today was painful and hilarious all at once. i really don't do funerals. because of my black sheep status with my family i play the back when attending family related events-- well i avoid family reunions, so pretty much the family sees me at funerals. but its a very uncomfortable position for me since my career took off in 93. Actually scratch that…even before that happening I've never been that comfortable. i don't know if that makes sense but any of you ever go through a life transformation and then pretty much everyone changes around you? The life altering experience really doesn't even have to be "Celebrity" it can be any transformation: a better job, a lottery ticket, perhaps you had to go to jail, perhaps you lost weight, perhaps you gained weight, maybe a car accident has left you disfigured, maybe you came out the closet? perhaps you shamed your religious family with an unplanned birth, maybe an embarrassing situation like a divorce...i mean ANY life transforming action can make you a potential blacksheep---meaning the feeling you get when you are aloof to the fact that a booger is coming out your nose and nobody tells you but everyone stares at you. That pretty much sums the feeling I have always had at family events most of my life. So thus I avoid em like the plague. i have to say that at my grandmother's funeral i was more on edge for fear of the groans and looks i got from various members who perhaps felt i have neglected them in the last few years. so pretty much i find refuge alone... and on myspace. (weird huh?) i attended about 5 funerals before this and most when I was real young….so this is the first time I delt with unexpected tragedy---because most of the funerals I attended were for people age 80 and up and I don't grieve more than less celebrate their long life on earth. So that said this is the first time that i have felt utterly comfortable in a funeral setting. at least enough to express my personal grief. kinda weird walking up ----(i was late i admit. I was going to play drums and I realized that I had no drumsticks so I arrived 10 mins into the service)----to see the people i saw--both whom i have been life long friends with....and some whom I've had friction with---all in the same circle. i started to feel uncomfortable again. but then i realized that this day was about dilla and not me. part of me felt underdressed (house shoes---a key figure to getting slum village exposure pre qtip meeting--- made me feel at ease once he came in jeans and tshirt), part of me felt uncomfortable (the last time i saw ali shaheed it was not under the best of circumstances), part of me felt like running away (the site of headstrong erykah crying made me not to want to walk inside), and part of me felt helpless again (i ended my 5 month silence from dangleo yesterday as i spoke to him for the first time since his fatal accident that almost took his life away. i expressed my fear of staying in contact with him for fear that i would get the call that i got about dilla's death last friday and that is something i CANT take)— but part of me felt strong. it was so uplifting to see the musicworld in full view today. all of the mavericks there. from a&r's, to CEOs, to directors, to A listers, to "backpackers", to blingers.---cats from waaaaaaaaaaaaaay across europe to down the street. hip hop is such a machismo thing. my motivation for keeping a stone face was "i can't let tariq see me cry". i don't know why that is....i mean he is after...well...my best friend. we have to be best friends after 19 years together....i mean do i know anyone not blood related to me that i have kept a constant relationship with for that long? at the most everyone i have known in my life now may be 10 or 11 years at best...but i can count those whom ive known in my life before 1987 maybe with one hand...i dont even speak to my father much let alone high school chums.---maybe i was afraid to further solidify what maybe the perception in my head of what i think tariq thinks of me: weak. ive always been the vulnerable root, or the "nice" root. or the gullible "root" or the "good" root. i just couldn't let him see me cry. then i cried. hard. i mean we all did. im scared. in dilla i would just watch in utter amazement at how committed he was to music. a commitment that i can't even execute into words. who is going to inspire me now? my days of losing sleep over prince was decades ago. and public enemy was a high school self discovery period. dilla was the only cat whose music gave me goosebumps in the last 10 years. and now i've lost him. but i have him too. once we all did the final viewing in the church i came back to comfort james poyser and omar edwards. two of dilla's most prized students. there was a drumset for me but i told com that the idea of getting funky and crying at the same time did not appeal to me. im sure dilla woulda wanted me to just one last time....but i couldnt. together those two did various dilla joints like "fall in love" "get this money" and most of the "fantastic intros" from dilla's various albums. I have one regret. There was a part of the program in which we were allowed to speak on Dilla's life and the effect it had on us. But nobody wanted to make the first move. And instead we settled for two speakers who knew nothing of his life and its effect on us. One particular preacher even said he took this last minute assignment on because they had some "parallels". Both were producers for well known music acts. Both were from The D. Both shared a passion for music.---as this poor man started running the comparisons down I almost started to get angry. In my head I was like "nigga you wish you'd have the impact this man had on us" I mean proof alone of dilla's impact was the fact that busta rhymes, a man whose life is currently in a mass of controversy over his video shoot debacle was sitting two rows ahead of me.--- Dill's mother had his studio setup displayed just as it was when i last saw him: his computer, his numark portable turntable (and dilla coligists the last 45 record he was working on when i saw him 14 days ago was still on that numark---i dont know the artist but if you have the beat cd he did, its the "you quench my thirst....much more than that" record---he said something about giving that jawn to kweli) --he MADE all those donuts/motown beats on a cheap ass numark and his apple computer. I am stunned that I need to spend 6 figures at electric lady and this cat's hospital bed setup studio is the basis of his finest opus (his swan song Donuts on stones throw records in stores today. buy it now). It was a closed casket. Something I approve of simply because the pain that his lupus condition left him in rendered him somewhat unrecognizable. Either allergic reactions that left him bloated like the URB cover shoot jaylib did in 2003. Or his frail frame hanging on by a string the last time I saw him. It was better for me to see his photos on display as opposed to the condition he was left in. I last saw Dilla when I took that meeting with Will Smith in late January. I wanted Dill to be a part of the production process so that perhaps he could get some sort of income coming in to pay for his medicine and hospital bills. Im sure by now most of you saw the photos of his European tour and were shocked to see him confined to a wheelchair.—-I was somewhat optimistic because I felt like he was at peace. I admit I thought he was going to get better simply because he was doing the very thing that he loved the most in life…..making beats. We stayed for about 20 mins and then said our goodbyes and it was then he did something very uncharacteristic: he gave me a rare very expensive album that I had been searching for since when I first met him. This record wasn't even a part of his collection. It stood as a display piece. And he just said…"I want you to have this"---I was really touched by that gesture. Little did I know…that was our last interaction---and even stranger based on the songtitles and the hidden sample messages on Donuts-----I get the feeling that he knew this was his final opus. Before the pallbearers (karriem riggings and Qtip amongst them) took him out to the burial ground….i waited til the place emptied out somewhat til it was just me, com, james poyser, and omar edwards. I wanted to leave something with him. So I gave him my most personal possession. Dilla is the only person to whom I willingly let have my GOOD afropick (most of yall are like…oh I got one too!---but the keyword is "good". I got about 50 of em. But only 8 "good" ones. Now I have 7 left.) This was the part in which all of us started balling. But then just like that in a "snap"---we was back to normal: "we can't cry like this yall…..we all we got!" james pondered then quipped: "man…you mean I'm stuck with you?!" we laughed so hard. Then as I was leaving I saw 3 things that helped the medicine go down easier----in the middle of this church...in all of its holy settings.... was his 3 favorite things some 45s (the ones he used for the donuts) rolled up blunts (yes..first time i saw that in a church....HILLLLLLARIOUS!!) and his never ending supply of RED VINES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! GREAT MINDS THINK ALIKE!!!!! EVEN DILLA KNOWS THAT THEY ARE CRAZY DEEEEEELICIOUS!!!!! thank you for changing my life dilla. -ahmir "?uestlove" thompson