1978
…So ladies and gentlemen, I regret to inform you that you’re meant for something greater,
Something greater than loose leaf pages and chasing paper.
You gotta look outside of yourself and outside of time. Stretch your necks if need to.
And when something great comes along, be sure to let ‘em know – it’s on.
The lanky speaker with notably good hair left the stage with a period the audience could feel like loaded seeds lodged in their chests. Ari, a weekly attendant at open mic Tuesdays at Busboys and Poets, a restaurant, bookstore, and performance venue in Washington D.C., at once felt inspired and overwhelmed. Ari was a reticent young lady growing up in Lorton, Virginia, 15 minutes south of D.C. with an avid interest in journalism, culture, and the people of Papua New Guinea. A supportive wallflower, always drawn by the wordsmithery and conviction of local spoken word artists and poets, she managed to make the trip up every week when she could. Who knows? Maybe she’d brave up and make it up to the stage one day. What would she speak of? Perseverance? Hair and beauty ideals? The contagiousness of Celia Cruz? Wishing she could have gone to Soul Train to see Cheryl Lynn sing “Got to Be Real”? The awesomeness of giraffes – woah!
Ari’s vision faded to white, and Busboys and Poets froze in its tracks. The hot coffee some barista was pouring his patron suspended itself in air. Peaking from a rip in the still fabric of the restaurant, radiant among a washed out, frozen environment was a long necked figure, awkward superficially, but made wholly beautiful from this new supernatural environment. He spoke.
Ari, I am your spirit animal.
“!” said Ari to the giraffe.
You have been chosen, From the big savannah in the sky, we’ve been watching you. For being the only person in the world who recognizes the greatness of our kind, we reward you. I hereby imbue you with the boldness and fierceness of THE GREAT GIRAFFE.
“!”
Use your new abilities for good!
The megalomaniacal giraffe faded away, and time resumed. Ari looked down and noticed that her wardrobe had changed. Suddenly, she was a supafly diva, and she felt like one.
Ari looked over to the left and noticed that the coffee-pouring barista was off in his aim. The drink was hurling towards someone’s lap. Using her newly-garnered special giraffe powers, she stretched her neck and nudged an empty tea cup with her head to intercept the wayward pour. The rest of the restaurant and the barista were too busy still swooning over the last poet’s words to notice.
The patron, however, was thoroughly impressed.
“I’m thoroughly impressed,” he said. “What’s your name?”
“Hotter than Coffy, Nobler than Cleopatra Jones, Meaner than Foxy Brown. I’m the diva queen Ari Hires, Now whatchu doing in my town?”
[woah! Where’d that come from? Is this the power of THE GREAT GIRAFFE?]
“I’m Agent Wasp. I work for the CIA. I see you have great talent. The government needs you to take care of a threat to national security.”
“Quit talking jive, brotha. You're sounding like old President Kennedy. Don’t tell me what I can do for The Man. What can The Man do for me?
[This is awesome! Just go with it, go with it!]
“This assignment will have you posted as a DJ. Seems like that’ll be your type of thing. You down?”
“I can dig it.”
“Follow me to CIA headquarters. We’ll brief you there. Oh, and from here on, you’ll be known as Agent Hi_Res.”
"Groovy."
At CIA Headquarters:
The room was manic. Giant blinking computers spewing out encoded paper were being attended to by buzzing swarms of assistants who would then run around and relay the information elsewhere. There was hardly any room to walk, yet Agents Wasp and Hi_Res made their way to a clearing in the center of the room.
“I’ll be brief,” began Wasp. “There’s a terrorist witch with unimaginable power performing soul transmigrations and sending people on nonconsented vision quests. Luckily, but perhaps strangely, she’s been targeting only student DJs at WXYC.”
“Isn’t that that radio station over in North Carolina?”
“That’s right. We want you to go undercover, find, and incapacitate this witch. We believe you have enough sass to resist her witchcraft. There is one problem, however. She resides in the year 2012, thirty-four years in the future.”
“Say what!? How do you turkeys expect me to fight witch crime 34 years in the future?”
“We are prepared. You see, there is another sorceress, but this one is one of us. Her name is Queen Enchantress Beyoncé. She’s a member of the Illuminati which has in the future allied itself with the CIA, especially in the issue of wayward sorceresses.
Agent Hi_Res was briefly overtaken by the seeming greatness of Queen Enchantress Beyoncé. “Wow, Queen B is one bad motha-”
Agent Wasp continued, “In 2006, she discovered the perfect choreography for amazing feats of time travel. She recorded it in a music video which ostensibly is meant for entertainment, but is rather an instructional video to CIA special operations agents future, past, and present.” Agent Wasp diverted his gaze to one of the standard-issue assistants buzzing around. “Stetson! Prepare the reel!”
Some guy presumably named Stetson did as he was told, and a large blank screen lowered in front of Agents Hi_Res and Wasp. Lights dimmed. The reel rolled.
This was what illuminated the screen.
After a few moments, Ari admitted, “Right on! This is the best jam I ever heard!”
“Indeed, our researchers have confirmed that this is the best jam ever.”
Agent Hi_Res was indeed already seemingly entranced and grooving.
“Your mission, Agent, is to memorize and perform this choreography to be transported to Chapel Hill 2012 where you will assume the role of student DJ. We have prepared a story for you to better integrate yourself in your future home. When asked why you became a DJ, you will respond, ‘I wanted to be a DJ because I love music and surfing air waves. It's my way of teleporting to multiple places at one time. I'm sort of obsessed with transportation.’ In its own way, it is a wry truth with you now becoming a time-traveler. You will continue, ‘I've always wanted a "Different World" kind of college experience where I was the Lisa Bonet in my own way, and XYC is that, but what sealed the deal was at the 80s Jam where I had a dance off with a mysterious, lanky DJ with the awesome hair and golden dance moves.’”
“What’s A Different World? Who’s Lisa Bonet?”
“We figured you’d ask; we’ve also prepared this cultural and technological primer to get you acclimated to 2012.” Wasp handed her a laptop from the future with Wikipedia and Youtube tabs open. “Your mission will begin tomorrow morning. Good luck and God speed.”
Agent Hi_Res spent the night studying the intricacies of Queen Enchantress Beyoncé’s moves, and by morning, she was an expert on all things modern and post-modern. She began to get bodied.
By the time she was doing the Naomi Campbell Walk, a white cyclone had begun spinning around her. She was separated from her surroundings. By the time she was snapping for the kids, the cyclone had dissipated and she realized she was in the control room of a radio station, presumably WXYC in 2012.
2012
After finishing up the Get Me Bodied spell-dance, she had her game face on. She checked the advanced computer-device in front of her. It was 10 AM on a Thursday, and she was alone here at the station. This must be her shift! She scoured around for a song to play and ran across a song by Corinne Bailey Rae called Put Your Records On. Hi_Res decided it would be her theme song.
Upon playing her song, she sat in the control room chair, hands firmly on the knobs and sliders of the mixer. Fittingly, she felt firmly in control.
She remembered what she was here for. Something great.
I am The Queen Diva DJ Hi_res. Bring it, witch. It’s on.
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Y'all suckas can catch DJ Hi_Res pumping out jamz every Thursday from 10 AM to noon at WXYC 89.3 FM.
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