I enjoy reading biographies of people. Learning all the ins and outs of another person’s life is fascinating. Learning what happened, what they experienced that has made them who they are. From his rough childhood with his father who dealt a harsh discipline (hitting him so hard he hit the wall) to a better life with the next man in his mother’s life who treated him with love and respect like a real father only who he dearly loved and cherished the memory of him for the rest of his life only for his mother to leave this good man who treated them well and paid all the bills and gave them both everything they could ever want to go back to the streets with a vile man who told Iceberg when he was a preteen he had better get out or he would kill him. When a mother chooses her lover over her child there is only one thing that child can do and that is to be raised by the streets and that is what happened to him. So many dark things were endured by this dear child it is a wonder he made it to become a man. And it is no wonder that he became hardened to life and did whatever he could to make money. He learned from the older men on the streets how to turn a woman out to prostitution and how to keep one’s stable of prostitutes in line and bringing in a steady flow of cash. Iceberg Slim does not mince his words nor does he make apologies for what he did to survive. He treated woman with love and hate sometimes simultaneously. He did stints in prison, he learned to run cons both in the streets and from some of the older cats in the joint. He was a quick learner and observer of life and how not to let the suckers get over on him nor to let any woman Georgia him, maybe a throw back from his mother taking him out of the one home environment that was stabile and away from the one man who he loved as a father who treated him as his son, at least that is what the prison psychiatrists said. In later years he tried to live the life of a “Square” even married, had kids, loved his family and tried to make a living for his family. Unfortunately it wasn’t to be. He met with adversity every where he turned. Thinking a career in sales would be right and easy for him (since he had sold women to johns for years) he was articulate and well dressed and fit the part but couldn’t get passed all those white suits that wouldn’t give him the opportunity to show what he could do in the straight world. So, every time, he had to turn back to hustling to make a living and keep food on the table for his kids. This was his day to day grind until the time he began to put his life stories down on paper and a new career awaited him as a prolific author. There were so many stories to tell that Iceberg Slim is the author of many books and has left a legacy of his writing and what the soul can endure and keep on keeping on. Rest in peace, Iceberg Slim.
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