Excerpts from

Babydoll, Gangster Disciple - Oral History

Part II - Seeing The "crew" As Family

I didn’t have a very happy life, the day I was born my dad walked outa the hospital room because I wasn’t a boy and wasn’t very happy that he had a girl. And, I wasn’t the athlete that he wanted, I wasn’t, I wasn’t anything my dad really wanted, so I really wanted, I craved that male attention that I didn’t have from dad. And I just was never very happy. I had lost my best friend by the time I was 13. My cousin died of cancer. I lost my grandpa who was, very important to me, he died on my 9th birthday, I just wasn’t a happy kid. I had a horse-shit life. And, I just decided that I was gonna make myself happy and I felt loved by these guys. They made me feel comfortable, they made me feel like I was important, they listened to me, they asked my opinion and took it into consideration. And that was something I hadn’t experienced my whole life, so. Yeah, I really, I really loved my crew, I loved them all.

They just asked my opinion when it came to, jobs they wanted to pull or whatever, they asked me what I thought. Well, ya know, in sleeping with half of them when you crave that male attention and that’s the only way you get it that helps you feel better about yourself. I mean that’s not a good way to feel better about yourself, but it’s the way it worked.

It made me feel special. I don’t regret anything that I’ve done in my life. Well, actually I do regret things in my life, but the one thing I don’t regret is choosing the lifestyle that I chose. I enjoyed it, I knew what I was doing when I was doing it, so I guess I can’t really say , "well, I didn’t wanna do it now." It not’s a lifestyle that I’ll continue to lead later on, but it is a lifestyle I enjoyed at the time. . . .

Gangster Disciple Graffiti

Actually not a lot, was about the availability of drugs. I never really did do a lot of drugs. The only thing I really did a lot of, was I smoked pot, and that was infrequent. For me, not a lot of things were based on the availability of drugs. It was the availability of attention that I liked. And, I had two brothers and in my family they were the ones that were lavished all the attention and praise, and that pissed me off, so I went out to get it where I could. And that’s where I could. My dad’s been in and out of the family. He’s been in the family the whole time, but he’s been in and out of prison, so he hasn’t been there my whole life. And when he wasn’t in prison, he was a bus driver for the school district and took all the trips, so he wasn’t home a lot. When I was in 6th grade my mom went back to school. And I kind of took care of my brother, my younger brother at least. My older brother could take a jump off a cliff and I probably wouldn’t give a damn. But, my younger brother, I took care a him. So, my dad really wasn’t in the picture very much, but when he was he was not a very nice guy...

I was very angry person, And I didn’t have anywhere to let it out. Like I said earlier, I did not feel very cared about in my family. I had lost my one link in my cousin. She let me know, "you’re worthwhile." And I really, never accomplished anything. I felt like such a failure and, I quit college. I got my high school diploma, but yeah whoopie, almost everybody in Grand Rapids gets their high school diploma. I didn’t feel like I had accomplished anything good. I never did. This was my way of letting it out. I’m a control freak, I like to feel like I’m in charge of things, that way I don’t get hurt. This gave me that control...

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