was so beautiful, that angels would stop their choirs, to listen to her eyes twinkle.

Maybe they were worried. Angels have a tendency for running scared in heaven when one is gone, lost to the toils of this world. Where they would have none of their ways remembered, and always in threat of airborne virii, unexplainable deaths, and the gawking of early pubescent boys who don't know how to control their eyes, mouths or penises.

Something about her told me she was too high maintenance, she would never care, she wasn't the type for me. Yet, her dark hair fortified my lust for a dark haired woman now. Her smile engrained my image of what a beautiful smile is. All I could ask for was her to say more than words of simple general politeness.

Like this one time, again, remember, this is as I remember it, she stopped at my desk. Placed her books which she held to her bosom, which was bloused in black, on the desk. The books fell to the desk, with a cry of being torn from the grasp of their mothers arms. They yearned to go back to their earlier resting point, as I did, to go to their earlier resting point. She smiled, as she always did, said "Hi Tom," as she always did, and unlike she always did, she sat. With me. By the window, to the right of the teacher's desk. Devon and I always sat there. Liz sat next two her, for as Devon and I were inseparable, so were Liz and Pam.

The both of us, instantly transgressed through pubescence to the men they...

They...

They never did this, even as I remember it. But "Keep on keepin' on."

Our Holy Crusade brought us to a day standing before all those in the state of New Jersey; well, all those who cared enough to be at the New Jersey's Governor's Award ceremony, and with my poem in hand, in a black binder, and I in a black binder, stood waiting. My black binder fit perfectly, tie tied perfectly, shirt tucked in perfectly, Montclair High School service awards on my shirt pocket, Eagle Scout Tie pin, my loyalties set perfectly.

The lights came up from dim, and I looked out.

"Silence,
"that sound that echoes through your head,
"and screams for more noise.
"Silence,
"That is what I love."

And silence befell the audience as my words danced around the hall with the governor of New Jersey, and legislators, and parents, and advocates, and teens, and teachers, and all those who made it that trip to Trenton.

And I kept on keeping on. Reading my poem in a black binder, I in a black binder, the stage around me, in a black binder, all us hiding something in a black binder.

"Keep on Keeping on."

I stood up in front of a group of my peers and I told them to check their egos at the door. That we are all here for a greater cause. That greater cause was whether CGI, Boy Scouts, or Alpha Sigma Phi, the reason I am bound to that which I set myself unto.

And Julian Bond left us with our Great Crusade, our Holy Crusade. Our Children's Crusade, with a more noble ending. I left Texas that year, fired up and ready for anything. Lunch with Kwesi Mfume, hotel lobbies shared with Wyclef Jean and Savion Glover, that year, I left Texas knowing that I can "Keep on Keepin' on."

I finally got out of my black binder, And I hit my puberty of life. I was changing into a man.

"Keep on keepin' on."

It's hard not knowing where you'll be down the road. You want to envision the perfect happily ever after, but who knows what that is. I've seen some ever afters. Some happy, some not happy, some; some never make it that far. Ever since about the fifth grade I've been told I should try to live up to my potential. My potential is so much. I stand on the shoulders of giants. Everyone says I can only go up, but down looks so much easier. I could just sit. On those shoulders I can see everything getting better around, and I can sit comfortably.

The masonry competition, my second year in architecture, I designed a weeping willow. A building with a skin of masonry leaves that peel open to create openings. Maybe I should have played with the scale a bit more, but my project was complete. From furniture to veranda. Space was created, finishes chosen. I lost to a design that had not chosen an interior.

I hadn't spent the right amount time working on it, diagramming it, creating it. It was a lost cause well before it started. I can imagine a design so perfect, so beautiful, so understandable, so complete, and not finish it. Forged in the fire of my architectural peers, the design was not seen.

I'm involved in a question where the answer is architecture. It's consumed my life. It's my introduction, thesis, argument and conclusion. I haven't figured out what the right question is. But I've worked on a few.

My undying infatuation with the unfinished work has left me wondering what if I was to finish or even worse, be recognized for my accomplishments. Everyone sees all this potential in me, and I'm scared of if it actually becomes kinetic. An amazing powerful force driving forward, snowballing and grabbing everything in its way.

A force of my own creation dragging everything I am with it. What would I make? What would I become?

Maybe that is how I start my Holy Crusade. It's about time I Kept on.

The first day of first grade at Watchung Elementary School was a special day. I was among my peers and no longer a part of the experiment of the year before.

In Kindergarten, I was placed in a class where there was a combined Kindergarten and first grade. That would most likely be where I started gaining such a liking for older woman. It was. My first childhood pointless love, Natalie Serock. Joe loved her too. Joe Mosely was determined to marry her.

And as I remember it, one day Joe came to class, as he always did. But today, today was somehow different. Joe had determination flaring in his eyes. Quiet coyly he looked over at Natalie, her hair free, curly, bouncy. Natalie had a smile. There is no other way to describe it. It was the quintessence of a smile.

Joe was a Mosley. There was nothing wrong with a Mosley, but the name was far too easy to come along by children in this town. By my 16th birthday, I knew of 6 and was soon to meet another. This new one was the youngest and friendliest, and told me that the problem wasn't too many Mosley children, but rather too many Mosley woman with one Mosley father with too much of a straight shot to miss.

So this Mosley boy had his sights on the famed Serock girl and came in this day with determination in his eyes.

It was lunchtime and the football pitch was prepared for our daily lunch match. Before a breeze could cut us to the field, Joe had Natalie's hand in his, was on his knees and spoke words to my love that only I should.

"Natalie Serock, will you marry me?"

The blood boiled in me in the way that blood does when you're angry, the cable cuts out or some little punk proposes to your secret love.

She said nothing. But her eyes swelled and she ran off crying. She retreated to the monkey bars in the aft of the park. I couldn't let my love go like this. Now I had to act.

And act I would. I went to the back, positioned myself behind her. Slowly, I walked up to her, and I don't remember what I said, but it was probably something coy and crackling from the voice of a petrified little boy. But we were now friends, and I still petrified never asked Natalie to marry me, even as I remember it.

But she came to my birthday party, and so did Joe Mosley, and all the other kids that shared my kindergarten-first grade mix

That's how I remember it, or would like to have.