Let me in! Let me in!

So we've already established the type of neighborhood I am living in. It's lovely with all the amenities that privilege provides. Already I have found myself acting a "certain" way - Taking my tea on the porch after a hard days work, and upgrading my vocabulary to demonstrate my familiarity with the finer things in life, like solid education. My posture has even joined in that act, the top of my head aspiring to somehow kiss the ceiling. Don't get me wrong, I am definitely still very much myself, but its the version of me that has learned over years of exposure to privilege how to carry herself as if she belongs.

I say "as if" because I am well aware that aside from the lovely couple who have invited me into their home, I am very much an outsider in this neighborhood. Yesterday's incident with the gardener spoke a plain truth that I'd known since the moment I stepped in the door. There are not many people who look like me around these parts. With that, my double -consciousness* (see definition below) took residence on my left shoulder, eager to serve as Tinkerbell on this journey through Never Never Land - Never wear your scarf outside your bedroom, they wouldn't understand and it makes you look like Aunt Jemima! Never take the leftovers from the fast food restaurant into the house, it will make you look like you don't know how to make healthy nutritional choices, never get too comfortable with your speech, they might think you don't know any better.

These thoughts are silly, particularly when the family has made me feel so welcome, but they are part of my thought process nonetheless. In fact they are so much a part of my daily routine that I often find myself tired and mentally worn out. It was with much excitement that I woke up today, my day off, to a quiet house. I leisurely lingered in the bed, emerging only to grab breakfast. Feeling a bit brave, and protective of the twists I had done in preparation for a wavier look later that evening, I kept my head scarf on my head. I was a bit surprised to see Luella, my host mom, prattling away in the kitchen. She looked up, greeted me, and we chit -chatted for a few minutes. "Not bad," I thought. I felt perfectly comfortable. But with Luella it's hard not to. She's just that kind of person. Feeling a bit more comfortable I sent my double consciousness off to enjoy the day off too. I was relaxed and feeling at home.

Tina ( my classmate) came home a few hours later, and I, still in my pajamas and headscarf, joined her on the back porch for lunch. I am beginning to realize that a Black woman's commitment to a hair-do will give her the boldness to endure any kind of judgement. Tina was going to have to take me as I was, do-rag and all. After lunch I got a hankering for something sweet. Remembering the watermelon I'd purchased a week ago, and yes, I did feel apprehensive about bringing it in the house, I went to the fridge. I pulled the watermelon out and cut it into squares. The juices ran down my arm sticky and sweet. When I was done, I went to throw the rind into the garbage, but stopped short remembering that the Warbucks' do all of these extra things with their garbage. They don't just recycle, they compost, and sort and send some to Chile :), all this extra stuff. Anyway, I went out to the side of the house to put the rind from the watermelon in the compost heap. Did I mention the rind stayed pretty much in tact? Here's where the fun the starts!

Immediately after closing the door behind me I realize that the doors slam lock. That's right, you guessed it. I am now locked out. But, not only am I locked out, but I am locked out wearing my pajamas, and my do-rag. Oh, and don't forget about the HUGE piece of watermelon I'm holding in my left hand, scraped to the white part of the rind! I looked like Pookie Jenkins' mom coming home from a watermelon eating competition. I didn't know whether to cry or to laugh. I wanted to discard the rind, but there was no compost heap in site. All my worst fears had come crashing into reality I was a walking, talking, stereotype. Where was Tinkerbell when I needed her?

I scurried along the side of the house like a squirrel being chased by a five year old. Tina had retreated to her room for a nap. Further, she assumed I was in the house. Between fits of laughter at the sheer ridiculousness of it all, and many furtive glances to the left and the right, and down the street, I darted to the front of the house and lunged for the doorbell. Impatiently I dinged. Ding, one - ding, two - ding, three. It wasn't working, but my need was urgent. I began to supplement the dings with a bit of knocking, okay, pounding on the door. Ding, one - boom boom boom, ding, one - boom boom boom. I was shaking my head and laughing while all the while praying, "please God, don't let anybody come down the street. Tina finally came to the door. Her look of concern dissolved into a fit of laughter as soon as she saw me standing there mortified and frantic with an empty watermelon rind in my hand. I laughed too, hard, in fact so hard my side hurt, but not until I could do so from the comfort and safety of the inside of the house. Tinkerbell didn't find the incident too funny. She often gets frustrated with me. She thinks I'll never learn. I am hoping she's right.

***The term "double consciousness" originated from an 1897 Atlantic Monthly article titled "Strivings of the Negro People." It was later republished and slightly edited under the title "Of Our Spiritual Strivings" in his collection of essays, The Souls of Black Folk. He spoke of “this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity” ("Of Our Spiritual Strivings," p. 2), and of a two-ness, of being "an American, a Negro; [...] two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder" (The Souls of Black Folk, pp. 5)

Mistaken Identity

gulp
(glp)
v. gulped, gulp·ing, gulps
1. To swallow greedily or rapidly in large amounts.
2. To choke back by or as if by swallowing.
1. To choke or gasp, as in swallowing large amounts of liquid.
2. To swallow air audibly, as in nervousness.
1. The act of gulping.
2. A large amount swallowed at one time.

I've recognized 2 things in the past few minutes. 1. Gulping is spelled with one P. Shame on all of you for not correcting me! (How did I ever get into college?) If you had trouble finding the site it's because I couldn't rest without changing the website address. 2. Gulping is an understatement for the whirlwind experience I am on. My old boss used to liken information overload to a dog trying to drink out of a fire hose. That's a pretty accurate assessment of my life right now. On some days, I am downright drowning. Between that and the mental exhaustion trying to process all that I have experienced, I just haven't found the energy to blog. I can't say its been for lack of things to tell you, because they are plentiful.

I'll begin with the fact that Tina (not her real name) and I have moved into a new home. I neglected to mention that I am here with another divinity student. She's a real sweetheart. True story: When I heard Tina and I would be sharing this experience together I was anxious to find out more about her. We share a mutual friend who happens to be Latina. I had always heard amazing things about Tina from our friend. I also recalled her Latino boyfriend soliciting Spanish speaking men to help her with a prison ministry she would be starting in the second semester. My first few conversations with Tina were good. She was considerate, and clearly loved the Lord. Our mutual friend told me Tina was an AMAZING person, filled with the Holy Spirit. I was pleased and knew we'd be just fine.

I arrived in Jackson about 5 days before Tina. In the interim, we had a number of conversations on the phone. During one phone call, Tina told me that I would be really helpful to her because she was sure there might be a number of things that she might miss, being white and all --

Was she serious?

I mean, I am not one who says that all people of color have to claim their ethnicity, or count themselves in the minority bunch, but I have to admit, I was confused. Ok, I might not be being as honest as I should here. I was annoyed. You know that type of annoyed black people get when they hear about Tiger Woods calling himself Cablasian, or when Mariah and J Lo dye their hair blond so that they look a little more "mainstream". Ultimately it is a smack in the face - as if its ok to want to sing "urban songs, and sell them to urban people while always making sure not to be mistaken for Black." Later that night I incredulously relayed the story to my BF. I think my exact words were, "She is one of those."

Its funny to me that I was so offended that a Hispanic woman would refer to herself as White, after all, it is common practice for many Hispanic people to do this. Cubans, and people from parts of Spain are much quicker to refer to themselves as White than Spanish. I knew this, so why was I so angry? Furthermore, why can't people label and categorize themselves as they see fit? Is is anyone else's business? For me, I think, like many minorities, we become offended by those who are unwilling to live within the confines of a minority label. This is not so much because we don't want people to supersede these labels, but because of the hurt it causes when we see our kin shake blackness and brownness off as if it is some kind of disease they are recovering from.

After spending a few days living with Tina I found her to be just as amazing as our friend had described, she was well adjusted, loving and had a tremendous heart for her fellow man and woman. We had shared meals, fears, expectations, and laughter together when finally, for the sake of authenticity, I had to ask - Tina, do you speak Spanish fluently? ( I figured I'd ease into it.)
"No. I can speak a bit, maybe enough to get by," She replied.
Oh, are both of your parents Hispanic?
She looked at me strangely. No both of my parents are from the South.
What? I laughed. You aren't Hispanic at all?
What? she said, laughing. No. Where did you get that?
I don't know, our mutual Hispanic friend? Your boyfriend? The prison ministry, your almost Spanish sounding last name? I guess since Hispanic people were my point of entry with her, and we were to be doing reconciliation work together, I assumed she was Hispanic.
Her giggling erupted into out and out howling. No. I'm white.
Had we not become so close in the past couple of days I would have been embarrassed, but between her being so tickled and my relief that she wasn't one of those, the clearing of the air took us one step close toward true fellowship.

Since that conversation I have been intrigued by my need to make people identify themselves so I may put them into some sort of category. Its funny how a person's identity must be approved by those they are interacting with at the moment. As we have learned through this experience, a Hispanic person in the United States identifying themselves as white just won't do. :) But its interesting to see what happens when you become the victim of the categories people attempt to impose on you. Just this afternoon as the gardener watched as I used my key to open the door to my home away from home, he looked confused. Mind you the house I am living in is easily worth at least a million dollars. (Wealthy parishioners from the church I am assigned to were gracious enough to invite me into their home) Needless to say, my brown skin, getting darker by the day in the hot Mississippi sun, and my strikingly un-permed hair betray me, causing all those who encounter me to do a double take.

The gardener, did I mention he was black, stared at me, desperately trying to figure out what the heck was going on. Finally he said, "Your the cleaning lady -- right? "

No Sir I replied. Just a friend of the family...

I wondered if he thought to himself, "Hmmm. One of those."

The Great Divide

There isn't enough time in the day to explain how different Jackson is from anywhere else on earth. It seems to sit much in a reality of its own, and that reality is romanticized in such a way to keep its inhabitants content and full of hometown pride. The rose colored glasses Jacksonians wear keeps them waving to everyone they encounter, whether you are walking the dog in the suburbs, or driving down the most run down of neighborhoods in the inner city. Everybody greets you with a wave. Interestingly, smiles don't necessarily accompany these waves, but like a tradition or ritual that has outlived the understanding of how it came to be, the arms of both black and white, spontaneously stand at attention, swaying back an forth whenever another human being crosses their paths. Getting past hello - Well, that's another story.

Time after time, whether at the food pantry, where the White congregants busy themselves with food preparation and church work to avoid fellowshipping with the sea of brown, tattered, and often pungent crowd that gathers outside the church doors to get the groceries to make it through the week, or the young black girls who attend youth group who essentially act as if the white girls in the program don't exist, or restaurants, where I am hard pressed to find one interracial group sharing a meal; it is proven that Jackson has perfected the art of separate togetherness. In many cases they have no choice, they must exist among each other. They must share space, however; the sharing of space has not stifled their commitment to remain virtually independent of each other. I am not unfamiliar with this practice. During my stint in private school and even at Duke Divinity blacks and whites seek and are allowed separate communities. But here in Jackson the chasm that separates white and black is different. They exist in a sort of justified comfort, as if they genuinely believe sharing the same space achieves the goals of reconciliation.

When I met with the pastor about the food pantry I was amazed to hear him speak of a time when the congregation and the recipients did NOT intermingle. "Really? Was he kidding? Apparently the thick moist air of Jackson did more than just make it feel hotter. It edits the uncomfortable parts of reality, facilitating that rose colored experience I mentioned earlier. From my estimation, the people were still very much separated, and content to stay that way, making me a little frustrated.

It's much like the frustration I felt when talking to two of the most well adjusted, intelligent and aware young ladies I had encountered in a long time. Both had graduated from high school just days prior. They were clear on their history, the covert efforts to hinder their education, and had mapped out life plans that would make any mother proud. But when they spoke of race relations, they told a story of separateness, independence, and self sufficiency. " I can go for weeks without speaking to a white person, " the more vocal of the two stated, matter- of- factly. "White people don't mean anything. We may be poor, but we are happy!" I marveled at her statement, and must admit it gave me pause causing me to reflect on the many things I believe I need to be happy. For a moment I felt a bit shallow and tremendously brainwashed. However, after further reflection, I realized that those simple things I consider staples of my own happiness were byproducts of justice that many of the black families of Jackson had been deprived of. It wasn't that they needed the amenities made possible by equal treatment, its that they were robbed of them because of the color of their skin. Sure they had survived, with family and community almost in tack, but the many deplorable things that they had to endure still sat at the pit of their stomachs. ineligible for the rose colored glasses enjoyed by their white counter parts, because of their hue; hard living numbed resentment, preserving their souls from anger and affording them their own reality of joy, laughter, dance and song.

Today, fully sober and alert, my eyes took in the devastation of abandoned homes over run with weeds and soot from intentional fires. Once thriving communities, these homes and the people who inhabited them have become pawns in a political pissing contest. Many black people of Jackson have never known the kind of education their children are entitled to, and if they do know they had no way of affording it. Defacto segregation in the school system is alive and well in Mississippi, and dare I say in the United States, in the form of public and private schools. Most of the young black people I encountered attended public school, and were on their way to Jackson State, which seems to be the "realistic dream" presented to the black youth, kind of like trade school was the suggested path for African American youth of previous generations. The White kids were a different story entirely attending private schools, because the public schools are "just to dangerous" - code for too Black and setting their sites for big name ivy league schools. So the Black families are happy, happy in poverty and a lack of options and happy to be exist in a divided community. I understand from whence this attitude of "White people don't mean anything" comes from. I chalk it up as a means of survival and preservation of ones self esteem, but the conditions of Black people in Jackson tells another story indeed.

The culture of blindness, complacency, coupled with contentment with what has been accomplished among Whites and a lack of engagement and forgiveness among Blacks posits Jackson as a city stuck between a rock and a hard place. The greatest issue I have encountered thus far is denial, and this pesky little critter is by far one of the greatest obstacles of real change. In order for people to be invested in justice, they must first see how the "other" is not as foreign as they assume them to be. Racism and segregation has ravaged Jackson and both Whites and Blacks bear the scars, while believing they have come away unscathed. Perhaps I and others like me can open their eyes so that they may finally see the bruises and ugliness that still afflicts them, so that they might truly be healed.

Paranoid or Traumatized

By the middle of Alabama, the warm air had begun to thicken like grits on the stove, ready to be salted and buttered. The space between me and my boyfriend of a month and a half who had graciously offered to drive me into the notoriously volatile racial climate of the south, had become pregnant with something I could not quite put my finger on. It was a strange mixture, somewhere between anxiousness, fear and curiosity. As African Americans born above the Mason Dixon Line in the post civil rights era , we were aware of what had gone on, and might still go in the deep south. We'd heard the stories of the maltreatment, the struggle and the lynchings, but they existed in our minds more as faint memories of a horrific mini series we might have encountered on the History Channel than a story we had experienced ourselves.

Those memories stung, and lingered more intensely for my parents, who lived in New York during the blatant injustice, the demonstrations, and the slew of killings of innocents and truth seekers. Though they had the blessing of distance, they did not share with us in the luxury of being so far removed from these travesties by time.
"I am in Mississippi." I said.
Silence… "Holy mackerel." my mother said almost in a whisper.

My Father, ever the former Air Force something, maybe sergeant, always ready to respond to a crisis, begins to speak. He has been listening on the line as my parents often do when I am talking to one or the other.
"Now I don't want to scare you, and I am not sure how much things have changed or remained the same, but you are in MISSISSIPPI. I want you to be careful. I don't want you walking around at night alone. Stay in groups. I don't know how safe it is out there. "

"Ok Daddy." I replied.
Though I have repeatedly downplayed their comments. I understand the apprehension and caution in both of their voices. It is the same apprehension that prompted me to say yes to being escorted in my travels. I too was concerned about whether Mississippi had had a change of heart, or had at least become more aware of the rules America says it plays by. But after both successfully getting through Alabama, entering into Jackson and being disarmed by the lack of dirt roads and the prevalence of the Walmart Super Center's and upscale strip malls, I began to relax. I even imagined myself in a warmer greener Delaware. However, after dropping my boyfriend at Medgar Evers Airport I began to think about where I was and what I was doing.

"Holy mackerel, I was in Mississippi. A place where it makes more sense to spend $140 on a one way ticket back to North Carolina because it perceived too dangerous to travel alone. A place where I have to be careful what I say and where I go, because there is no telling whether racism or maybe even violence lurks behind the next corner. It's 2009, and the fears that gripped the black community from slavery to the civil rights movement are still very much alive and well in the mind of a progressive northern raised educated Black girl who has traveled the world, and her family's. How much more do these fears and memories of hatred and injustice affect the Black people who lived through it, or the young people who are only one generation removed? And what of their white counter parts?

Its often said in relationships that a cheater will always cheat and an abuser will always abuse. Can the same be said for the mentality of the oppressor? Can all white people of Mississippi be considered oppressors? My desire to engage in the work of reconciliation asserts my belief that the answer is no on both accounts. God has reconciled all things through Christ. But the damage that has been done in Mississippi has to be more than prayed away. Like the abuser and abused in therapy, Racisms participants must confront their past, their motives, their mentalities and figure out where the malfunction is and work together to figure out how never to repeat the atrocities of the past. I pray that God uses me in some way to shine light on dysfunction as well as examples of a better way. I also hope God reveals some of my own faulty thinking so that at the end of my Journey, Mississippi isn't the only thing that has evolved.

Run With Me

Run with me a bit in Jacksonville MS, affectionately known as "The Sip." I will be spending 10 weeks here for my first feild education experience in Divinity School. I have entitled the blog Gulpping The Sip because of the feverish pace my schedule will maintain until the end of my time here. There are so many things to see here, from pig ear sandwiches, which no lie I encountered this afternoon for just 1.05, communities, rich and poor, black and white and the answers to what happens when a community steeped in racisim decides to put down their rocks and play nice.

My goals here are to learn as much as I can about this beautiful city, to explore how current programs toward reconciliation have been effective, and to identify those things that are not working. most importantly, I am hoping to be used as an instrument by the Lord Almighty and allow these experiences to shape my future ministries by illuminating the ways in which I fall short when it comes to being willing to put down the past and engage in reconciliation, and by replicating the many amazing things that are happening as Jackson continues the difficult task of building bridges to the community God intended for it to be.

I warn you, I am a pretty opinionated person, and you won't agree with everything I write, but if this blog inspires you to think just a little bit, I will feel like it has served its intended purpose. I look forward to you sharing your thoughts and journing with me into a strange land. its in these kinds of places that we become most aqcuantined with who we truly are.