It is perhaps the most ominous phrase in African-American Southern English.
As a warning, “gone ‘head now” ranks right up there alongside timeless pieces of verbal caution tape such as “I ain’t gonna tell you no more” and “I’m finna go to my car; don’t be here when I get back.” Not only does “gone ‘head now” give the listener the opportunity to apologize for their misdeeds or atone for their actions, but it also serves as a preliminary injunctive order. No matter what offense you have committed, if someone who lives within spitting distance of a ditch bank presents you with the “gone ‘head now” option, take it. Now.
Or not.
My first gon’ head encounter was with my cousin Derrick, who we called “Geet” (Look, I don’t know either. That’s not how Black nicknames work). He was a couple of years older than me, and he could fight. I’ve never actually seen Geet fight. I’ve never even heard a story about him fighting. No one has ever even told me that Geet was good at fighting. But anyone who ever met Geet would immediately understand that he could scrap. He just gave off “this nigga can fight” vibes. With Geet, the fighting ability was implied.
I didn’t believe it.
I didn’t necessarily disbelieve the “Geet’ll whip that ass” mythology. But as an unbiased observer who operates on facts and data, I had no visual evidence or firsthand testimony of my cousin’s fisticuffian expertise. So I refused to fall for the “Geet got hands.” I was a Geet skeptic. Of course, I understood the hazards of testing my cousin’s fighting ability in a real-world situation, so I didn’t fuck around with Geet, just in case. I basically just treated him like a cousin…
Until the Dookiehead Affair.
If you’re expecting an extremely hilarious story with juvenile twists and turns, I’m sorry. This one was simple. A bird shat on Geet’s head. That’s it. We were standing in the backyard with our cousins and a few other boys from the neighborhood when, suddenly, doo doo was on Geet’s head. And face. And probably on his lips.
We didn’t see it fall from the sky. It just magically appeared out of nowhere. One second, Geet was standing there; the next, his high-top fade had an avian whipped-cream topping. We didn’t even notice it until he put his hand on his head and yelled: “A bird dookied on me.”
Now, here is where my Geet agnosticism should have kicked in, because literally no one laughed. They just stood there staring at my fecal-faced cousin as if having pigeon poop spontaneously appear on your head was an everyday occurrence. Looking back, this is when I should have known that Geet could fight, because they just stood there as if sometimes it rains, sometimes it snows, and sometimes, God opens up the windows of heaven and pours a little butt juice on his beloved children.
Oh, how I guffawed!
Just as the universe showered down caca on my cousin, the gods of roasting hit me with a thunderous horde of doo-doo-related whimsy. I tomfooled. I buffooned. I shenanigged and shenniganed. “I knew you had shit for brains!” I rejoiced. “You got some dookie on your lips. That must be the early bird they were talking about. Does it taste like worms? ”
By the time he had reached the “gone ‘head,” I was in the zone. “How do you know it wasn’t semen?” I asked. “What if you’re pregnant? Can you get pregnant in the mouth? What you gonna name the birdmouth baby? Look on the bright side: Aunt Linda ain’t never gonna have to buy no eggs!”
By this time, people were slowly backing away as if my Bruce Banner was about to turn into the “‘credible Hulk” (which is what we called him in South Carolina). Theoretically, I knew my cousin had reached his breaking point. But I was too far in my bag. So when Geet affixed a “now” to his third and final “gone head,” I still had one piece of my seemingly infinite jest that just had to be released:
“Oh my God, I just realized something,” I said with all the awe and wonder I could muster.
“CHICKEN LITTLE WAS RIGHT!”
Bloop.
My cousin Geet punched me right in the mouth. I can only thank my mother for making sure I got my daily recommended dose of calcium because I have no idea how my teeth didn’t fall out. I didn’t even know teeth could ache—not the nerves in my gums and mouth, but the individual molars, incisors and canines. I truly believe the Dookiehead Affair is why I’m one of the few adults who didn’t need dental surgery. My cousin knocked the wisdom out of my teeth when I was 10.
But Geet didn’t stop there; he tuned me up real good. I punched back aimlessly, but it was no use. He didn’t even talk or say, “Take that!” He just surgically whipped the wisecracks out of me.
Y’all, my cousin Geet can fight!
When I stumbled into the house all bloody-nosed and sore-toothed, my mom and grandmama immediately began screaming. Was I lynched by the Klan? Had our neighborhood become gang-infested? Were mountain lions native to South Carolina? Because, obviously, there was a tiger involved.
“I told him to leave me ‘lone, Aunt Dot,” my cousin Geet said nonchalantly.
“Shole did,” my snitching sister Sean chimed in, superchalantly. “Geet said ‘gone head now’ three times.”
“Well, you can’t start a fire and then whine about getting burned,” my mama said, returning to washing dishes. “If you soak that shirt in the sink, the blood might come…"
“Wait, Geet,” my mom said quizzically. “What in the world is that white stuff in your hair?”
I didn’t say a word.
See?
Sometimes, violence is the answer.
This story is about Stephen A. Smith.
Today’s Reading List
Algorithms of Oppression by Safiya Umoja Noble
Your phone isn’t secretly listening to you, but the truth is more disturbing by Rich Haridy
NABJ did the white thing by Michael Harriot
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