The True Story of Real Talk

I only think it’s fair to give credit where credit is due. With this being my tenth official post on this blog, it is safe to say, it’s past time for a small tribute about the title. Just to make things clear, this blog was not a first time project. It was something that I knew I wanted to do, but it was also like trying to find a door in a pitch black room, I totally lacked direction. I didn’t even have an objective to accomplish by writing. Ten posts later, I am not sure that I have direction, but I was given my objective. When I first started writing, I went exactly where I always go for my advice, my girlfriend. I could not think of a title that was anywhere close to acceptable, and I had been struggling for weeks about it. Within maybe five minutes, she said, “why don’t you call it Real Talk, True Story?” After letting that absorb for a few minutes I soon realized that she had captured everything I wanted this blog to be in a four letter phrase. She devolved this commonly used phrase from a hip-hop artist by the name of Clifford Harris, more popularly known as the rapper T.I. At first I thought that this won’t work because T.I. isn’t political at all, why does this seem so prefect? That is because T.I. also referred to as Tip, has a life story that he masterfully turns into music, that so accurately portrays what I wanted this blog to identify. Tip, much like me, has seen both sides of the coin. Raised in poverty, on the fierce streets in Atlanta, T.I. was influenced by drugs and gang violence at an early age. While I was not as close to the problems of big city neighborhoods, growing up I saw my share of people literally living in poverty, and not knowing any different. Inspired by the words of this rapper uses when he feels he needs to be heard, I use these words in the same way, because when the true story is hard to face, real talk is necessary.