the city of baltimore is a city built on that struggle from the economic book book cooking and city hall to the shadow economy street justice that half the city lives under the struggle is womb woven into the very fabric of the city it's between every row house on every street corner and on every dock in the harbor and recent history we've seen the struggles the struggles of baltimore blazoned across our news feeds and newspapers with the killing of freddy grey in the black lives matter protests that followed baltimore struggles represents a nation struggles with classism racism in a broken justice system but even in baltimore there is and always has been beauty and three examples of baltimore's beauty in the struggle is found in the lives and work of the watkins aaron may have been and can do an infidel a writer a painter and they poet all bore from streets that brought many asunder. today hawk watchers we present to you there are three stories in their own works so that

hopefully through discovering how these three sons of baltimore found their beauty their artistry and their success we too can find our own beauty in the struggle as we start watching the hawks. good. eats at the bottom it's. like you know what i got. when it's.

time to get serious and i'd look at my calendar to see where i got to be at the next big was going to like seven o'clock americans like my manager and she takes stuff off and she misuses like it's like just don't have to touch it you'll be fine and it's not i just don't touch it. the first time he used. my. name is aaron maybe a are and they why be guy and. girl. that's. made me. like well like i like. i'm ok when i was in high school and really when i was a college up at penn state like you could get opened up to this world that all these people lived in for their entire lives and you're just like so i mean that even exists because. you had things on the embers you know and that's your norm but

that they're going to have much you can't understand. what life is like for them they can't even begin to fathom like what it's like growing up. i was a street guy and. i stressed by street guys i was i was in a drug game man. i wanted out and i didn't really know what i wanted to do but i just kind of felt like you can you can make money doing anything if you good at it so while. i went to college and when i first i bought a liquor store i bought a liquor store and i said i told myself i said you know your last you know you have your freedom. you've been through all of these crazy things in you fortunate enough to be here so. you'll be a horrible person if you ever as i sold a drug again so i bought this liquor store. you know because when you from the hurt

you don't really have like. there's not really a lot of a lot of. different types of success that exists out there. which you see and if you're really see the art world like that you see in the business so what this liquor store cost baby and how to weigh on the street from a young age it was always a mechanism to press myself you know i dealt with a lot of things in my life that really forced me to struggle with how to react to trauma it's a pain to the loss losing my mother to a young age definitely affected me. in a very traumatic way i was six years old when she passed away and you know that was one of the first times that i really was in a position where i was reaching out just looking for something anything that would help me to fill that hole that was in my heart you know and art was always that

that that catalyst for me it was always that vehicle by which i could escape whatever i was dealing with whether it was through you know drawing painting. once i was really able to start the grass literature and to formulate my own thoughts i started writing. and. in doing those things not even not only did i get a measure of healing from a lot of those instances but i was able to tap into something that was much greater inside of me that you know that i was able to take. refuge in you know and that was the creative process itself i started to realize how much i loved how much. i had a passion for being able to express myself in different forms and to force people to kind of look at their lives and their relationships in a different way based on my own experiences i think that that's

a powerful element about art that. that allows you to really go deeper within yourself so that process for me never stopped. and that's always been something that continuously has a hard time going back to saying how am i making. these emotions and these thoughts that i had real visceral. almost tangible for somebody else. i never really liked writing. growing up i just sort of because it was a requirement for school but i got expecting them to virginia state university in two thousand and eleven and. i was major in a sport management. and i was taking. english my freshman first semester and i had this professor named dr on the west and he introduced me. braille black history you know in the literature. and i was reading

a lot of my aunts in langston hughes and then i. realized that a lot of this stuff was some of the things that i was listening to. hip hop and rap so i started reading a lot of lyrics from j. cole jay z. makani eight you know and i would say you know this is the same as the things that are marine and. you know bin bare molded by a rat because that's where i grew up or enough fell in love with it in a deeper sense so i read their stuff and i would say to myself you know what like i can do this you know so i started writing i will share my poetry or my ras what i want column our cousin avon he was going to be doing you know in a couple more friends from back home and they. you know they found love with it but i didn't really believe them because i know that i'm their friend and i needed if i was bad i don't think it would be like you know conny just some straight trash

right so i would type up stuff on a computer and i will make up a name you know a say it's from like some guy named james with a spoon or something like that and i was to make us and he liked it anyway and you know if your friends think something is bad or even tell you you know it's best it is there was somebody else so i started to believe them a little bit more you know so fast forward to two thousand and thirteen miles apart is meant organizational college and he was having this event. they had a dance organization that was supposed to perform for in a mission but they ended up backing out so we was on our board me and decide who is going do fine the mission in our raise my hand and i say you know what i'll do it in a mission and it was like do what and i said i'm a performer and i was like before when i reckon poetry me right ok right we've got nothing to lose you know right so i make a long story short fast for the february two thousand and thirteen. i got on stage

for the first time ever to speak in front of a crowd perform in front of a crowd and i perform this poem and i had got a standing ovation in front of like two hundred people and i said to myself you know you're not the smartest man in the world but if this your first time and you know you can spy all of these people and get them to stand up for me and clap you know day in you. i can only get better so i had legs day i went to gandy hall and i went to change my major from sport management to english avatars two thousand and thirteen had to perform in a right and then i will perform a foot at the time even a sorority don't count with different groups organization is a thing that spreads to like the rich man in petersburg virginia you know. that i was trying to get i mean i've been an artist my whole life you know i was creating before i was actually able to form words and speak. you know at the age of eleven and you know i did my first commission job for the for the state of maryland

city of baltimore it was like a forty fifty foot mural or north avenue in st paul or st you know i was mentored by guys like larry poncho brown charles big you know. i've come into contact with you know the family of ernie barnes and you know they've they've they've been a great resource for me and you know navigating my way as a professional artist so that's always been a part of who i am and and and and i'm a big element to you know my life but. after playing after majoring in art in school and leaving for the n.f.l. and playing there for five years eventual i made a decision to to retire and to pursue my art and community engagement full time the only so far as think about it for me personally was. the fight of being not just accepted but respected as a professional artist and. and really being able to let people know

not just how seriously i take my craft but how this is not just something that i've decided to do one day this is been a lifetime pursuit for me. you know so my parents you know it was a tough for them obviously when i say you know what my intentions were because they obviously didn't see that as the best decision to make at the time you know. why not keep playing why not but they understood me as a person and they understood what was important to me and when you talk about you know the community engagement the art and everything that i'm doing right now i was still doing that as an athlete but it was a problem that you know my my priorities were in the right place or i should be you know using my time more efficiently as athlete but this is always been something that was just as important to me if not more so important to me than the game because growing up idolized guys who who who were bigger than their respective

sports you know guys like muhammad ali you know guys like jim brown guys like kareem abdul-jabbar jack johnson you know even younger guys that were influencing the younger generations like allen iverson you know these people to me. they were bigger than their professions because of the stances they took because of them being being unafraid and being unapologetically themselves them staying true to where they came from and staying true to what was important to them i always wanted to be that type of figure that type of athlete and when i reach that point of actually being there being a first round draft pick and making millions of dollars and you know saying all right i'm an n.f.l. player. when i was exposed to the bureaucracy of it the fact that it's a corporation now so whoever the corporate interests of your team their owner the organization that pays your bills and signs your checks that's what's supposed to be important see that's what you're allowed to care about an investor time i just

always was anti that. as we go to break off watchers don't forget to let us know what you think of the topics are covered in facebook and twitter your full show at our feet dot com coming up we continue our look at the lives and experiences of baltimore's old three sons there may have been want to balance the watkins and we discover a beaut. strong and continue what. you did good capitalist america and a. good insurance for gun owners don't be such

a shy communist loving bootlicking stock you insurance company c.e.o. just take a bloody willy nilly for making people here want to addicks do something constructive impose got insurance and stop the bloodshed. welcome to the wonderful world of blood donation i come here every three weeks to get my transfusion to be specific i receive immunoglobulin my body gets and some bodies that i cannot produce itself around the world giving blood is seen as a symbol of generosity knowing does this because it helps people it's just that one of the side effects is that it helps reduce the prize more burning to put money on your car immediately. half of all plasma based drugs today come from private companies and are produced from paid plasma as well as compromise of their own motor car and. one of the risks of pay donation in it then is proof

that the frequency of pathologies is much higher in paid donations and it. if i was lying when i. was over two years old he will go in the money movement for drugs and who runs the blood business. thank. you.

often when one tries to do the right thing the system of oppression addiction and greed follows them anyway and it is this struggle that the voices of baltimore call out more importantly when one is faced with the opportunity to take the easy way out and simply remove themselves from a community that has caused so much trauma they refused the fight for places like baltimore isn't going to happen in the halls of justice but in the hearts minds and deeds of those who call it home and that's half of the getting in the struggle to walk and starts by talking about how he went from dealing drugs to owning a legitimate business but what he found is that the problem isn't what we push or take it's how and why we need it in the first place the problem is the pay here's more from author and educator dean watkins on discovering the depths of the cycle that keeps so many in his community and others from raising their base faces to the

sun. the stores right down the street from miller corner there was another one right. their grief but i felt like i could do this you know so. two or three months go by and i'm not making any money and this is like. if i want to pay if i want if i'm paying like fifty give you an example if i pair fifteen dollars for a bottle i'm trying to sell if i like sixteen there was a curious shop up the street who was paying fifteen dollars for about a because we had the same distributors so they would spend fifteen honestly about it but there was someone there for like fifteen ten and i'm like you know how you would how are you doing this like i didn't know and i was frustrated my bar was small right the lounge area was smart and there was a big plug poker machines in there so you know to take them out and i'm just going

to you know connect with a promoter and we're going to have more parties and do more drink specials and things like that so i called the number on a machine got it i'm going to sing and i said look. you know my name's dee you know his ability to know his business to old people or go you should come pick your machines up i want to throw him away so i said this guy is tight and it's like for people start real tight suits is real so fashion forward guy he slides in with a tight suit on and he's saying you know like you know like what you did with the place you made some changes you cleaned it up it looks good i hear and i'm like oh my god i just wait for your approval we get these machines out he moved these machines in a little suit. studies machines and stores my whole life and i knew people played them but i never play close enough attention to understand if he actually paid out so. he said you know give you give you ten thousand dollars if you keep it you know. we split the money fifty fifty we did great business together if you

don't like it you know at this a couple of months take him out i said cool so he left and came back with a check and i was like. no then he left again to came out with cash and i speak this language very well so. now the machines are going to make money and it's great like it was exactly like a great fame and so one night there was a woman who played a machine is a lot and we were in a bar alone and i was moving boxes around and i was you know taking inventory you see what was going on and i walked out and i saw her sitting next to the machine and she was like slumped over she looked really really sags on like pat what's wrong with you and she said i had it work uniform on and everything i said what's wrong with you she said the machine beat the hell out of me. i just got a my check was eight hundred dollars upholding an ad i have anything to weeks so i was like oh this is horrible and i felt you know like a bank so i want to back him up when i three four hundred dollars i have like

a little stash in the back and i came out i said you know what pat. so you take that and you know you got to pay back the less you feel like you know because hold on to that she was like you sure you know you come in on a time like i can tell you you know starting tomorrow so i go back into the. you know finish whatever came back out she put the money in the machine and i said this is very i don't want to do this no more next day i put the market sold it when i first started it wasn't about inspiring it was just about being nice and i'm good you know because when i listen to music i like music that. you know make me want to rewind and be like oh my god what did you just say right let me run it back that's what i wanted to be but then i realized for my messages could be right and i was sheri's poems that are my messages could be right and i was sheri's poems and people kind of get out you know and i made me cry oh you know what i mean you think about my father when the poem was about my little brother you know or this poem

a spy in me you know and i never. heard these type of thing about me of my own life by services like well like i've been noted that had that much of an impact so. i started to take heed that a utilized in a by a strategic way because i sort of recommend then of a feat and i came to spy people did i say you know that's what i need to keep door you know so i channeled myself to start learning more history because i hated history you know because i just never understood after that who cares about what happened back then like we need to focus on it now but and i realize how important history was so then you know i started a researcher more learning more and becoming more in tune with black history you know and i'm like yes a lot of people that's not going to really you know so i have to be that plug like that middle man and that guy has got something once i mean it's like yo cond want to you might be the only bible that people really write so that's why i take the

things that i learn and are put it to my to our poetry because i hope people will listen to me and if i had it and feel it i don't want to be. and then to do you know a lot of the wrong thing because just how you know it's wasn't a good way i can be an influence in a bad way so you know it's already a lot of negative stuff going on in the grass i don't want to be that you know other person just you know making people go to the wrong way when i had the potential to make them go right i didn't believe that. the best way for me to serve my community was just to you know do that said go n.f.l. thing you know go find you know some sick kids in the hospital and you know give them a bunch of jerseys and you know try to convince them that they're going to be ok and all that kind of stuff you know but really just making a commercial for the n.f.l. you know or you know then saying you know you want to change your community go find a vacant lot you know and then find a whole bunch of poor kids from the projects and bring them down and have them drinking gator aid and running around and doing a whole bunch of tricks and given the whole bunch of jerseys and you know filming i

involved in the community being much more intimate i saw the my life pursuit being something that in my mind really impact the lives of the people that. you know. from this was a neighborhood of these bottom line and. i saw any and everything that you don't want to child to see. and there's like a couple very thin and it's like tom sawyer and it's like you know they get to be followed by like a sleaze to like i want to paint paint gates or something and i'm in this world where like my friends walking around with thousands of them and i think reading was blazing fire because but they don't know any black people how you write about poverty and you never was hungry like how you tell me a story and i'm not saying that you know. well i was that interest you know the introduction into you know reading some articles and things like that because you know i put it down for them and i went to see what was you know what was out there kind of the light was just a soldier different me so you know. if nobody from these neighborhood i

tell any story being told. no a story will be told to be told by a person who doesn't have proximity to those issues and i think that's dangerous gives they give society the space to kill us this is lab person right there i was thinking i have a twenty second interaction with mike brown killer. and that is our show for you today remember everyone in this world we are not told the ups i told you all i love you i rolled and in time tabitha wallace keep on watching the hawks and have a great night. simply

a game. set up have been miles from the to the independent with meters that day think it's been. a lesson but the counselor the placenta i was up at a sauna we were meeting day. i will recess at my love and respect to let him get me or be here now with jamie as a hunk on the road. now at the bad day but because hell i got money but that never i see like him can cause a great deal. paying a decade's debt. studying so hard it requires trying to. go through humiliation to enter society. and paci dead sometimes quite literally. other true colors of universities in the

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smartphones even when users have switched off their location settings. on the backlash over a new children's book in sweden it features a horse who claims to be a dog among the words women's clothing sparking fierce debate about whether children should be taught by from the prison.