Tag Archives: JOE HAMMOND

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2024

NYC, DAY 5 — Finale

Last night in NYC & the city had me fully feeling myself.

Valerie June, Louis Mendes, Joe Hammond, Tiffany & Co., Selena Nelson, Spike Lee.

By this point, you couldn’t tell NYC Joy nothinggg.

And she had a thought.

That first night, no one expected Valerie June to exit into the main hotel.

On my last night, I could use that knowledge to squeeze one more drop of magic from the Big Apple.

Worst case scenario, I was all dressed up for a Saturday evening in NYC. Oh, no.

So I called a car to take me back to Café Carlyle where this all began.

For the next 15 or 20 minutes, I slunk around their lobby trying not to be weird. Temperatures were in the 30s most of my time in NYC, and I’m too old to choose cute over comfortable, so to hotel guests and passersby, I was just some creep in a coat.

Just as I was reaching peak levels of awkwardness, the café door swung open and Valerie June rushed out in a wave of pink tulle…

Until her dress snagged on someone/something along the way, jerking her back like a pull-string doll.

It was the most adorably ordinary thing I may have ever seen.

And snapped me back to the reality that I was WOEFULLY unprepared.

Another fan nearby clutched a VJ album and book with a blue Sharpie.

I’d shown up with absolutely nothing but a story about how I’d seen her in Austin just the week before and my NY-given swag.

You ever looked back on a moment and realized that your brain was the real MVP, working faster than you were actually processing thought?

Did I have any writing utensil? No.

Did I have a single scrap of paper? Of course not.

Would it be silly for her to sign a key card from a totally different hotel? Absolutely.

But Valerie June’s setlist had included one of my favorites, “Workin’ Woman Blues.”

And what I DID have was a $20 bill. And somebody else’s Sharpie.

“Can I ask you to sign something too… And can it be a twenty-dollar bill?”

With an infectious giggle that rippled through her curled locs and pink tulle dress, VJ remarked that nobody had ever asked her that before.

After the way NYC met me, it made my heart happy to leave behind a lasting impression of my own.

[Ed. Note: This post is part of a one-time February 2024 mini-series that took me to NYC where I was treated to an abundance of Blackstories first-hand. In place of my usual February content, I chose to share my own real-time (-ish) lived experience to honor the vibrant people New York put in my path.]

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2024

NYC DAY 4 (cont’d) — Breakfast Served with Joe

Most people who interact with Louis Mendes fall into two categories: the perfect strangers who become totally enamored with him and the long-time locals thrilled to finally spot him. Every now and then, they fall into both and realize who he is mid-conversation.

But one particular exchange at Jimbo’s Hamburger Palace caught me WILDLY off-guard, right in front of my grits and bacon.

While Louis and I chatted over the merits of chocolate cake for breakfast—he’d flatly refused toast or a biscuit in favor of cake at 9am—another older gentleman quietly entered.

A black cane supported his long arms and broad shoulders that hinted at a once imposing physique. He’d been staring at us since he walked in, and sank himself into a chair at the opposite table.

“Legendary cameraman.”

He spoke so softly and deliberately that Louis thought he said “legendary camera, man.”

“How old are you?” Louis asked.

“73.”

“Oh, it’s younger than you.”

“I know. I remember that camera.”

“You know who I am?”

“Yeah, I know who you are. You used to shoot me & my boys ballin’ down at Rucker Park.”

A man (unintentionally?) eavesdropping from the diner countertop spun on his stool quick and exclaimed, “Man, I KNEW you were Joe Hammond!”

Joe “The Destroyer” Hammond, who once put up 50 points in a half against Dr. J, is widely considered one of the greatest street basketball players of all time. This year, he’ll be inducted into the New York Basketball Hall of Fame alongside Carmelo Anthony. That morning, he watched me shove eggs in my mouth. 🥴

In his soft-spoken but thick and charismatic New York accent, Joe regaled me with a few Harlem streetball stories, some tinged with regret, but all so proudly recounted. And I listened so intently, I barely remember him walking out the door.

I turned in my chair, hoping to catch one last glimpse of a New York great and spotted him just under the restaurant’s awning, waiting out the rain. Joe lingered there just long enough for me to snap a single photograph—something Louis constantly pesters me to do—before Harlem took him back.

It might be one of my favorite portraits I’ve ever taken. 🖤

[Ed. Note: This post is part of a one-time February 2024 mini-series that took me to NYC where I was treated to an abundance of Blackstories first-hand. In place of my usual February content, I chose to share my own real-time (-ish) lived experience to honor the vibrant people New York put in my path.]