I called the station the next day and told them I wanted to apply to be an intern. The receptionist told me that I had to send in a résumé and I had to be eighteen. I typed up a résumé that embellished my experience and of course, my age. I had just turned sixteen that June. The station called me in for an interview with the program director. After about an hour of me talking, he hired me on the spot.
I was really into music and was able to talk about every hot rapper or artist, new or old. I was the girl who knew every word to “Represent” off of Nas’s Illmatic album. I knew every single song ever done by Method Man. I instantly clicked at WHTA. After a couple of weeks, I was doing everything.
I caught the eye of Chaka Zulu, the music director there. In many ways he was even more important than the program director, who was more of an administrator and facilitator. Chaka Zulu was the man. He was the one who decided what actually got on the air. New artists were wooing him constantly.
I loved being in his office because he had wall-to-wall CDs and tapes. I was in heaven. He really took my music game to a whole other level, and I ended up becoming his personal intern. It just happened. I spent so much time running errands and doing odd jobs for him that people just started referring to me as Chaka’s intern. I did everything that was asked of me, big or small tasks, and did it the best I could. It’s important to be reliable and effective; opportunities come to those who work hard!
Chaka started giving me more and more responsibilities. He asked me to work the night shift with one of the hottest teams on the station—Chris Lova Lova and Poon Daddy. During the commercial breaks, I would get into it with Chris and Poon about some artist or song. Before I knew it, they were opening a microphone for me and we were having these discussions on the air. This was very unusual at the time. Very few women were doing radio on a rap show. You had women on R&B stations and a few hip-hop, of course. But hard-core rap was a male-dominated domain. I soon became a regular.
I was sixteen, working from ten to two in the morning, three to four days a week. And I couldn’t have been happier. My mom was really cool about it, too. She knew how much I loved what I was doing, so she made a deal with me. I could do the show as long as I kept my grades up. I was a straight-A student at the time. School came pretty easy for me, so this job didn’t get in the way at all.
I was independent and worked hard to be so, always. I had a beat-up blue Jetta that I saved up to buy. Ever since moving to Atlanta as a teenager, I always had a job. I worked after school at Baskin-Robbins. And on the weekends I had a job as a receptionist for a tattoo parlor before getting a job at the radio station. I would drive to the station. On some nights I would bring my cousin Dice with me to keep me company. The station was in a not-so-nice neighborhood, and having her there made it a little less scary. I remember us having so much fun. Dice would answer the phones. She would take caller information for the winners of the contests or giveaways we would run. Back then, we used CDs, and Dice would line up the CDs in the order that we were going to play them and have them ready for us to be on the air. I loved when she was there with me.
After I left the studio, I would catch maybe four or five hours of sleep and be up and out for school. I’d do a nap after school most afternoons before going to the studio to work. I did that until I graduated and moved to D.C.
I thought moving to D.C. was the right play for my game. We do that sometimes—convince ourselves that we’re making a good move, when really we’re just giving up our power and following behind someone else. If I had just stayed focused . . . I knew what I wanted to do, which at my age was half the battle. I had it all figured out—everything but myself.
You can never be totally lost as long as you have a game plan.
My playbook took a major hit in D.C. But I learned that just because you made a couple of wrong moves didn’t mean that you couldn’t fix it. Sometimes we also get so discouraged or mad at ourselves that we don’t do the work to get back in the game.
Once I left D.C., I got back on my plan. That was one of the things that made it easier getting over Doug, too. I had something else to focus on—my career. Sometimes you will lose focus on your journey and get off plan. But if you have a plan, it’s a whole lot easier to get back to it. You can never be totally lost as long as you have a game plan.
When I came back to Atlanta, I even moved out on my own. After being away at college, it was hard for me to move back in with my mom and brother. I was used to my independence—not that my mom had a whole lot of strings attached to me. I just felt like it was time for me to be an adult.
Chris Lova Lova had a rapping partner named 4-Ize. He was always around the studio and he and I became good friends. He told me he was looking for a roommate and I was looking for a place, so we decided to move in together. You could see from a mile away that there was nothing going on between 4-Ize and me. It was strictly platonic. Of course, I could have lived with a girlfriend, but he asked first. Neither one of us could afford our own place, so it was the perfect arrangement. I bought a waterbed for my room. And we had no furniture in the living room—not even a couch. But I was on my own.
During this time Chris was rapping on the side, producing his own music. He was meeting with labels and nobody was biting. He had a song that he put out independently called “Phat Rabbit” that started to pick up steam locally. Then one day he comes in and announces, “I’m leaving the radio station!”
He told us that he was going to load up his car with his CDs and drive around the country selling them from his car.
“I’m going to see what happens,” he said.
I thought it was incredibly brave of him. Nobody was trying to sign him, but Chris believed in himself enough to put it all on the line. Do or die. He headed out on the road as Ludacris and the rest is history.
Chris gave a month’s notice. While I was happy for him, I knew that after he left, the show would probably not last long. He was so dynamic on the air and he was the driving force behind its success. If I wanted to take my radio career to the next level, I knew I had to do what Chris was doing and venture out on my own.
I got this industry book that listed the top radio stations in the country. I got the addresses and names for the program directors and sent my aircheck to ten markets, which included Los Angeles, Chicago, Philly, and D.C.
About a week later, I got calls from Chicago, Philly, and even D.C., but it was the phone call from the station in L.A. that caught my attention. They said they were hiring some new people and they would like to bring me out to L.A. I had never traveled that far in my life. I was still a teenager. They asked me what my current salary was. At the time, I was making something like $15,000 a year. But I told them I was making $30,000, just throwing a number out there. They said, “We can double your salary.”
What?! Double my salary!
They hired me over the phone. I was going to replace Big Lez on the midday (10 a.m.–1 p.m.) show. My mom and I flew out to Los Angeles that week on a buddy pass from my dad. They put us up in corporate housing for thirty days. My mom stayed with me for a while to get me settled. Keep in mind I was only nineteen, I had just gone through the heartbreak of my life, and I was now in Los Angeles about to make more money than I could ever have imagined, doing what I loved.
I went from feeling like my life was over to living my dream. After I’d been there just a short time they gave me the 6 p.m.–10 p.m. spot. I was loud and boisterous and they felt that would play well with the young after-school and college-age crowd. And it did. I was on my way to radio stardom—and then my phone rang out of the blue.
It was Doug.
He’d heard I was doing well in Los Angeles and he had lost his job. He wanted to come out to L.A. to see if there was anything out there for him. He asked if he could hang with me while he got settled.
Of course, I said. Yes . . . I know. I know. What was I thinking? I swear, as soon
as you’re getting over someone and doing well, they always seem to creep back in. I wish I had said no and kept it moving. But I was lonely. I didn’t know anyone in L.A. My mom had gone back to Atlanta. And though I was doing well on my own, I missed him. That’s the thing about that crazy love—it can suck you back in at a moment’s notice. He came with his apologies and sweet talk and I was a sucker for it all.
I guess I was still hoping that maybe we could make it work. And now that he was in my territory, I’d be in control. I was the one who was established. I had been in L.A. for about a year at this point, and I felt like now I would have the upper hand.
He’d been staying with me for about a month and we had rekindled our relationship a little, when I got a call from some girl. She said she was pregnant with Doug’s baby. “And he up and left me!” Déjà vu! She sent me a picture of the sonogram to prove it.
I confronted him and he said, “She’s lying!”
“It’s always ‘She’s lying’!” I said. “Get out!”
He refused to leave. Before this, when I would hear about friends trying to kick someone out and they refused to go, I would think that was ridiculous. I mean, how could someone refuse to leave when they’re told to? Well, I totally understood it now. Because he sat in my living room, arms crossed, and he wasn’t budging.
I finally had to call a couple of male friends of mine to help.
“I’m in a bad situation,” I told them. “He is refusing to leave and I need him to go.”
About ten minutes later, three of my very large and intimidating friends showed up. Doug was mad as hell, but after they arrived he understood what would happen if he didn’t leave. He got his stuff, and they drove him to the airport and put his ass on the next thing smoking back to D.C.
Rich Nice, a producer that I’m still cool with, was one of my buddies who came to my rescue that day. I’ll never forget that they did that. They saved me. I have no idea what I was thinking, letting Doug back in, but I can say it’s real easy to fall back into a rut with someone that you know isn’t good for you.
Sometimes you think being with that dude is better than being alone. I’m here to tell you, it’s not! It’s far better to be alone.
The other lesson I’ve learned the hard way is that you should wait to give that person your heart until he shows you his true self. When you first meet, you aren’t meeting who he really is. But had I waited and watched, I would have seen who Doug really was. I would have seen that he was just a player. Instead, I thought I was special and he was saying those sweet things only to me and nobody else.
I moved on quickly after he left, and got back to my life and working hard. I spent the next year and a half in L.A. enjoying being single and learning to live with myself and for myself.
Great things were happening for me professionally, but I didn’t have a man. Somehow it made the experience less important to me. Isn’t that crazy? How many women are out there doing fantastic things but aren’t enjoying them because they’re miserable because they don’t have a man? That was me. I was doing all of these great things in my career, but I didn’t have anyone to share it with. At that time in my life, I felt that if I didn’t have a man, I didn’t have value. I guess it goes back to my need for attention.
I wasn’t completely alone in L.A. After I got settled, I sent for Blaze, who was staying with a friend of mine in Atlanta. They put his big ass on a plane and sent him out to me, and I was so happy. After work and before I had a club date, I’d take Blaze to the dog park. Having him with me made me less lonely.
It’s so important that you have a life, especially after a breakup. If you don’t have one, you’d better find one or create one. That should be in your playbook. And even in a relationship when things are going well, you still have to have your own life. Your life can’t be his life and it can’t be all about him. Your life also can’t be all about you. If you want a man in your life, you have to carve out space for him to fit in. Women who pour themselves totally into their careers miss out, too.
For me, I left room for my dog, for my friends, and for fun. I was done with men for a while. I also recommend that when you’ve gone through a rough relationship patch, you take some time to reboot your life. Get back in touch with yourself and clear your head. Take the time to remember who you are and what’s most important to you.
If you jump right into another relationship, you will definitely be bringing some of the crap with you from your previous relationship. And while that rebound relationship may be a fun distraction in the beginning, it can totally end in more heartache and pain. (Now, rebound sex is fine . . . just not a rebound relationship.)
Learn to be by yourself for a minute. I guarantee you will learn some things about what went wrong and prevent it from ever happening again.
After the breakup with Doug in D.C., I decided to be bold. I took that job in Los Angeles, which felt like a complete free fall without a net. I was scared, but I did it because I had nothing to lose. I was miserable in my personal life; I had failed at love. I needed to pursue something and see if I could make it work for myself.
TIMEOUT
How Can I Change a Player?
“I really like this guy that I met, but he’s a player. He’s a ladies’ man. Is it possible to change him into a one-woman man?”
And as my Mami Nina always said, you can’t change someone. You don’t enter a relationship ready to change, and you can’t expect your partner to change once you start dating. Of course, people grow and evolve while they’re in relationships, hopefully in harmony. But you shouldn’t get serious with a guy if you’re expecting to change the very core of who he is and how he acts.
What you see is what you get with a man.
For the most part, what you see is what you get with a man. They may play games or try to muster up some swagger when you’re first dating. But their true colors always come through.
But . . . there are times when a man is motivated to change. He wants to change in order to have what he wants. That’s different than trying to change someone. Sometimes you have to present the right motivation for him to want to change. I have seen several cases where that’s exactly what happened.
My mom’s brother was a cop. Growing up in Brooklyn, he had a lot of girls. He was cute, and he had a lot of style. Nobody thought he would ever settle down. But then he met “the one.” When he found that woman, she brought something to the table that made him want to commit and settle down. He wanted to be with her. And in order for that to happen, he had to change—give up the other girls and get serious.
Today, he and my aunt Pauline have been together more than twenty years, and they are happy and he is devoted to her. So can a woman change a ladies’ man? Yes. By being the kind of motivation that will make him want to change. She has to bring to the table all the things that will make him forget about everyone else.
CHAPTER FIVE
One-on-One: Friendship First!
One-on-one: 1. Playing directly against a single opposing player. 2. Involving a direct encounter between one person and another.
I believe the best way to find Mr. Right, so to speak, is to find a friend first. When I watch successful relationships, what I see most often is couples who genuinely like each other. They’re friends. I believe in love and butterflies and flowers and candy and all that. But that comes in waves in a relationship. When that new love with the butterflies wears off, what’s left? If the relationship started off as a friendship, you still have someone you like hanging out with, eating dinner with, going to the movies with, sharing your life with.
A solid marriage starts with a solid friendship. If it’s all about the physical attraction, how do you keep it going when that wanes? What do you have to talk about? Being married to your friend should feel like a sleepover every night (maybe not every single night, but you get what I’m saying). If you’re not friends and problems creep in (
because they always do), your relationship will not be able to stand up to the trials and tests.
Most of my relationships started as friends. I believe that’s the best recipe for success. If you’re friends first, you already have broken down so many of the barriers and the fronts that people put up in relationships. He’s seen you without makeup, looking like a bum, and you’ve been around him when he’s farting and in a bad mood. He’s seen you and been there for you when you’ve had trouble on your job. You were there when he had a fight with someone in his family, and you talked him through it. He was there when you were sick as a dog with the flu and brought you soup. You were there for him when he was lonely and just wanted someone to play video games with and talk to.
When you’re friends, after seeing each other at your worst, y’all still like each other. So if and when that spark hits—you know, that spark that makes the bottom of your stomach jump when he’s around—it’s just natural to take things to the next level.
And when those tingly feelings and butterflies and all of the lust that comes with new love wear off—because they eventually always do—you still have your buddy. And it’s a lot easier to reignite those embers when you really like the one you’re with.
Carmelo and I started as friends . . .
A couple of years into my radio stint in Los Angeles, I got a call from New York. They said they wanted me to be a host of MTV’s Direct Effect with DJ Clue. It was a hip-hop show and I was making a name for myself as a hip-hop chick.
I had been working on the show for about six months when they approached me about hosting Total Request Live. What? That was huge! Carson Daly was leaving and they were testing out different hosts. To say this was a much bigger platform is an understatement. On Direct Effect, it was a certain kind of flow and I was interviewing rappers. TRL was mainstream. I couldn’t get on TRL talking about “Yo, yo, son . . . !” TRL La La had to be different from Direct Effect La La, and I knew I could pull it off. My immersion in world news as a kid came in handy . . . thanks to my stepdad.
The Love Playbook: Rules for Love, Sex, and Happiness Page 5
