“Are you rich or somethin’?” I asked her.
“No.” She finally looked at me. “I don’t think so.”
“Well, how come you got so much meat on your bones?”
“My momma said it’s ‘cause my tabulism is so slow,” Patricia told me.
“How do you get your tabulism to slow down?” Maybe if I could slow mine down, Daddy would stop calling me “toothpick.”
“I don’t know. My momma said it’s from my daddy’s side of the family,” she said. Then she held her hands to her lips and whispered, “Sometimes I get up at night and sneak chocolate chip cookies.”
Okay, I did that, too, but it hadn’t helped me any. I was convinced she had to know more than she was confessing. “You want to swing together, Patricia?” I asked her.
“Sure.” Her cheeks almost pushed her eyelids closed as she smiled. “And you can call me Peaches.”
That happened right around the time our teacher, Mrs. Schumacher, divided our kindergarten class into two sections: the butterflies and the rainbows. It didn’t take long before we all figured out that the butterflies were “smarter” than the rainbows. Being a butterfly meant you used crayons less and wrote more often with big, round pencils. Butterflies read from certain books with the “real” teacher while rainbows assembled around the teacher’s assistant, being drilled over and over again on the letters of the alphabet. I couldn’t have explained how happy I was to have another brown face in the butterfly group. We quickly became inseparable.
* * * * *
I met Peaches for dinner on her side of the city. She picked a quaint, elegant little restaurant well known for its pricey but hard-to-find specialties. The clatter of silverware against plates and glasses attested to the upper-class atmosphere, putting us both on dialect alert as we waited to be seated.
My Boaz look-alike rushed in through the restaurant doors and accidentally knocked over my purse. “Oh, excuse me, sister,” he said, bending down to hand it to me. Ooh, he called me ‘sister.’ I got that warm, familiar feeling inside that I wouldn’t have to start from square one with him.
“It’s okay.” His skin was likened unto Hershey’s with a smile that said, “I see my dentist regularly.” Granted, he was a bit clumsy. But he’d stopped in his hurried tracks to make it all better. Can we get some violins here?
He nodded and smiled at Peaches and me, then rushed past us toward the waitress’s podium.
I hated moments like that—the ones that leave you thinking, I should have said something, days after the opportunity has passed.
“I see my party over there,” he said as he pointed to the bar. Then he waved. Peaches and I looked clear through the mini-garden and two other panes of glass to see his party. A black woman in a blue dress and blue pumps waved seductively in his direction. So much for the violins.
“Girl, I could feel that in my bones. That was a good black man,” I said, shaking my head.
“A taken good black man,” she added.
Our waitress, a young white lady with a vibrant smile, ushered us to a booth for two. Peaches relieved herself of her sweater, revealing perfectly toned arms and the bones that protruded just below her neckline. I’d seen her in that dress before, but it always amazed me to see the degree of transformation the human body can undergo given a change of habits. Her makeup was perfect, as usual, and her handbag matched her red, strappy shoes.
“Are you going to the retreat?” she asked me later, twirling pasta around her fork. Her church always held a dynamic Spirit-filled women’s retreat in early December.
“I don’t think so. I’m in charge of career day at the school next week. I haven’t confirmed all the presenters. I’m still looking for someone with a career in math or science—preferably an engineer.”
“Well, if you find one, give him my number.”
“Girl, please—you! What about me?” I held up my hand to stop her. “Anyways, I think I’m gonna invite a female engineer. And an African-American one at that,” I informed her.
“You go, girl.” She leaned back and smiled, dabbing the corners of her lips with a white linen napkin. “I wish they would have brought in some black people to talk to us when we were in school. Maybe we would have had a little more vision.”
I echoed her sentiment with a touch of natural black attitude in my voice. “Be for real, Peaches. Those white folks wudn’t thinkin’ ‘bout us. They wouldn’t even hire a black teacher, so you know they were not about to bring in no black role models makin’ mo’ money than them.”
We shared a laugh and carried on, catching up on each other’s lives. I watched her brown eyes light up and dance when she told me about Eric’s upcoming basketball season and how she had found the cutest little high-tops for him. She also let me know that Raphael made good on a promise to take Eric to Six Flags.
“Really?”
“But why did he come up to my doorstep with another woman?” She glared at me with her neck and lips stuck out.
“What?”
“Some girl from his job, he said,” she went on. “I think Raphael is just using Eric to win her. You know, trying to make it seem like he’s the good type of brother doing the right thing for his son. But I’ll take it for what it’s worth. God is doing His thing in His own way in His own time. All Eric knows is that he spent the day with his daddy. Oh, girl, let Eric tell it, they had the best day on earth.” She’d tried hard, but the sarcasm still came through in her tone.
“I’m proud of you, girl,” I encouraged her. “The old you would have snatched Raphael up in a heartbeat! Isn’t it funny how we’re changing?”
“It is.” She grinned with me. “Regardless of what I think about the situation, what matters most is the relationship Eric has with his father.”
“And that is so important.” I tossed my curls back and leaned in to her. “Our men already have issues. Every black boy needs a black male role model.”
“A good black male role model,” she clarified, striking the air with her fork. “My brothers already do a good job of mentoring Eric. Whether Raphael is the best role model for Eric is still questionable.”
We ordered light desserts and savored the familiarity a little longer. The restaurant filled quickly as the dinner hour progressed. The same waitress seated two white men at the table next to Peaches and me.
“Don’t look now”—Peaches lowered her voice—”but one of ‘em is staring at you.”
“Girl, please,” I sighed. “He ain’t about to get none of this chocolate drizzled on his sundae.”
“You betta get that white man,” she teased.
“There is nothing a white man can do for me except fix my computer, okay?”
“So what’s been going on with you?” she continued, not giving their table another look.
“Girl, the Lord has got me reading a lot of stuff on love,” I told her with the same puzzled look that I had when I discovered, through the process of straightening up the books on my bookshelf, I’d begun collecting books on love. “It’s really interesting because it’s like, I always thought I knew what love was. I mean, I work in a school and teach children’s church—how can I not be a loving person? But the more I learn, the more I realize I didn’t know.”
“That’s serious.”
“I know. There is so much work to be done,” I admitted. “But I know He’s gonna do it.”
“Look, if he can deliver me from chocolate, anybody can be delivered from anything!” Peaches roared, and the other customers looked at us like we were a little crazy. You had to know Peaches to understand how much chocolate meant to her. It was the one thing that had kept her overweight more than anything else. She believed God for perseverance in diet, endurance in exercise, and deliverance from chocolate when she lost eighty pounds. Of course, that led to the other stuff with Raphael.
Next, I told Peaches about my battles at work. As a vice principal, I often felt pressured to uphold so many ideals and principles as a professional, a woman,
an African- American, a role model, and a supervisor. My students weren’t really the problem. Most of my conflicts involved parents or colleagues.
“Girl, I had this woman, Mrs. Donovan, up in my office last week talking about how she’s gonna go up to the board because her daughter flunked math and can’t play basketball for the next three weeks.” I stuck my lips out and waited for Peaches’ question.
“And?”
“That’s exactly what I said! She can go to the board, the superintendent, the Lord Himself, but a rule is still a rule. The girl had a fifty-eight. She wasn’t even close to passing!”
“Then what did she say?”
I put on my best prissy, proper voice to imitate Mrs. Donovan: “Miss Smith, I don’t know if you’re aware or not, but my husband is a major contributor to the booster club. We do a lot to support this school.”
“What color was she—white?”
“You know she was.” I stuck my neck out and gave her a smug stare. “I told her, in so many words, that her daughter’s education was not for sale, and that the little girl would have to bring up her average in math before she would be allowed back on the court again.”
“She was hot when she left, wasn’t she?” Peaches grinned.
“Girl, she was hotter than fifty Mexicans in the front seat of a Pinto.”
Peaches almost choked on her water. That was right about the time a still, tiny Ding! Ding! warning bell went off inside me. I felt it, almost tangibly. But why? This old joke had never caused the bell to go off—until now.
I decided to talk about something else. “Then I had this little black boy that this white teacher sent down to my office because he had a straw in his mouth.”
“What?”
“A straw, girl. Like it was a knife or something.”
“That’s crazy.”
“I sent him right back up there with a little note to her saying Handle this with your classroom consequences.”
“When are you gonna quit that job and come to Northcomp?” Peaches asked me. “You know I’m director of personnel. You could be making two or three times what you’re making now, with half the stress,” she offered for the billionth time.
“Because our kids need us,” I replied, running a finger across my forearm. “I’m the only spot in administration at the school. It’s important for our kids to see somebody black running things. I wouldn’t trade it for a million dollars. Education is my calling. You know that. Besides, I don’t have the degree for your field.”
“Girl, please,” she fussed, waving her hand. “All those white people up in there with little or no education! And even the ones who have degrees aren’t necessarily competent. They made up the buddy employment system—it’s about time we got some people in high places so we can have it like that, too.”
As we rose to leave the restaurant, the white man that Peaches referred to earlier quickly cleared the corners of his mouth with his napkin and stood as well. He took a few steps toward me and held out his right hand, shoving the left one deep into his pocket.
“Hello. My name is David Moore.”
I’m sure my face said, “And?” but in the interest of my good home training, I shook his hand and introduced myself as well. “LaShondra Smith.”
“I. . . I was just admiring your smile.”
Peaches poked me hard in the back and almost caused me to have a muscle spasm. “Ow—oh. Thank you.”
Apparently, it took him a moment to get the message that I had absolutely no interest in pursuing the conversation any further. “Well, it was nice meeting you, Miss Smith,” he said with a quick nod.
“Same here, Mr. Moore.”
“You have a nice day.”
I watched him return to his table and grab his glass, his hopes of a forbidden fling with a black woman dashed.
It was still early when I got home. My soul was both thirsty and curious. Why had I heard that little voice in my heart over something as innocent and familiar as our Mexican joke? I’d never felt bad about it before. There really isn’t any harm in two old girlfriends sharing an inside jest. Or was there?
I had been talking and thinking and meditating on love lately. And I’d begun to feel uneasy instead of peaceful about an area that I had always thought was pretty well covered in my life. What am I misunderstanding about love, Lord?
When I got inside, I called Peaches to let her know I’d made it home. After washing my face, brushing my teeth, and tying my hair in a satin scarf, I made my way to the prayer closet for my last words of the day with the Lord.
I approached the room with some degree of apprehension. I didn’t like feeling as though I was missing out on God’s voice. I fell to my knees and started out with praise; thanking God for His blessings and praising Him for who He is.
Then I got into my groove at my desk and asked the Holy Spirit to take me where I needed to go in the Word. Since God had been teaching me about love, I knew I needed to be there. I just wasn’t exactly sure. I searched the subject index of my NIV Women’s Devotional Bible, and searched through the references pertaining to love for others.
Still beseeching the Spirit for guidance, I went through the indicated pages and read until I felt the Word speak to me. Halfway down the list, I realized that I was still “cold” on the trail. I let my eyes wander to the adjacent page and then I saw it: PREJUDICE. I flipped to Galatians 3:26—29 and read:
You are all Sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
My heart sank as I rolled this scripture over in my mind. I tried to find a loophole—anything to unjustify what the Word said about prejudice. After all, I had good reason to be prejudiced. Mexicans were taking over. Middle Easterners were always bombing people. Asian people made me sick following me around their little dollar stores as if somebody really wanted to steal a cheap plastic yo-yo. The Native Americans were getting a free ride, though they deserved it. And white people. They stole my ancestors, sold them, used our backs to build their own wealth (mind you, never paid us for it), and the list went on and on.
I thought aloud, “It’s so hard for me to love white people.” But as quickly as the confession escaped my mouth, I knew that I could have just as easily substituted the word “black” because I truly had a hard time dealing with my own kind, too. I mentally ran down the list of our issues. Black people could sure enough get on my nerves making us all look bad. Always running on C.P. (Colored People) time like the world revolves around us. Not checking over our kids’ homework, let alone coming to PTA meetings to find out what’s going on up at the “schoolhouse.” Then we want to come up and act crazy when our children get into trouble. Empty promises, half-steppin’, all talk and no action. Kids dressed to kill in Tommy Hilfiger and CK, but they’re on free or reduced lunch. We don’t support our own, we’re always pulling each other down, we don’t vote, and we could sho ‘nuff get “ig-nut” over some money. Leave it to black folks to start a friendly family game of dominos and have it end up with somebody getting shot over fifty cents.
Yes, we could be called a lot of things, but much of it was due to the fact that we are still trying to find ourselves in America. After all, I was in the first generation of African-Americans to have both freedom and civil rights, the first to be able to live out my dreams with the law on my side.
With my justifications for prejudice still fresh on my mind, I closed my Bible and got back on my knees to have a little talk with Jesus. What, exactly, was He asking me to do? Was He asking me to ignore all the facts? Was He asking me to forget about the cause of black equality? Did He expect me to just put down my guard when dealing with people who I felt, collectively, intended to remain on top by keeping others down? Was I supposed to make friends with whites and Hispanics and every o
ther type of person on the globe?
And what of blackness itself—the pride, the attitude that came with my heritage? I liked black things—Juneteenth, Essence magazine, hips, our sororities and fraternities, our churches, and those little shirts we used to wear that read: It’s a black thing—you wouldn’t understand. I paid my NAACP dues, and I was committed to making sure that every child in my church got the help they needed to be successful in school. So what if those kids happened to be black? I’m black. I wanted to help my own.
Truly, this thing in my spirit was an assault on my fabric. I prayed my own words and ended the conversation. I left my prayer closet that night without any answers, only a conviction that I did not feel was a fair one, given the history of the very land I stood on.
Chapter 5
When Jonathan announced his intent to enlist in the navy, Momma was a little frightened—as any mother would be. But my parents were in no position to turn around and put a second child through college. They had already taken out several loans to pay for my education, and it was no secret that Daddy postponed his retirement to make sure I finished school without owing anything. Initially, Jonathan went into the military so that he could see the world and get a free college education. As it turned out, he enjoyed military life so much, he reenlisted for another four years. This time he was off to Germany indefinitely.
Momma had that first, awkward-looking military photo hung high above the mantel. I don’t know what they do to those soldiers just before snapping that first military picture, but those people always look starved, worn out, and homesick. Jonathan was no exception. I almost cried when I saw my brother in that photo. Momma did cry.
“Stop all that cryin’, girl. They just makin’ a man out of him,” Daddy said proudly.
“That was your job!” Momma yelled. Then they got into it again about how they would have had enough money to put us both through college if Momma wasn’t giving so much money to the church or if Daddy would stop playing the lottery. Let them tell it, they would have been billionaires if only the other one hadn’t been doing this or that.
Boaz Brown Page 5
