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July, 2001
DEATH OF A DRUG DEALER
By Margaret Cox
June 19, 2001. I've been thinking about my friend
Thurman all day. I miss him. We were unlikely friends, but
good ones. When we first got to know each other, in Los
Angeles, Venice Beach and Hollywood in the early seventies, I
was a clueless young white woman in my early thirties, with
a handsome black husband and precious small daughter; and
Thurman was a beautiful, brilliant, brash young black man in
his mid-twenties, with a drop-dead gorgeous wife, Pam, who
gave him fits all their lives together. We went into business, the
four of us : bright, attractive, energetic young people; and we
came this close to being fabulously successful. Oh well.
Thurman had an entrepreneurial soul which Henry Ford
would have admired, and a work ethic that even Oklahomans,
proud as we are of ours, could only aspire to. He and I, truth
to tell, did a little more than our share of the work in our
businesses - though the others did their part - my husband was
the brilliant-idea man, and Thurman's wife served just by
stimulating and aggravating us and keeping our blood running
high. Still, Thurman - ''T", we called him - and I were the
workhorses.
In our best, longest-running venture, we made trendy
denim shoulder bags, embroidered and bejeweled. If you are
old enough, Reader, you probably owned one. You may own
it still, as they were of good quality, well made. (continued
inside)
NEED A WARM FUZZV?
Then again, don't we need all the warm fuzzies we can get?
In a burst of civic pride, the OKC Metro-Women's Chorus is
presenting a whole evening of nothing but fuzzies on July 14.
Epworth United Methodist Church, 1901 N. Douglas (two
blocks west of Classen Blvd.), will again host the annual
Metro-Women's summer concert at 7:00 p.m. in the church
sanctuary.
''We'll be singing about the all the different kinds of good
feelings we can find," said Music Director Don Clothier. "We'll
tell you about the Rainbow Connection, and what's over that
rainbow. There will be discourse on how much warmer love
is than Steam Heat, and we'll take away all your worries with
'Hakuna Matata', just like Simba, Timon and Pumbaa"
Tickets will be $7 .00 in advance from chorus members or
at Jungle Red, and $10.00 at the door. A reception will be held
0
following the concert in the Church's grand hall.
Volume 19Number07
Herland Sister Resources
The Her/and Legal Defense Fund and the Social
Justice Committee of the First Unitarian Church
invite you to attend a concert with
FREEFALL
Sunday, July 22, 2001
2 - 4pm
First Unitarian Church
600 NW 13th Street
Oklahoma City
Donations to the Herland Legal
Defense Fund requested.
A Herland SUMMER CONCERT
Featuring
DEE BRITT
po~. S\ueS
°"d c,ountr'Y
AND
THE CUR VE
IN Concert Saturday night, JULY 7TH, 200 I
7:00pm
ON THE BACKYARD STAGE AT HERLAND
2312 N .W. 39TH
Come and enjoy an evening of great entertainment with one
of Oklahoma City's up-Cl'ld-coming hot bands , the Curve.
featuring the talents of veteran bassist Terri Hoersch and
the rockin' rhythms of Gloria Matsf ield, the Curve plays a
wide range of popular covers and catchy originals . Bring a
blanket and enjoy Cl'1 evening of infectious fun. Suggested
donation $5.
www.herlandsisters.org
2312 N.W. 39, OKC, OK 73112
DEATH OF A DRUG DEALER
(Continued from page 1)
We were perhaps the only small manufacturing business
in downtown LA which paid legal wages, and even so we were
making money and getting orders from across the country. I
was the office staff and bookkeeper, and Thurman was the
operations supervisor. It was he who used the dangerouslooking jigsaw-like machine that cut the cloth, and he who
rescued and bandaged the finger of our chief seamstress when
she ran a needle through it; and he who almost threw up
afterwards, and gave everyone in the small plant an immediate
raise.
Still, as is so often the case, while labor toiled, management
had a lot of time to sit in the little office, wonder oflhand what
our spouses were up to and if we cared, and talk. Sometimes
we talked about our friends and families, and the people we
knew who were getting deeper and deeper into drug dependency;
but mostly we talked about ourselves. Thunnan told me a story
one day that he had never told anyone else, neither his wife nor
my husband; I think one reason he became so fond of me was
that I never told anyone else either. He wouldn't mind now.
·A few years before, he said, he and a friend had conceived
a wondrous business plan: it would make money for them and
be of great benefit to their customers; it was a truly fine
business venture; wasn't America wonderful to offer these
great opportunities?
There was, in an area just south of
Hollywood, a large neighborhood filled mostly with retirees
with healthy savings - in other words, old people with plenty
of discretionary money to help them pay for chores which their
bodies were a little too old for. My friend T and his partner
arranged with the major grocery stores in the area to deliver
groceries, and sent out a first-class mailing to over five
thousand homes, offering, for a small percentage of the overall
tab, to pick up and deliver groceries to these old people's doors.
Years later, telling me about it, T's mortification was as
evident as if it were fresh: they received no - zero - zip - not
one - return card or phone call asking them for even more
information, let alone requesting service ...
Still, Thurman persevered. He almost made it with our
purse business. We had so many orders that we were thinking
expansion. As luck had it, , however, it turned out to be the year
of the Boll Weevil. That little pest created a world-wide cotton
shortage, meaning we couldn't get any denim, so we couldn't
meet our orders. We tried to adapt, but we couldn't, and we
went under.
When that business folded, the partnership did also, and I
didn't see a lot of Thurman anymore. Still, we were always
very glad when we did run into each other. Besides his obvious
pleasure, his warm and brotherly smile and kiss, he would
always, with quite some reverence and solemnity, honor me
with a little gift: gravely, he would pull out a tiny spoon and
offer me a "one & one".
Now, I really didn't want it. A little powder cocaine up my
nose never did anything for me, thank the god and goddess, but
besides killing a few brain cells it never seemed to hurt me
either, so let me assure you, Reader, I accepted this offering.
Page 2 Her/and Voice
One little spoonful up one nostril, another up the other - "one
& one." It may have been unhealthy, it may have been illegal,
but I know a gift from the heart when I see one, and I hope I'll
always have the heart myself to accept one when it is offered..
It was a generous gift; cocaine was huge in Los Angeles
in the seventies, and expensive as all get-out. Maybe it still is,
I don't know; we left California in 1978 and settled down in
Oklahoma City working 9 to S's and put that life behind us.
We heard a little from and about T from time to time. I knew
that he was dealing a little coke for his livelihood, and heard a
scary story about him nearly being murdered. But he escaped,
and I thought he always would persevere and survive. In his
last business he had a limousine service, and ifthe renters knew
the secret word they would find a tray full of magic powder
in the back seat for their pleasure.
Pam's call came in the middle of the night. Thurman was
gone, dead. Someone, a dealer maybe, - had my friend run
into a cocaine-style Boll Weevil and been unable to get his
money together? - had burst into his apartment and shot him
in the head. The 911 operator had it on tape, T telling the
gunman, No, Don't ...
I guess this was twenty years ago. I'm old, so it feels like
yesterday.
Over the last twenty years, I have heard more people than
I care to remember say that the people they really think deserve
the death penalty are the drug dealers. Wait!, I have to tell
them, No! That's just wrong! My friend Thurman, my pal,
my confidante, my cohort, my buddy, was a "drug dealer"; and
yet, he was also a hardworking, kind, gentle man who tried
his very best to make an "honest" living. And what, indeed,
should he have found so "dishonest" about selling and dealing
in a commodity which everyone he knew partook of? Leave
hypocrisy behind, and was his business so different from any
other? Should we kill the drug dealer while we elect his
customer President?
Thurman was shot and he died and was buried, and those
who knew him and loved him grieved and mourned. Although,
a sanctimonious horde says: good riddance. And today, June
19, 2001, in Terre Haute, Indiana, our government killed a
drug dealer named Juan Raul Garza, a man whom I'm betting
would have made a good friend to most of us. I know that he
had a family who loved him. I will take the government's word
Herland Board of Directors:
Laura Choate
Jacqueline Gatewood
DTH
Ginger McGovern
Pat Reaves
Judy Walden
The Voice is published by: Herland Sisler Resources, Inc.
2312 N.W. 39th, Oklahoma City, OK 73112.
The Voice is
offered as an open forum for community ciscoun;e. Articles
reflect the opinions of the author and not necessarily those of
Herland Sister Resources. Unsolicited articles and letter:; to
the edlor are tNe/comed and must be signed by the writer with
ful name and address. Upon request, letters or articles may
be printed under a pseudonym or anonymously. Subscriptions
to The Voice are free upon request alhough a donation is
requested to meet publication and distrbution costs.
that he killed and ordered others killed. If Thurman had lived
this long, would he have killed too? Would he have aspired to
be a "drug kingpin", and done what the job seemed to require?
I don't know. We'll never know; and I am sickened by
thinking of it, and heartsick at the killing. But I'm sorry,
America, I feel my blame pointing towards our way of life,
towards hard-core, laissez-faire capitalism, towards intractable racism and to a ''war on drugs" that has no value, no
achievable goal and which does incalculable harm. I see my
dear African-American friend Thurman turning to drugs for his
living, and for his dying; and see Hispanic-American Juan Raul
Garza being executed for things he did as a drug dealer.
At the vigil for Mr. Garza this morning what keeps coming
to my mind is an old car I used to tool around town in, my little
fireball-orange Ford Pinto. I'm lucky, because my Pinto
never turned into a real fireball; but had I been one of the many
immolated in a Pinto on account ofreversibly bad design, what
then? My heirs - some cold comfort to me, I'll tell you, might have made a few hundred thousand dollars, but meanwhile I'd be gruesomely dead - and what about those Ford
Pinto executives who decided that it would be more costejfective to pay a bunch ofwrongfal-death suits than to correct
the faulty design? I guess they are all on death row, too,
awaiting their date with the Mad Needler.
I'm sorry, what's that you say?
You say that those
intentional, deliberate, coldly criminal executives are proud
citizens with huge incomes living with the warm respect of
their offspring, their peers and the criminal court system? It
makes me sick.
Today we executed Juan Raul Garza. He died a drug
dealer. Thurman Brooms, a hard working, loving futher,
husband and generous friend, believed the American dream and
lived it until his death; and he died a drug dealer. I stand here in
vigil at the Jesus Wept statue and mourn the deaths of Thwman
Brooms and of Juan Raul Gana. Let us end it now. Stop the
Hate. Stop the Violence. Moratorium Now! Abolition Now! Cl
IN REVIEW
by Ji// Gamer
I don't buy a lot of music by so-called mainstream
country artists, but a friend of mine gave me Trisha
Yearwood's latest CD and it got me thinking. There are a
few mainstream artists whose CDs I do buy, often because
they have great voices, but largely because I think they are
good at choosing songwriters. Some of them sing songs by
some of my favorite songwriters, and it makes me more
interested in them. Yeah, they do thejr fair share of fluff stuff
for the radio, but they also might have on their CD a song by
Kim Richey, or Cheryl Wheeler. It makes me appreciate their
talent a little bit more.
There is not much disputing that Trisha Yearwood has a
nice voice. It doesn't give me goose bumps or anything but I
love the deep smoothness of her voice, and on this latest CD,
she shows she can hit some of the higher notes too!
I own three of her CDs. Thinkin' About You I purposefully sought out because of the song ''On a Bus to St. Cloud."
The song was written by Gretchen Peters ("Independence
Day," "The Secret of Life," ''Like Water Into Wine") who
definitely has a talent for writing some hit songs. She's also a
co-writer on the title song for Yearwood 1s latest CD, Inside
Out. Yearwood also likes Matraca Berg a lot and has recorded
several ofher songs, one of the most popular being "XX.X's and
OOO's (An American Girl)." Kim Richey is one of my very
favorite singers and songwriters and Yearwood is also a big fan.
She's recorded several songs written by her, as well as Melissa
Etheridge's ''You Can Sleep While I Drive" and Roseanne
Cash's ''Seven Year Ache."
I do admire her choice of songwriters and musicians. Plus,
as an added bonus, she has a. recurring role on one of my
favorite shows, JAG, as a forensic pathologist and does a great
job!
I have to say my favorite of the more popular singers is
Suzy Bogguss. I own all her CDs and always look forward to
the next one. I think she has a great voice and a great selection
of songs.
One of her first big hits, if not the first one, was "Aces,"
written by the great Cheryl Wheeler. On that same CD, she
recorded ''Outbound Plane" written by Nanci Griffith and Tom
Russell, and ''Save Yourself' by Beth Nielson Chapman. On
later CDs, she's recorded Cheryl Wheeler's "Don't Wanna"
and "Moonlight and Roses", Julie Miller's ''Take me Back," Kim
Richey's ''From Where I Stand," "Drive South" and ''Lovin' a
Hurricane" by John Hiatt, and recorded a CD with the wonderful Chet Atkins on guitar, who just turned 77 on the day I'm writing
this. But I could bore you forever with who wrote what song.
Suffice it to say, I'm really pretty happy listening to any of Suzy
Bogguss' CDs, and I can't say that about that many people.
Patty Loveless is someone else I really like a lot. I think I
only own two of her CDs, but one I never get tired of listening
to. Long Stretch of Lonesome, one of her less popular CDs,
is my favorite. Ifs easy to find used just about anywhere you
can buy used CDs, but don't let that scare you off because it's
worth the money and time to find it. She also picked some good
songwriters on this CD (Annie Robo:f( Gretchen Peters, Kim
Richey, Jim Lauderdale) and just some really great songs.
"Long Stretch of Lonesome", written by Gary Scruggs and
Tony Arata, two songwriters whose songs Suzy Bogguss uses
a lot, is the song that is truly a gift to her voice. On part of the
song, her strong, clear voice belts out and just leaves me
speechless. I don't even sing along, I just listen. The CD has
several songs that really show off her voice and she's a singer
I sit back and pay attention to.
And last but not least, is Kathy Mattea. What a
gorgeous deep voice. She has stayed true to her vision and and
partly as a result, is not selling the billions of CDs she once did.
But she also picks great songs and on her latest CD, The
Innocent Years, she wrote many, ifnot all of the songs, herself.
I have not bought the CD yet but I plan to soon. I love her
previous CD, Love Travels, where she recorded songs by
Gillian Welch, Cheryl Wheeler, Jim Lauderdale, and a song
written by her husband Jon Vezner and Janis Ian!
Cl
Her/and Voice :
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