By Terry Reid
The ConTextos Authors Circle was developed in collaboration with young people at-risk of, victims of, or perpetrators of violence in El Salvador. In 2017 this innovative program expanded into Chicago to create tangible, high quality opportunities that nourish the minds,,expand the voices and share the personal truths of individuals who have long been underserved and underestimated. Through the process of drafting, revising and publishing memoirs, participants develop self-reflection, critical thinking, camaraderie and positive selfprojection to author new life narratives.
Since January 2017 ConTextos has partnered with Cook County Sheriff's Office to implement Authors Circle in Cook County Department of Corrections as part of a vision for reform that recognizes the value of mental health, rehabilitation and reflection. These powerful memoirs complicate the narratives of violence and peace building, and help author a hopeful future for human beings behind walls, their families and our collective communities.
While each author’s text is solely the work of the Author, the image used to create this book’s illustrations have been sourced by various print publications. Authors curate these images and then, using only their hands, manipulate the images through tearing, folding, layering and careful positioning. By applying these collage techniques, Authors transform their written memoirs into illustrated books.
This project is being supported, in whole or in part, by federal award number ALN 21.027 awarded to Cook County by the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
Music Makes Life
Terry Reid
I can barely make out the faces in the crowd. I was nervous. We drove 2 and 1/2 hours to get here so I can’t fold. All I see is eyes, the music starts going. I recognize the beat and my friends start jumping. It’s go time! It’s July 2022. I’m nervous asl.
Hold up we going to run it back in just a bit
8 years previously...
One day I’m in the basement watching TV scrolling through Facebook when my homie Fresh FaceTimes me. He was like “ you know AD just had her baby.” I was like “what you telling me that for?” He was the only person that knew me and her was messing around. He told me the baby looked just like me. I wanted to hang up on him but instead I told him to send a picture. I thought he did kind of look like a light skin version of me. I didn’t know how to feel.
I was blocked on Facebook from messaging her so I had Fresh get her number for me. When I called she was acting funny but she finally said I still could come see him. I still didn’t know how to feel. He was 8 months at the time, she used to make me sneak through this little basement window. If I wasn’t skinny as hell I wouldn’t have fit. Going through that window was going to a different life, fatherhood, a life I I love.
Around this time is when I just started playing with music and started to really love it. My granddad had a body shop in Evanston, let me tell you he used to cook up some shit. He was amazing with repairing cars but when he did custom work it was crazy. My dad bought a BMW 545i blue with peanut butter interior. My dad had the vision and my granddad was the Beast with the paint gun.
When they were done the outcome was a masterpiece. The car ’ s base color was purple that flipped green and some more shit when a different light hit it or if you walked around it. The wheels were Forgiatos 21 inch in the back with an 8 inch lip and the front was 20-inch with the 4inch lip. My uncle John was a mad scientist with the engine, the MF that created Frankenstein don't got shit on him.
We are a car family, but this is where I fell in love with making music for real. My Uncle Sean built a rinky dink studio in the office area of the shop so me and my friends took off from there. I've always loved music, all types and genres. But trying to come up with my own was hard at first but I never gave up. I started by just finding Hooks and Melodies.
My dad used to tell me trash that shit. You sound like every other Chicago rapper. At first I didn’t know how to take that, I didn’t want to be classified as a rapper. I wanted to be an artist that painted a picture and not just one type of picture, all types of pictures. Then he told me if you can’t take criticism, you won’t be able to grow. It made me more resilient as a musician and as a man.
As I'm working on my craft, I'm crafting myself to be a father. You couldn't pull me away from my son until me and his mom broke up. She had this mindset of if we can't be together, you can't be around Nolan. That's my son ' s name. That broke me at first but I kept pushing. The time I spent away from them I was perfecting my craft. Finding new studios, and new producers and going out meeting new people to help my music pick up. Then I met Fay. She was sweet and quiet.
I used to see her walking by my house as I was pulling up. I will always only be able to get a few words in and this went on for about a year. Then Valentine's Day came around and I got her some flowers. I saw her walk to her house a couple of times. I would drive on the side of her as she walked to the house door. So I knew where she lived and when I got the flowers I walked them to the door.
She loved them and said I was crazy for doing that. The crazy thing is her mom came to the door but I didn't fold though. We started spending time together and our first date was at the El Famous, this little taco spot on Clark. She used to pick me up from work. For my sister's birthday, me and my family were going to Atlanta and I invited her. We had a blast. When we came home, guess what we found out….
She was pregnant. I remember her brother walking past when she said, “OMG Terry I'm pregnant.” He was like “Ooh, that’s on y 'all.” That shit was so funny. Knowing I was going to be a father again made me happy. When she gave birth that was the first time I ever saw a woman giving birth. I wanted to pass out but I kid you not I could not peel my eyes away from it. Let me tell you, y 'all women, I respect y ’all a lot more after that. From the 9 months of carrying a baby until the birth, you all are amazing.
After having my second child by the way we named him after me and I'm named after my father so my son is the third. That's cool, right? But anyway at this time me and my friends started going to little open mics and people loved us. My music was good and I was speaking about my life and the trials and the people I encountered. It was just getting better and better. I was trying to balance fatherhood and my music life and my social life and it was getting kind of messy. Let's just say I messed up a good relationship.
The difference between this relationship and the other was that the breakup didn't mess up the friendship between me and Fay. I got to stay in Terry's life with no problem. Then I had enough space to really turn up with the music. It wasn't no going home, I was at the studio all night and with the kids all during the day. My dad even built us a professional studio. It was amazing. I started learning how to engineer and record others.
I used to drive around with my dad listening to my latest song. If he told me it was good I knew it was good. My Dad was and is my best friend. He is always positive and plays multiple roles in my life: father, manager, friend and mentor.
We went from little open mics to traveling to different colleges like NIU, SIU, Clemson, South Carolina and more. This is when I met Ka Bella, she gave me my beautiful daughter who by the way looks just like me, baby Teryn. When I met her mom she already had kids, twins, a eight month old boy and girl, a 6-year-old girl, and two boys, 9 years old and 14. Those kids are something special.
I love them so much, we have a real bond, you can't tell me those kids are not my own. Every time I had a kid I was so happy, it is also a lot of responsibility. I used to be in the house with them all day and then I would go to work at night. When my daughter was born, I would take them to the studio with me. It would be me and my four babies, my 6 month old daughter. The twins were about one and a half and my 3-year-old son.
I used to be in there working and changing four diapers at once. I loved it, you couldn't separate us. And before shows I used to practice my songs and the whole performance in front of them. They would give me good feedback, laughing and dancing. I must have been doing a good job right?
Our music group was friends and family. We started opening for artists like IceWear Vizzo, Lil Keed and Phor and many more. I remember opening for Smoke Purp. There were a lot of people and I could barely make out the faces in the crowd. I was nervous. We drove 2 and 1/2 hours to get here so I can't fold. All I see is eyes, the music starts going and I recognize the beat. My friends started jumping. It's go time.
This game is rigged and I'm ahead of it, give it full gas till the pedal stick, this ain't the end so let's just settle this, I see a win and ain't no L in this.
I start rocking out. You can see the people in the crowd looking in awe like who are these guys. We do all of our songs and get off the stage. People start surrounding us like we were the main event.
After a while, everyone settles down and Smoke Purp is set to go on and let me tell you the whole crowd started walking off and it actually went viral. It was crazy. My performances for the kids paid off, when I get home I'm going to pay them back for giving me the strength to keep going and for my time away from them. I think I might take them to Jamaica and show them where I spent 5 years of my life. I was there from ages 3 to when I was 8 years old. It was a real experience. I was going to tell you a little bit about it but I don't know. Just a little won't hurt right?
Well fuck it! Living in Jamaica was different, totally different from living here in America. Jamaica is where my love for music started. It’s where my parents are from. It’s my roots. It’s where I want to bring my children.
I remember going to school down there. I went to two different schools. We had to wear uniforms, one pink and one gray and the other was black and green and white. School out there was hard, they moved fast out there and it was so strict. That yardstick was a real asshole. Me and dude did not get along at all I swear. I was sent down there to live with my grandmother, my dad's mom. And the house was me, my Gma, her husband and my dad's sister Giana.
Gianna had this friend named Janelle, she was my first crush in Jamaica. She was so beautiful, she had these eyes that you could get lost in. I used to be in love with her. She set the bar high for women in my life. I used to just follow them around, but enough of that.
Jamaica was so nice. I remember when it used to rain, we used to get bottle tops and take them to the side of the road where the water would flow to the drain and race the bottle tops.
We also used to cut open milk cartons and turn them into cars. The first time I saw a chicken get his haircut was crazy. I thought it was possessed. It just started running with no head, the craziest thing I ever saw.
My first time riding on a motorcycle was in Jamaica. We used to take trips to this big outdoor market every Saturday with people who would have stands set up selling different things from food to handmade baskets. One thing I know is there's no food like Jamaican food, if you want to try some I recommend getting a Jamaican beef patty. I love Jamaica from the palm trees to the music to the way of living.
I want my babies to experience all of it. I want them to get in the river and the ocean. I want them to know their background, who they are and where they come from. Life is good, God is good.
Music is life, and life makes music.
You know, going through all this taught me a lot. I wouldn’t make it through without my father. He has shown me how to really be a father to my own kids and he showed me what it means to love your creation. In other words, how to be a man. The love my dad put into me and my brothers and sisters helps me be able to put it back into my kids and everyone I come across. Being a father has changed me, if made me fight harder, it made me see the value in life, I was just watching my baby sleep sometimes and it made me realize what my dad was thinking when I woke up and caught him watching me sleep. My father and my kids play a big part in me being a musician. The both pushed me to not give up. They kept my flame lit at all times, they opened me up. They made me a better learner. I couldn’t see my life without them and now I can make passion out of pain and that cannot die away.
Terry Reid
I Am From
I’m from Rodgers & Evanston & Jamaica
From donks on 26s and 501 jeans and vans
I am from curry chicken, white rice with oxtail gravy
I am from fast cars and loud music
Where we go to the track and the studio to work
I'm from Terry Ried and Sophia Morris
From music and cooking Jamaican food
From Rastafari and Christian background
I'm from “I brang you into this world, I will take you out”
And from “I love you son ”
And from a God fearing household
I'm from Evanston Hospital
From Jamaican Independence being on my birthday
From Drizzy Dre showing me how to hustle
I am from where money is important
And you gotta keep your eyes open
Until the lion learns to write their own story, tales of the hunt will always glorify the hunter - African Proverb
