Tribute to a Crocodile Princess of the Bayou

I honor the woman who instilled defiance in my soul…Deborah Kay Weiss. I salute you Mommy and thank you for being such a bad ass skank. Your laugh is as wild and infectious as the cough of a tuberculosis patient. And for those of you who know her, she speaks like English is a religious doctrine to be flagrantly ignored at any given moment.

Here is an example of what she has to say about people telling her what to do.

“I don’t like anyone to tell me how to act, behave, or be because I am the boss of me. I don’t like anyone to tell me that I am lying because if I want to lie, I can lie as much as I want to because I am the boss of me. I like certain weather climates…HOT! I like my house and my yard spotless and I don’t like anyone to mess it up. I like to be safe. I am street smart by staying out of the street. I like to shop and I don’t like it when anyone tells me I have to stop. One day when I lived on Spain St. in New Orleans I came home from school and Sylvia the maid put my clothes in my drawer and I could tell someone had been in my drawer. This was not okay, so I pitched a fit, crying and screaming. I wanted everything to be a certain way and that was STRAIGHT. All of the clothes straight. I had another drawer that was filled with lots of little special things: jacks, cards, bracelets, pennies, nickels, little toys and I never wanted anyone to ever open that drawer. When I got sick or pretended to be sick I had a little glass “mammy” [she’s from the south] bell that i rang when I wanted my mama or sisters to sit with me on my bed. I would ring the bell and make them get me something that I might want. The Jews are too bossy for me. Religion thinks it can tell me how to be, but I can celebrate Christmas and still be a Jew if I want because I am the princess of me.”

-Mommy

Here is an example of a wise teaching that she imparted to me on a note she packed with my lunch in high school. I encourage you to take the same advice this very day.

“Wake up you silly head
Get out of bed
And listen to the coco shosho”

Now you wonder where I come from…