Bernard E. Harcourt

University of Chicago

April 5, 2006

“I had me two baby 9's. I fell in love with those. They look beautiful to me. They were chrome, like perfect size, they had some power to them. I was like damn, I really don’t use them because I don’t want to get them burned. Somebody’s body to it. I have them at home in a shelf, I don’t really use those. Those just like, I’m gonna keep those for a long time. . . . They’re like tight. They’re just all chrome” (CMS-10: 35).

“We used to get in robbing houses that have a lot of guns, and trade’em for pounds or ounces of cocaine or just sell them. . . . Living close to the border, guns are very valuable to the drug dealers. If you know the right people, you can get good deals for a gun. . .” (CMS-14:7)

When I was younger, I used to kick with those fools and I was looking, “There’s a bad mother fucker right there. Look at that shit. Nobody fucks with that fool.” And I just wanted to be a bad mother fucker.. . Like, nobody, nobody crosses him. . . Fools just always trying to start shit with you. Everybody always trying to like, I don’t know, kind’a like trying to like, punk you, or whatever. . . Like tell you, or just punk you, like, “Fool, you ain’t this, you ain’t that...” And then, . . . when you’re younger, that’s when you got to fight back the most, because . . . once you start a reputation, you got to keep it. . . If you start off as . . . getting punked and stuff, it’s not good. Cuz then everybody tries to punk you. (CMS-16: 35-36).