“Bill Bonds. He did it His Way!”

Bill Bonds

“Bill Bonds. He did it His Way!”

(Saying farewell to a Detroit Broadcasting Legend)

By Glenn Peppers 12-13-14

Longtime Detroit broadcast legend Bill Bonds passed away at his home Saturday December 13th, at roughly around 4pm from cardiac arrest. He was 81 years old. One thing is real and true. The retired WXYZ Channel 7 news anchor, and journalist was the type of broadcaster you either loved him or you couldn't stand him! I won't use the word hate! The word hate doesn't factor in on the likes of someone like Bill Bonds. You may not have liked everything he said often time. But one things for sure. Bill Bonds demanded your respect! Especially for his work! 

Sure you could sometimes love him like a long lost brother. Or Not! Either way, in the words of recently retired Channel 7 news anchor, Eric Smith, "You always watched him!" 

I write this tribute to Bill Bonds with longtime Detroiters in mine, in that if you’ve ever watched Bond’s at work, you knew what you were going to get! The news as it happens, according to Bill Bonds. In other words, the news as Bill Bonds always presented it!... His Way!

Yes Bill Bonds was arrogant, brash, and an antagonist form way back. Yet Bonds was always set and sure, ready to fight for, and defend his and our Detroit against anyone! I loved his cantankerous on-air battles with Mayor Coleman Young, and loved it when he ran Senator Orin Hatch off of a live satellite hookup interview on a 6pm broadcast!

It was Bill Bonds who sat up with us Detroiters all those long nights, on the air for many distressing hours as Detroit burned during the 1967 riot, back when I was 10 years old. For almost 7 days Bonds was at Broadcast House reporting the news, during the riot here in Detroit, as it happened. No matter what, throughout his career, Bill Bonds always kept a cool head, until he’d sometimes lose it with his impassioned opinions and commentary! And as I said, Bill always read the news, His Way!

Bond’s bigger than life personality was what Detroit media personalities were all about back in the day! Bonds wasn't just a news anchor person. He was an old school, old time broadcaster!... A real News Man! His editorials and commentaries were scathing at times, yet mostly dead on!

Diana Lewis

In 1976, it took the wise, gentle, and totally professional soul of one Diana Lewis to sit by his side as anchor with him for twenty some odd years, to soothe and mellow, (and somewhat tame) the mouth that roared for many a year at the WXYZ anchor desk! As most of you know. A brilliant co-anchor never really stopped Bill Bonds from being uniquely BILL! Yet poor Diana Lewis. She always held her own with Bill. Toe to toe! 

Bill Bonds and Diana Lewis

I felt that no other anchor team member within a hundred miles could have survived and handled Bill Bonds' nightly onslaught of ego, character and identity assaults as well as Diana Lewis did! Still, Bill Bonds and Diana Lewis were the perfect yin and yang in the field of on-air broadcasting! Especially at a time when black women were first coming onto the scene as news anchor team members in the middle 1970’s!

And so another icon in the era of Detroit's golden age of television and one of her original sons has passed on, leaving Detroit one more icon short! Bill Bonds is one of the last of the Detroit’s great public servants, and icons who’ve made this city an interesting and wonderful place to live! Both Bill Bonds and Coleman Young were wonderful strong personalities! Rock solid principled, and always their own men! This is what made them who they were! They demanded the best from everyone around them. Bill Bonds excepted nothing less than your best work, and for you to be able to back it up!

In a city that once boomed and blossomed, and built the best cars the world has ever known. We had one of the best news personalities in the country, right here in our fair town! A town that taught the world what soul and R&B music is really all about! Not many cities could compare with our on air television personalities who've gone on before Bill Bonds. We all remember the likes of Sonny Elliot, or our sports announcer, Al Ackerman and TV2 noon anchor, Beverly Payne and also TV2' Woody Willis. 

Bill Bond's Commentary

Now our mostly often argumentative, and quite frequently ostentatious Bill Bonds has gone and left us! If you lived in Detroit within these last 35 years or so, then you are one of many whom Bill Bonds has touched, in one way or another! We ate dinner watching him at the dinner hour weekdays! We went to bed at night stewing on his commentaries. And we all laughed at the very thought of he and Coleman Young in a boxing match. Of whom Bill challenged Young in a heat of passionate, Billy Bonds style with a burst of that Bill Bonds impulsivity and boldness! Political correctness? I can hear Bill Bonds’ conscious saying, “To the Producers be damned!”

Coleman A. Young and Bill Bonds eating Coney Hotdogs in Downtown Detroit

Personally, I think the picture of Coleman A. Young, and Bill Bonds sharing coney hotdogs in downtown detroit is how I'd like to remember those two!

If you've ever been interested in becoming an on-air broadcaster, you had to have loved Bill Bonds! Grant it, you may not have always agreed with his editorials, or his opinions, but if you were old school Detroit, somehow you understood his rantings and his rage on many subjects! 

If you are a longtime Detroiter, you just couldn't help but like him. Just like Soupy Sales, and Bill Kennedy, Bill Bonds is apart of you! Why? Because Bill Bond was Real People! What you saw in Bonds was what you’d get! No Frills, and no Fluff! Therefore, we watched him, every evening and every night! 

Bill Bonds!... He was Truly One of a Kind! Rest in peace Billy! And as you use to say on many a weekday night around about 11:28pm!... “Good night everyone!”

Glenn Peppers 12-13-14         Updated 12-15-14

"People of Color in America Awaken”

“People   of  Color  in America   Awaken!”

(Now you Know!)

By Glenn Peppers

This letter goes out to all men and women of color! And that means people from the darkest of dark skin, to you, the lightest of light skin, and ya'll in between type brothers and sisters out here, everywhere! But more importantly, this letter is written especially to all young black men in america! 

After today, if you did not know, or if there is still any doubt in your mind as to where and how you fit into the grand scheme of things here in this country, you're either fooling yourself, or you are numb inside. 

December 3rd 2014, is the day New York chose not to indict New York Policeman, Daniel Pantalio for the choking homicide death of Eric Garner! Despite clear and up close video coverage of this man struggling to breath, and dying right before the worlds eyes! This date should be a hallmark, and a most pronounced date of your awakening! "What awakening?" You say! 

That awakening is this!... You should now at last realize where you stand, and what your life has always truly meant to a great many (yet not all) of those who enslaved our ancestors, and have looked down upon us as their descendants, discriminating against us, and treating us horribly for centuries!  

By bringing our ancestors to this land on slave ships, eons ago, we've been exposed to, as well as fell victim to a culture filled with hate, thievery, envy, oppression, spite, scorn, torture and murder! 

Notwithstanding, and in spite of it all, our ancestors had hope! With this hope, over the countless decades to come, through reconstruction and Jim Crow, we've opted to try and blend in, fit in, and get in wherever we could. We forever were those people who through slavery were constantly scorned, abused, chased, hung, raped, separated and displaced.  

In the eyes of the slave owner, we were seen more as things than human beings. We were then and still are a people a long long way from home! 

With no wealth to assist us, and no other real financial means in order to leave america and return to africa, our ancestors had to stay here and try and build a better life for themselves among those who hated us enough to want to kill us, for simply being us! So with hope, and as best we could, here we are, still in america some 500 years or more, still believing and still fighting for our right to live in this country! Sadly enough, through it all, we've managed to maintained hope that this world would one day change!

With this hope, (along with our strong ancestral fortitude), we blended in as best we could, and tried to got along and work hard, like any good american. We chased dreams and cleaned houses, and continued to slave as butlers, and maids and janitors some of us, always keeping  positive goals in mind and on the back burner. 

As a result of our patience, we build universities, and invented a host of products and tools and machines for medical and manufacturing use over the last 200 years here in america. Most of which go unsung, and unnoticed, and undocumented in history books, yet a great many of them are still in use today!  Like the traffic light, and the refrigerated truck! Most ideas and patents by blacks were copied and/or stolen! Still we carried on here in america, always having hope!  

Coming along in america, our wants and needs were and are simple. We mainly wanted only the very basic of things that all americans wanted for their families after working a hard days work and pay. Freedom, justice and equality! 

Yet over countless long years, through emancipations, marches, speeches, and critical laws penned to try and help us get along in this land; a law was passed in 1965. The voters rights bill came into being, making it so that we could now freely vote as americans. 

This right, and this act would have but only a short forty year tenure, succumbing to political deception, and deceit in 2013, only to in part be reneged upon, as we watched our human rights be juggled and dropped by an insensitive Supreme Court. A basic citizens right Reneged upon by a heartless panel of antiquated, out of touch bumps on a legal bench who thought nothing of our basic american right to vote! And all this happening with a black man seated on the same Supreme Court panel, and a black man in the Oval Office!  

Regardless of any sort of freedom movement that either worked or failed in the past, we mostly kept faith that we would one day be treated fairly in this country, and would one day be able to live peacefully in a nation that we had largely help build more than 80% of, all the while getting no wages for the work done. Just the taste of a slave owners whip if we weren't working fast or hard enough! All this, and still we are treated as prey, and not as citizens of these United States. 

Hundreds of years have passed, and in all this time, there has never been any real atonement for our sufferings and the degradation of our basic human rights through denial. Nor has there ever been any visible regret for the countless murders and mistreatment of millions of black men, women and children since that first round of slave kidnappings set foot on Plymouth Rock, so many centuries ago! 

It is hard to believe that all these many years, and countless decades were wasted in america, begging peace and equality; and that it all basically has come down to this one petty and frivolous thing!... 

"Enmity and hatred against black americans, as a result of america electing (and then re-electing) a black man as President." 

Yeah I said it! Com'on' now! This is not a secret! Its not like people don't know! Yes America is that Trite! You can feel it!... You can see it, and in the rude comments made by White House press core members, senate members and people in general who dislike him because of the color of his skin, we've all heard it on the news, and read it on the internet, and in the news papers!

This in turn has lead to a firestorm of media charged racial bias, childish attacks, and a fervor of hate so explosive it is bringing out in white america this dark, murderous specter of evil that I suspect hasn't risen its head this blatantly since possibly the late 1800's, just after slavery was abolished! 

This is a childish hatred! A 5th grade (Hey wait a minute, That's My White House) covetousness over the Presidency so inflammatory as to roust awake this hive-like wrath and anger in white folks that is so sadly disturbing, that it has literally has become somewhat of a hunting season on black america byway of the police, and other entities throughout america! Literally and figuratively!

I'm seeing wrath, anger and envy that is being allocated out to people of color through various modes of racism, and forms of discrimination in a mean spirited, and again, in an almost hive-like fashion. Incidences like blacks suffering racism on the job (which I can surly attest to that) as a result. Racism while shopping, driving, and pretty much anywhere when out and about! 

This ugly wrath seems to center itself around and against the President of the United States, right on down to everyday innocent black folks, mostly males who have become subject to beatings, being choked and/or shot down in surrender mode, in their driveways, in their homes, in shopping malls, toy stores, and even in their own homes. Mainly by police officers! And these police officers are doing this with impunity, and getting away with it, all over the country! 

How dirty is this up coming tidbit? Officer Daniel Pantalio, was not indicted December 3rd, 2014 for killing Eric Garner. But the young man who shot the video of the police officer who was choking and killing Garner was himself indicted! Imagine that. They went after this man with gusto! Retribution and revenge serve cold, curtesy of New York's finest! You call that Justice?

Even on the busy main streets of Staten Island, New York this wrath played itself out taking a life in a matter just minutes! Yes, the notion that a black man's life is worthless in america, or is fair game for murder is now to the point where the police will outright murder a black man in public, even with people standing about video taping the incident. As if to say, "Screw you John Q Public, there'll be nothing done about it anyway!" 

Thus why Eric Garner was being choked to death on a city sidewalk in New York by a gang of four 200 pound policemen pile driving atop Garner, as another officer squeezed the life out of the man with a choke hold from behind. A hold so tight it denied his lungs and brain the proper air and oxygen, collapsing his windpipe, probably causing an asthma attack which might have lead to his heart attack.  

All this while, the other police officers were kneeling on his back and his neck, holding his arms, and forcing his head into the ground! All of this captured on a perfectly clear, HD smart phone camera, in closeup video mode. A callus murderous act that went totally unpunished and overlooked by a bias Grand Jury! 

To add further insult to injury, these cops had the nerve to handcuff this man, and do a rescue Check, Call, Care protocol and proceed to check his pulse, as if this man were somehow still alive. The EMT's who came on the scene afterwards were a wreck, trying to play it off that they were examining a man simply laying unconscious, when in fact Eric Garner had expired many minutes before they even entered the scene! The way these police officers treated Garner's body after he had passed on was insulting, and undermining! Especially if you've worked in emergency room situations in a hospital, and you know when someone has expired! 

So there you have it! A live public execution of a black man who did nothing more than just be suspected of selling loose cigarettes, and just so happened to be at the wrong place, at the wrong time! Believe me folks, had this been a white man who had been ganged upon, and choked to death on a public city street in america by a gang of black police officers, and having it caught on the same kind of ultra clear video tape. Believe me, rioting couldn't even explain the hellish turkey shoot that would occur as a result afterwards! 

The only other thing Eric Garner was guilty of that day is being a larger black man with health issues. Eric Garner was a victim of most white's fear and stereotype about larger black males, and that is for whatever reason because a guy like Eric Garner (was a big man), those police officers felt (because he was so large) that they needed to just take him down! 

Forgoing the law, and out of pure aggression, Daniel Pantalio knowingly used an illegal tactic banned for over 20 years in New York, which was the use of a choke hold! This was done to Eric Garner as if he were some kind of animal on an open plain that needed roping and steering in order to capture him! They did this to a human being! In looking at this video tape I ask you, who in fact were the animals on that day?

Eric Garner was victim of that deep seeded fear white's have of black men who are larger than they are. It's called the "Big Black Buck Syndrome!" They don't see us as human's, they see us in the light of cattle, and stockyard animals! This is the lowest form of degrading racism! Its inhuman to treat anyone like this!

I'm seeing that a lot of this widespread, uniformed resentment of black males is centered around white america's hatred of Hip Hop/Rap music, Hip Hop culture and Hip Hop fashion. The sagging pants, the stank attitude, and of course, the music! Now mind you, I do not like Hip Hop and Rap music either! But I sure as hell won't kill you because of it! Although some people have been known to shoot into automobiles full of Hip Hop kids at gas stations when the Hip Hop is far too loud! But that's another story all together. One that has been already tried and justice was served, sending the shooter to jail!

Hell, I don't like a whole lot of Rock Music, but I'm not gonna go around choking out a bunch of head bangers because of it! Secondly and most of all, like I said earlier, it is white america's distain for America's Black President that is getting their goat worse of all! Thus the rampant disrespect, and constant barrage and insolence toward him, and in turn, US! 

I guess the consensus with some white americans is this: 

"If we can insult and belittle this black President of the United States, we can totally screw over the n-----s as well, no problem!" 

Think about it! If they feel that they don't have to respect the president of the united states, who happens to be black. "Why in the hell should they respect US?" 

This wrath is crafty and deceptive, and all derived out of hate and envy! Envy that despite congress' efforts to block him, and not work with him. The President is doing a pretty decent job getting things done considering his has no congress to work with, as they have built up walls blocking him out, shutting down our government, and trying to destroy everything this president implements! This president has to try and work with a GOP faction that has based its beliefs and actions on the rantings of a drug addicted radio shock jock in order to make sure he fails at his quest to try and better america! That's childish resentment, and its petty! 

As a result, this kind of behavior reveals an unwarranted indignation, and an insane hidden personality trait of this country's true spirit! It is this spirit of shame, prejudice, control, hatred and barbaric contempt against the black male, unto death! 

Men of color. If you did not know then. I assure you, you now know where you stand! If you were or are still in the least bit of denial of where you stand in this country, I say look around you and awaken! Let this day and this date be your wakeup call! 

You should mark this exact moment in time, and let it become emblazoned upon your mind and heart! Tell your sons! Let this knowledge unshackle their souls. Knowing where you are on the big map of life should be your liberation from confusion and pain! For now my brothers and sisters, you know full well where you stand in the eyes of america! 

Glenn Peppers       12-3-2014

"To Non-Effect”

Bill Cosby

“To  Non-Effect”

(The Case of Bill Cosby. Memories on Trial in my Mind and Heart)

        By Glenn Peppers

So, question is!... Does this latest and most definitely shocking barrage of allegations of rape put against Bill Cosby make all of his work that he has done from say, the middle 1960's up to now, Non Effective? 

How are we who've grown up loving Cosby’s work, his comedy, and his many talented facets and modes of entertainment to now view him, as he smugly sits by and says nothing in his defense of these awful charges of rape and abuse? Accusations that apparently a slew of women in the entertainment business have come forth and unloaded in a firestorm media blitzed, Public Trial by Fire! And this isn't just one person crying rape mind you! There are many women coming out of the woodwork, revealing decades of horrible experiences of rape, control and abuse, at the hands of one Bill Cosby! 

Amazing! Even when I say Bill Cosby and Rape out loud in the same sentence, it doesn't even compute! My mind goes into shutdown at the thought! Hey guys, Cosby to me was Fat Albert back in 1969 when I was a kid! Cosby's Fat Albert was one of only two african american cartoons available on TV when I was growing up! Yes Two!... The Jackson 5 Cartoon, and Fat Albert! 

Bill Cosby was the first black male actor on television to play a federal agent on a network television show, in a role that made him actually look pretty darn cool! This wasn't a role where he was grinning and shuffling and jiving, or playing a butler or a slave. Cosby was Scotty on “I Spy!” He was Chet Kincaid on "The Bill Cosby Show!" On comedy albums, he was "The Chicken Heart!" and “Noah!” 

Bill Cosby had full network backing way back in the racially charged 1960's, as NBC and Kraft foods sponsored Bill Cosby’s various “Bill Cosby Comedy Specials” on the NBC network! In my mind, I'm saying to myself, "Cosby is not a rapist! He couldn't be!" Hell, I ate fruity Jello cups and Jello Pudding Pops because of those damned commercials! I even remember the song, "JELLO!" 

Cosby was the man who said it was cool to eat cake for breakfast on one of his comedy albums! "This guy couldn’t have raped any women!" Well, so my memories and iconic biases and ideals want to tell me! 

How is it that this man who has done so much can (and just might) lose everything in the twinkling of a chicken heartbeat over simple accusation alone? And at his age! I mean everything, all at once, and in his golden years! Think of it. All that he has achieved and worked for over the last 50 years, gone! Every aspect of his life up for question! In the end, Cosby’s life could show itself as meaningless, and totally suspect! 

As I write, situations that arise from the past begin to come to mind. Like the woman who claimed Cosby was her father, and it turned out that through DNA testing, Cosby was indeed her father! Well, like many others out here when confronted with media “Icon Reality Jolts" like this, I simply pushed it aside. The media dropped it, and the issue just seemed to somehow fade away onto the tabloid cutting room floor! There was one other thing that I was somewhat always left in the dark about. And it was that riff between Lisa Bonet and Cosby! The way he fired her from the Cosby Show because (as I heard it) Bonet did a nude love scene in the movie, "Angel Heart," with actor Mickey Rourke, way back in the latter 1980's. 

"My gosh," I'm thinking. Maybe Cosby black balled Lisa Bonet too! The poor girl was barely seen by anybody until, "A Different World" came out as a television series! and the the very last thing I saw her in was the Will Smith movie, "Enemy of the State!" My gosh, all this time, I had put these things out of my mind, or just didn't give them a second thought! But not these latest string of events! Oh no!... These accusations were not going away that easily! 

These accusations are on the forefront of everyone's mind, and are hot items in tabloid media!... And that's the problem I'm having with this! Its too organized. Too On Time! Still, this is news, balls out and to the wall! Yet again, something is wrong! Why is this all so timely, and so convenient? So all these women just suddenly out of the blue decided to come out of the woodwork and publicly stand up against Bill Cosby's tyrannical conduct and abuse! Just like that? 

As a result of all this, presently as it stands, Bill Cosby could be heralded as one of the most hated persons in the world today! How does one deal with that notion? How does his poor wife, Camille deal with any of this? I guess like she’s always had to. Quietly, and behind closed doors!

Off the record, I remember back in the day, a lot of people once questioned Cosby's niceness as well as his clout and uncanny influential media power when actress Denise Nicholas (of 60's television show "Room 222" fame) married (“Lean on Me”) recording artist, Bill Withers. 

It was said that Withers was quite abusive to Nicholas. "And what of it," you say? Well put it this way!... Rumor had it that Mr. Cosby (who at the time was real good friends with Denise Nicholas) made Bill Withers' life a living hell because of this alleged abuse against his friend, blackballing him (somehow) in the record industry! 

Now mind you, this is only a rumor, yet it is one of many of its kind that I've heard over the years concerning Bill Cosby’s behavior and imperialistic media prowess gone wild. As far as this story goes, I to this day truthfully, and strongly I still question the Bill Withers story as far as there being any kind of real truth to it!

Getting back to what I touched on at the outset! Even if these allegations all happen to be proven true somehow. Does this make Bill Cosby’s lifelong body of work to Non-Effect? They even yanked "The Cosby Show" from Nick at Nite's nightly line up! Double standard? You tell me! You remember all the crazy things a mentally deranged and drugged out Charlie Sheen did and said. yet they never canceled or yanked "Two and a Half Men" off the air! 

A drug crazed and addicted lifestyle didn't stop Robert Downey Jr. from rising above the muck either! He put his past so far put behind him that he one day became Iron Man! From drugged out '80's Brat-Pack Star to a super hero. Overnight! Imagine that!

And what of the ocean of other many stars in the entertainment realm; some of whom we may have lost respect for, because they appear to have fallen from grace? Taken down byway of something they’ve said or done, other than being a supposed newly discovered rapist or murderer! 

Should we not look at any Robin Williams' movies anymore because we are angry at the fact that he took his own life? In doing so, does knowing that Williams committed suicide make it that much harder to watch his many movies, or his body of work on television? Should they be banned from television as well?

I know I'm comparing apples to oranges here as far as situations go, but in essence, the feelings we as viewers might share are somewhat the same in that because of real-life situations, these real live people that we revere and put on a pedestal, have suddenly become human! All at once, they are no longer these bigger than life, TV and Movie Stars that we've made them out to be. 

They have by way of reality (in an odd and humbling sort of way) become more like us! In fact, more like people you or I may know in real life; and not necessarily people we may like a whole lot either! John Lennon once said, "Aspire not to meet your Idols for they will almost always disappoint you!" 

Finding out that Bill Cosby may be a serial rapist is like finding out that your kindly ole' grandfather was stalking school girls back when you were in middle school! Maybe this is why these women and/or girls hadn't come forth earlier! Maybe they themselves couldn't believe what had happened to them! But why now and not then?

Aside from the horror of being raped by a beloved television star, imagine these women's whole idea of someone they may have looked up to at one time, all at once totally ruined! Think of how hurt and disappointed they may have been! Imagine all those years hiding and keeping a secret like that! 

Maybe they felt what many other people would have felt. That feeling of "Maybe I shouldn’t come out with this, because Bill Cosby is loved by so many people?" This had to have driven them crazy! If these things happened, I believe they were afraid and felt powerless to do anything about their situation. When you look at the situation like that, I truly cannot blame them for not speaking up right away! 

I cannot imagine holding all this in for as long as some of them may have, and at the same time thinking, "I wouldn't want to ruin the public’s ideal and image of Bill Cosby as this perfect "Cosby Show" father figure, iconic stand up comedian, and actor, cartoon creator, and TV and movie producer. 

Bill Cosby and Sammy davis Jr. playing poker

Aside from Sammy Davis Jr., we’re talking about a man who at that day and time was someone on the order (power-wise) of Bob Hope. Cosby could practically call his own shots at NBC back when black folks were still protesting and fighting to sit at lunch counters in the south! The man was and is a television pioneer, and was a most cordial ambassador for people of color the world over! Bill Cosby and the word Rape in the same breath?... You've got to be kidding me! Something does not compute!

If true, I know that not any of those women wanted to be the one to come out against Cosby with this kind of thing first, as the weight behind such news would have been tremendous had they not been able to prove or substantiate such a thing! Not even with the coborating testimony of other women who have made claims against Cosby! 

The very idea of such information eventually destroying a man who spent a lifetime helping break down the walls of segregation, and prejudice on television, and in motion pictures throughout the 1960's and 70's and 1980's had to be overwhelming! One that must have made them stop in their tracks! 

If this man is guilty of these crimes, his downfall wouldn't be the fault of any of these women. Not at all! The fall of Bill Cosby would be one that he and he alone would have to take full responsibility for! A fall that I don’t think he could ever fully recover from and endure, as he is well along in his years. Such a major demolition of the House of Cosby could prove to be quite debilitating, and soul destroying to say the least. 

Cosby with The Jackson 5 on the "Going Back to Indiana" TV Special

In the meantime, what do I do with all these images stuck in my head! Does this incident make my good memories to Non-Effect as well? What do I do with all the sounds of laughter and the positive images I harbor in my mind that were set forth over a lifetime? Do I mentally erase all those funny Tonight Show segments with Cosby and Carson. Or Cosby and Leno? Or how about Cosby and Fallon? How about Cosby on the Ed Sullivan Show? Yeah, he goes back that far with me!

Tell me, how do I not watch "Uptown Saturday Night" ever again? How do I watch or listen to his work with the same tears in my eyes that I spill whenever I watch "Mrs. Doubtfire or Mork and Mindy?” Do I now close a blind eye at Cosby's blemish of rape as I did for Mel Gibson's insane behavior, and ugly racial video tirades, every time I watch one of my favorite movies of all time with him in, "Lethal Weapon?" 

Do I close my eyes as to what kind of man Bill Cosby quite possibly can be, as I do when I watch my favorite John Wayne movies, knowing fully knowing that Wayne had such hatred and disdain and disrespect for black people in real life? 

One things is certain. I said it once, and I'll repeat it again. John Lennon's quote of: "Aspire not to meet your Idols. For they will almost always disappoint you!" is so true!  As far as favorite stars as well as anyone goes. This saying has become a mantra, and a most cherished and guarded defense mechanism for me to depend upon! 

I say, "Let’s be our own heroes! Let's look at the world at hand and love people for who they are, and yet not worship them! Let us all toot our own horn on our own glorious walk of life! And never believe everything we hear, see and read in the media!

Glenn Peppers                                                                     November 20, 2014  

Updated: Nov 21st at 9:18am 2014
Updated: Nov 24th at 7:43am 2014

My Bell Isle: Getting Reacquainted”

“My Belle Isle: Getting Reacquainted” 

Detroit's Belle Isle Scott Fountain

By Glenn Peppers 10-28-14

Earlier last week, Wifey and I and our doggie rode around Detroit’s jewel, Belle Isle! Yes, amidst all the controversy concerning Belle Isle, I had my misgivings about doing so at first, but after much prodding from my wife, I consented and just before dusk Sunday, we rode around the island doing slightly less than the posted, 20mph speed limit!

And what I saw wasn't what I thought I'd see. Surprisingly, there were no State Police cars sitting at speed traps, and hiding in wooded thickets and shady areas waiting to profile, pull over and ticket people of color as they drove the 7 mile perimeter of Belle Isle! Now what I did see was a Belle Isle that was in fact neater (not necessarily cleaner) than I remembered it to be in recent times. I was happy to see that the raceway parking area for the Grand Prix was cemented, fenced and finished. and that all around the island were trashcans everywhere! I mean like every 35 to 50 feet apart!

I noticed that the bathrooms appeared to be remodeled, and the grass and brush that the city let overgrow into the picnic areas for so long was neatly cut away, and there were port-a-potty's in areas where bathrooms were sparse! After getting out and walking our dog, I used one of those port-a-potty's, and it was probably the cleanest port-potty I've ever see! Yes we walked our dog! Never have I ever been so apprehensive to step out of my car and walk anywhere on Belle Isle in my life before. Yet I did so! My wife encouraged me to do so! And when the queen Darlene beckons, I got moving!

All the while that we were there on the island, there was barely a soul out and about. I counted maybe 7 to 10 other vehicles cruising Belle Isle along with ours, and literally no one walking or running. Almost zero activity except for an actual wedding that was taking place at the Scott Fountain! The reception to that wedding was being held at the Belle Isle Casino. It was beautiful, and done right at sunset! As the sun faded away, I cynically spied the landscape for any looming State Police Cars, and there were none! In fact, I only saw one police car, and that unit was far far away on the other side of the island, and that was it! Don’t know what I was so on guard for. I hadn’t done anything! Then again. Such was the plight of many other men of color who’d been profiled, and pulled over for doing virtually nothing! I stuffed my cynical attitude back in my noggin, and tried to enjoy our outing! I saw zero squad cars!

As a matter of fact. I didn’t see Mooky and Ray-Ray riding 5 deep in an old hoopty, slinging back 40's and blasting Rap Music like everyone once complained about sometime ago either! I was glad of that! Although back in the day, I didn’t see very much of that kind of thing to where it would make me stay away from Belle Isle. Statistically speaking. There was almost no shootings or murders reported on Belle Isle, despite the annoyance of loud music and alcohol. I’m sure white kids do, and have done the same things at Metro Beach and Lower Huron. It just isn’t made news for obvious reasons! And because no one was trying to do a takeover of Metro Beach. 

I think the newer message sent by having such a strong show of force with the State Police was to at (at first) scare off riff-raff types, and other people of color. The gentrificationing of Belle Isle made it where for some folks who lived in the city felt that they should not go to a familiar place like Belle isle and relax without a slew of police cars tailing you, watching you, profiling you, and making you feel as if you do not belong there. As if you are on holiday at the Treblinka German prisoner of war camp. That show of force and message had some weight to it! From what I saw on that one late Sunday afternoon population wise, maybe their plan worked!

An article I read recently made mention that a lot of people have pretty much stopped coming down to Belle Isle completely, for fear of being harassed and/or having a confrontation with the police, and ending up a police brutality victim, or a fatality statistic (great echos of Ferguson and other police brutality cases come to mind). Obviously this was and is a fear that mostly black folks (mainly men) would and could easily harbor! I understand that frustration! 

All things side. Yes, I kind-a liked what I saw at the new State Park, called Bell Isle! It was quiet, and there was road blocks all about, as road and sewer work is being done, and there were many detours and such in various places all over the island. Yet all in all, Bell isle is basically the same! Just a lot more trash cans! 

Strangely enough though, there was something missing from Belle Isle. Gone in a sense was that since of comfort I’d grown so accustom to coming along. That feeling of getting away. that feeling of refuge where you’d say to yourself, as you'd pulled onto the island, "Ah, I'm home! I’m on the island now. I can leave my cares and woes back in the city. I can set up my Smoky Joe baby grill, and ‘Que up some Ball Park Franks, listen to the Tigers on the car radio and watch the freighters go down (or up) the Detroit River, and cruise on over to Lake Saint Clair!"

Gone was that carefree feeling of comfort that said. "Its ok if you just happen to doze off for a moment in your car after work, as you quietly listen to the Hits and Oldies radio station, greasy Wendy’s double hamburger and Soda in hand!" 

There was a new kinda feeling in the air that day. It was that feeling you get when you go to a really nice Museum like the DIA in Mid-Town, and everything is all beautiful and priceless and cold. And no matter how beautiful things are you can only look and admire, and you better not walk here or there, or touch anything!... And that means ANYTHING! Its kinda like that to me!... Sort of!

Driving, and walking around Belle Isle that other day for me was like going back and visiting a house that you once lived in for practically a lifetime. On the outside, it pretty much looks the same. On the inside, its got somewhat the same paint job, yet it smells odd, and maybe there's a little different furniture inside. Nicer furniture, yet its not yours! 

The comfort zone and aura that this house had when you lived there, and once knew is somehow changed! Although it appears the same, everything is somehow out of sorts! The house as it is in that moment is tangible, and physically accessible to you, yet plainly in a word, it doesn't belong to you anymore! Not in the way that it once did! 

Maybe all that has to happen is for me as far as Belle Isle is for me to go back visit her more often. Maybe I have to simply Reintroduce myself to this jewel, and my once cozy corner island that I've known all my life, that now through political power struggles, and takeovers and gentrification processes has somehow changed! 

I almost cried that Sunday evening because the Belle Isle that has always been so beautiful to me and always there, had somehow become so cold, robotic and unfeeling! Maybe a weekly spin around her shores will choke out all my deep seeded cynicism! Hopefully visiting her will quell my fears of forever losing my once peaceful, Fortress of Solitude! 

A fortress of solitude where I was cornfed family reunions, barbecuing with friends and family, cruising the strip with my childhood buddies, trying to run game on girls who'd almost never talk to a guy stuck in purple AMC Gremlin with a bunch of idiot guys!   My Fortress of Solitude had summer concerts, Boat races, Fireworks downtown, and spring flowers blooming at the conservatory. 

The Belle Isle I remember is where my fairly unskilled and yet hilarious fishing adventures took place. It was that same Belle Isle that housed the smell of the oldest and coolest aquariums in america. This island that sat between the Motor City and Canada was where I spent many days meditating and painting wildlife by the waters edge. It was this island where my wife and I once did a cancer walk that all of a sudden didn't feel quite that same to me. 

I shuttered at the thought of my Belle Isle becoming a hub for just only the well to do who are pushing Detroiters out of the city, Keeping Belle Isle for themselves, all the while and being protected by jackbooted State Police and Storm Troopers, lying in wait on the island to bash in some urban heads of anyone who’d dare enter the island uninvited and unwanted!

As my wife and I drove off the island and headed home. I noticed all the many geese and ducks all about the grass and marsh areas! Even the petting zoo is up and awaiting children and public school out trips (Oh I forgot, there isn't very many public schools left in Detroit). 

Even the long awaited Detroit Yacht Club building looks as if it were being remodeled. I am happy to see that things are looking up, despite my sense of apprehension and cynical uneasiness. As I said goodbye to Belle Isle, somehow, I felt better about her condition after seeing her! Yet gnawing at me was this disturbing thing of not seeing hardly anyone moving about on the island! 

Except for the wedding at the Scott Fountain, there was no one else walking about, feeding the gulls, strolling along and holding hands, and barely anyone sitting on the Canada shoreline side of the island, watching the waves or looking over at the downtown skyline at sunset! 

I chalked it up as being one of those days where it was just no one was on the island at around 5:30pm on a Sunday. As we crossed the bridge onto Jefferson Ave, I felt as if I had left a gravesite of a long lost loved one. Someone I hadn't seen in ages. Someone that I was glad I’d gone to see in order to convince myself that they were in fact alive, and not dead at all! 

In the back of my mind something tells me that I "Will" be back to Belle Isle soon! Real soon! I'll be back with my, Comfy little tent, my floppy Jimi Hendrix hat and my mini-grill, with my hot dogs with all my condiments and grill fixings in-tow! And yes my lil' dog too!  

By Glenn Peppers