Highs and Lows!

This week has had its share of highs and lows, and that’s just how it is sometimes.....

Monday, I woke up at ReHoboth beach and walked to have breakfast, and afterwards, I walked to the beach to get one last glance at that beautiful body of water that God created just for us.

Gazing at the water, gratitude overtook me, and I sat there and gave thanks to God for a perfect summer, great friends, a mom who lived to see her 80th birthday, good health, and this beautiful beach that he created just for us. I drove back home later that evening ready for whatever God had in store for me.

Well, Tuesday was the first day of school, and I am grateful for a school that eases us back into that stampede that is called school. School on the first day did not start until eleven. So, we got to use the time before the students arrived to do those last minute things.

We met all of our classes briefly, and I scurried to the gym for a workout, and I made may way to DC to do a quick bike ride.

I ended my day feeling hopeful and happy!

However,  Wednesday brought with it a whole ’nother set of emotions....

There are some things going on at school that do not sit well with me, and I just had to let my voice be heard. I went to my administrator to voice my concerns and while talking to him I wanted to cry. I held it together while in his office. However, when I got in my car, I cried a little, and I wanted to go back inside to resign. Instead, I called a friend who reassured me that it is ok to advocate for children, and this gave me just the peace that I needed.

Thursday, I was able to introduce diverse novels and this blog to my seniors, and they were so receptive about reading books that are off the beaten path. I passed out a list of titles, many from this blog, and my people, we talked and talked and talked about books. This was so good for my soul; you know that I love to talk about books...

At the end of the day, one of my students told me about the school that he came from, and in his words, “It was ghetto.” Looking at his curious face, I thought about him attending a school that he considered to not be a good learning environment, and I am so happy that he is in a place where he feels safe and a place where he thinks he can learn. AND, I get to teach him.

Yes, my school has things that we need to work on, but at least “The school is not ghetto.”

"Change the way you look at things, and what you look at will change.” Wayne Dyer

Today, was a continuation of the feelings that I felt on Thursday: happy and grateful. It was an absolutely perfect day: the students were pleasant and eager to talk about books, we were able to get everyone logged into google classroom, they openly expressed themselves etc., and I thought that I must be one of the luckiest people in the whole wide world.

I’m extremely grateful that I have more good days than bad days!

I guess from my emotional experiences this week, I know for sure that our emotions are fickled, and we can’t trust them nor act on them. We must ride them out and be ok with them, because they do change just like the weather, people, tides.........

One for the Record Books...

My dear friend and fellow NEH scholar!

Over the weekend I had time to reflect on this summer, and it was one for the record books....

Blessed and High Favored!!

By the way, the first day of school was well with my soul.

HOLLER.

The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

So, today at the beach I read The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin....

The Fire Next Time is autobiographical, and its starts when Baldwin is around fourteen years old when he and his peers start to change: “And there seem to be no way whatever to remove this cloud that stood between them and the sun, between them and love and life and power, between them and whatever it is they wanted.”

My people, this book gave me much to think about, and I will be thinking about the ideas in this book for quite a long time. In the racial charged times in which we are living, this is a book that can generate great discussions on race, and at the same time, offer some solutions. I am beginning to believe, like Baldwin that “color is not a human or a personal reality; it is a political reality.” Why can’t we all just be American????

I’ll leave you with the words of Baldwin on how we can heal this country or burn: “If we - and now I mean the relatively conscious Whites and the relatively conscious Blacks, who must, like lovers, insist on, or create, the consciousness of the others - do not falter in our duty now, we may be able, handful that we are, to end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country, and change the history of the world. If we do not dare everything, the fulfillment of the prophecy, re-created from the Bible in song by a slave, is upon us: God gave Noah the rainbow sign, No more water, the fire next time."

My People, read this timely classic, and let’s talk.......

I am going to read one more book by Baldwin that was recommended to me by a friend: If Beale Street Could Talk.

You MUST experience Baldwin for yourself......

Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin

I spent the day in one of my favorite places, Rehoboth Beach, and I finished Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin. Not necessarily a beach read but....

You know, reading James Baldwin’s thoughts are so liberating. This man was a thinker, and he had no trouble speaking his truth. (I totally admire his courage!)

In this collection of essays that was published in 1961, we get to read many of Baldwins’s candid thoughts on what it means to be an American, the American South and North at that time, inner cities, William Faulkner, and Richard Wright. Many of the essays made me read and reread and ponder.

If nothing else, these essays show how important it is to be a critical thinker and to know that once we write our thoughts and share them, we have no control over how they will be received or percieved. (Pay close attention to the chapters on Richard Wright.)

Here is an article from 1961 on Nobody Knows My Name that basically sums up this entire collection of essays.

I’m not through with James Baldwin yet, and as I soak up the sun tomorrow, I will be reading The Fire Next Time.....

I just love me some James Baldwin!

Happy Holiday Weekend, My People.......

Books In the Bookroom!

If you read this blog often, you know that I believe in the value of teaching novels, short stories, and poems by and about people of color. We’ve got to get away from ‘The Single Story.'

One of my colleagues and friend proposed that we start a voluntary bookclub with the English department where we will read a diverse novel each month in order to share ideas and to have books in mind when it is time to order new books at the end of the year. We even thought about the idea of going through our own bookroom and perhaps reading diverse novels from our bookroom that may or may not have been read in our classes.

So, I went to do a careful look at the books in our bookroom, and my heart started racing as if I had just been told that I had won the lottery; our bookroom is completely awesome.....

Yes, we have lots of the classics, but we also have many contemporary titles like Funny in Farsi, Under the Feet of Jesus, The Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns, The Mountain Echoed, The Narrative of Frederick Douglass, Black Boy, The Color of Water, Cooper Sun, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Cuba 15, Dreaming in Cuba, Sold, and we also have class sets of books by Gabriel Garcia, James Baldwin, Toni Morrison and on and on and on..... You see why my heart was uncontrollably beating as I perused the book room??? (Click on the highlighted books to read the reviews by me.)

I wanted to faint when I saw a few class sets of one of my favorite reads from my summer reading list: Losing My Cool! And, we selected it to be the first book that we will read and discuss at our first departmental bookclub meeting. (Winning!)

I can't wait to have discussions about Losing My Cool and other books that we already own. My People, a change is coming.....

Team Work Makes The Dream Work.

My People, I am grateful to work with people who are willing to try new things!

Check back to read about our departmental bookclub meetings.

Grateful is my Attitude Today.

Just a Few Things....

80 years old!

So, My mom turned 80 on last Monday, and it was a big deal to me and my family, because all eight of my sisters, and most of their children, and I traveled to Atlanta to spend the weekend with our mom for her birthday. This was the first time that we have all been together in such a long time...

Blowing out candles!

Yep, we were packed in that house!

Everybody together!

School!

I went back to work last week, and I am so grateful to be in a school that eases us back into the swing of things. We had a few quick meetings, breakfast and lunch, and we were sent on our way to do whatever we needed to do....

However, for the first time ever, I looked at my class roster and all of my classes have twenty-eight to twenty-nine students, and there are other things that I am concerned about, and I instantly felted stressed. I had to remind myself that classes are still being leveled and this number will go down, AND God always has my back... I said a quick prayer, I am going to check on this number issue, and let God do the rest.

What I know for sure is that sometimes we must speak up... Faith without words is DEAD!

Looking forward to seeing what this school year brings, and know that I always advocate for myself....

No Television!

A few months back, I decided to cut off the cable in my house, which means there is only fuzz on my TV whenever I turn it on. And, no, I don’t do Netflix or any of that other stuff.

Well, My People, I must have been wasting more time that I thought watching TV, because now I seem to have much more productive time at home: I read more, relax more, take care of things that need to be taken care of in my house more often AND,

my stress level is down; I had no idea that seeing those images of someone being shot by a cop, or a natural disaster, or all of the other crazy things on TV were causing me a little bit of stress. Now, I control what I see, read the news, and is able to critically think about whatever I read. It’s amazing how we are manipulated by the images that are shown on TV.

The other day a friend mentioned to me something about a cheating site that had been hacked, and I knew nothing about it at all. She told me all about it. I went online to ABC news to check it out, and literally wiped that out of my mind; that ain’t my business, and I don’t care to know more about that craziness...This was the moment when I realized that having no cable in my house is a good thing.

My people, see if you can go without watching TV for just five days, and let me know how it goes!

CLOSED DOORS!

Normally, I am the kind of person who knows when it is time to go.... However, I have been in a situation that was not a good fit for me, but I was going to endure it, because it was convenient. Yep, I was only staying because it was convenient.

However, because I would not leave, and I needed to, God shut that door completely.....

At first my pride was hurt, but then I accepted the fact that God had to force me to move. I would have stayed, where I was not growing, because it was convenient.

I know that I am not the only person who is or was in a situation only because it is or was convenient,  and know that convenience is not always the best option especially if we are not growing.

Sometimes, we must be uncomfortable in order to grow, and that’s ok.

Race!

So, I have been thinking a lot about race and racism, and the more I think about it, I agree with James Baldwin and Coates when they say that race is a social construct...Why label people by race, and why can’t we all just be Americans since no one is really from this country.

However, I believe that this probably started the minute that the Civil War ended and definitely with the 13th Amendment to the Constitution which abolished slavery. Now, this social construct is on autopilot, and we just can’t stop the labeling.

If everyone is viewed as American, then we could possibly work harder for the good of Americans as a whole. However, as long as we are put into groups, then there will be a group with most of the power, and the rest of the people are left trying to figure out how to get some of that power, and that will be impossible as long as we are confined to our group by race.

Robert Peace and Thomas Williams

So, a friend proposed to me that The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace is a juxtaposition of Losing My Cool, and I just could not see that; however, I have turned this idea over and over and over in my mind, and I finally see it.

According to Jeff Hobbs, Robert Peace seem to not be able to find away to go between his world at Yale and the culture in which his grew up, which was not a Black culture, but an inner city culture. And, not being able to find that happy median, may have caused him his life?????  He just did not know how to “wear the many mask.”

On the other hand, Thomas William in Losing My Cool seems to have gotten to Georgetown University and completely turned his back on the culture in which he grew up. He seemed to have distanced himself from other minority students at Georgetown, students at the nearby historically Black University, Howard University, and all the people who he grew up with. Also, by the end of the book, he refers to James Baldwin’s idea of separating himself from the group in order to find self-identity.

This juxtaposition has been driving me crazy, and I have no idea what all of this this means, but it does show the complexity of being labeled Black in American...

This is all I got..... In the meantime, I will be studying James Balwin and preparing for the upcoming school year.

Happy Sunday, My People!

James Baldwin: The Last Interview and Other Conversations

I must sadly admit that I have not been a student of James Baldwin... I know, I know, I Know, but I think that I tried to read Go Tell It On the Mountain, and did not like it, and sort of put James on the back burner.... Very bad decision!

My readers, never, never read one or two books that you do not like by a writer and throw the author in the trash can.... Very Bad Decision.... I was not fond of Jesmyn Ward’s first two books, but I fell madly in love with Men We Reaped! So, happy that I did not give up on Jesmyn.

Many of the books that I have been reading lately from Between the World and Me, to How to Kill Yourself and Others in American, and Losing My Cool, the writers have mentioned James Baldwin, and I thought to my myself that I must give Baldwin some more of my time!

A friend mentioned that I read The Last Interview, and of course I did....

This book is four interviews with Baldwin with one done in 1961, two in 1984, and one while he was dying in France in 1987.

Let me leave you with a few quotes:

1961 Interview

“You have to decide who you are, and force the world to deal with you, not its idea of you."

“Time is aways now.  Everybody who has ever thought about his own life knows this. You don’t make resolutions about something you are going to do next year. NO! You decide to write a book: the book may be finished in twenty years from now, but you’ve got to start it now."

“I began to see this country for the first time. If I hadn’t gone away, I would never have been able to see it; and if I was unable to see it, I would never have been able to forgive it."

“The only thing that really unites all Black men everywhere is, as far as I can tell, the fact that White men are on their necks."

“Assuming that sanity..... assuming that humanity itself, the humanity in all of us, will triumph, there will be, as you say, no White nation and no Black nation but nations of people."

May 1984 Interview 

“There are two things we have to do -love each other and raise our children. We have to do that! The alternative, for me, would be suicide."

“But, I do know that, too that some of the evils that we live with are really produced by the society we live in, by the choices that society offers. I’m not trying to get anybody off the hook when I say that."

June 1984 Interview

“Go Tell It on the Mountain, for example, is not about church, and Giovanni is not really about homosexuality. It’s about what happens to you if you’re afraid to love anybody. Which is much more interesting than the question of homosexuality.” 

“I loved a few people and they loved me. It had nothing to do with these labels. Of course, the world has all kinds of words for us (homosexuals). But that’s the world’s problem."

November 1987: The Last Interview

“It’s a great shock to realize that you’ve been so divorced. So, divorced from who you think you are - from who you really are. Who you think you are, you’re not at all."

“ I was not born to be what someone said I was. I was not born to be defined by someone else, but by myself, and myself only."

These are just a few of the wonderful thoughts of James Baldwin, and if you want to know his thoughts about, homosexuality, Toni Morrison, Miles Davis, Richard Wright, Fannie Lou Hamer, Dr. King, Malcolm X, Ralph Ellison and several other people, than you must read this very short collection of interviews that spoke to my heart, and I know that they will speak to yours.

I just can’t let Baldwin go, so I will be reading a collection of his essays called Nobody Knows My Name.

My place in this world is becoming clearer.... Thanks for taking this journey with me!