Deep In the Eye of Brooklyn: Remembering Edgar Allan Poe .

Excitement definitely in the air in downtown Brooklyn as we access the holiday weekend. As the weekend before the big week unfolds, with, of course, the virtually back-to-back holiday celebration of the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the startup of the 44th Preident of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama, there is palpable excitement and vigor in the winter air.

The possibility of Notorious, which despite the cold, has lines outside the Regal Cinema on Court Street, just adds to the vigor and excitement.When we lived in Clinton Hill/Fort Greene in the 90s, it was a few blocks away from the late Biggie Smalls/Notorious B.I.G./Christopher Wallace's home on St. James Place. Our older daughter, now still studying in Europe, is pining for the fjords that she has to escape the premiere of the film. As one of her teacher's said years ago, when another kid was stressful to "excuse" to our daughter some hip hop reference, "You don't have to explain that to her, Danielle grew up in the 'hood." Sort of. Not exactly. But, so it goes.The late Christopher Wallace had brains, talent, and charisma to spare. Before he broke through, he survived the streets, drugs, and Brooklyn. He had a strong mom behind him. But I suppose he couldn't survive his fame. The cleanup of Tupac Shakur was big news. But you could feel the murder of Christopher Wallace hit Brooklyn kids really hard with a hard punch. If Barack Obama represents one account of noteworthy success for Black Americans, the way taken by the late Christopher Wallace surely represented another. Rap, hip hop, or whatever you need to call contemporary Black music, has interpreted the man by storm. Wallace, yet another achieving kid from Brooklyn, made his mark.I know these lines from Notorious:Sean Combs: Yo, he got sex appeal like LL?Wayne Barrow: A little larger than that. Sean Combs: What, like Heavy D? Wayne Barrow: He's a little darker than that. Sean Combs: He seem like Wesley Snipes? Wayne Barrow: Oh, he ain't Wesley.President-elect Obama is trim, vibrant, healthy, athletic, a bright writer, supremely self-confident. B.I.G. was big, robust, pleasure-seeking, a bright writer, and supremely self-confident. They each took their own path, both tinged with pity and the blues, and each forged his own unique, individual brand. Although President-elect Obama, clearly a brilliant, remarkable, charismatic, strong family- values-rooted guy represents a more familiar, comfortable model of success, America will ever make room for and make the creative, visionary, and healing artist, no matter how often that talent skirts with realms of danger, self-destructiveness, and violence.