The world looks so very different from where I am right now. From my perspective. Web 3 has a lot to do with it. People wonder why I don’t do my art more, why I don’t write more, why I’m not acting. My mentor of many years told me, “Don’t let time get away from you, focus on your wriitng. You are a writer.” She couldn’t understand why I had to say, become a Forex and Crypto trader for a while, just as my friends and family didn’t understand why I had to become a long-term caregiver for a long time.

They said: “Can’t you just order your father Chinese food?” or “Wouldn’t your life be better without your father…” (Yes some “friend” actually said that)…and family, “Throw his stuff in the dumpster and put him in a nursing home.” These people are exactly the type of people who compelled me to take a different route in life. One that is more focused on the experience of life, my values, my beliefs, and taking the slow-road to success. I never really reacted when people told me these things, I was too busy. Both being a caregiver, but also learning, observing, and growing. Not just technically, but as a human being. Looking at nature, processing and healing my own traumas. I figured, the last thing the world needed was another asshole. So I took the slow path to success, with that in mind.

They don’t understand that I am writing, doing art and producing, albeit on a very low level. Bamboo grows beneath the surface of the soil for many years, and not until year seven or so does it grow where people can see it, then it becomes the fastest growing “tree” in nature. Not really a tree, but you get the metaphor. That’s the type of person I am…if a person tells me I can’t do something, that’s the thing I wanna do. I lay down roots and I get to work.

In this world there are millions of actors, writers and artists, but why is it for tech startups, for the decision-making positions, for media companies, those who craft the decisions that move culture, money, and environmental policy there are so few BIPOC owned companies? About 4-5% Black owned and as best I can tell even if you add women and minority owned the figure is still rather low. And within the Web 3 space, the numbers are likely non-existent.

And within the Web 3 space, we have a once in a generation opportunity to create true equity and a more egalitarian system. Yet, on a daily I am met with people who just want to turn it into a lifeless/soulless gated suburb. I say nothing, I make notes.

I don’t want to sit at any table I’m not wanted at, I will have my own table, and I’ll decide who is worthy to sit with me and my people. And here’s the twist, my people are the people with, what my Aunt Lee used to call, those with “the good heart”, irrespective of their race, color, class, sexual orientation, nationality or gender.
Keep a good heart and join me at the cool kid’s table by the window.

Edmund