Norah and Martin Luther King, Jr

It has been an interesting week with my daughter.  Most weeks are pretty damn good.  But I wasn't ready for this week. I thought she said some pretty cool things and stuff I really wasn't expecting to come out of her distracted and wandering mouth.  

Because I'm lucky, I am very grateful for her teachers and the attention they have given to Martin Luther King, Jr. this last week. Here are the treasures this has yielded for my wife and me at home:

STORY #1 and #2
Talking about her school day is always a chore for Norah.  She would much prefer to make up fantastical stories of her own (like the time her teacher pushed her down during story time and hurt her knee, or the time that I turned into a small creature).  So I was pleasantly surprised when Norah told me that they had been talking about "Martin Luther King, Jr.."  I like getting the whole name in, specifically.  I asked her what she learned about Martin Luther King, Jr.  and she said, "He was somebody who made speeches and got shot."  I asked why he got shot.  And she said, "Because he was trying to do something good and the guy who shot him didn't like it."  I asked what was he trying to do and she said, "Just make sure that we're all nice to eachother." 

YES. Well Done Mr. Brack and Sra. Ariza.  That IS what he was trying to do.

End of Story #1

And then I said, "You know Norah, Martin Luther King, Jr. helped us understand a lot of important things.  When he was giving his speeches, people thought that kids with brown skin, beautiful brown skin just like yours, shouldn't go to school with other people."

NORAH: What?!

Because she's lucky, a feeling of hurt is creeping over her beautiful brown face . . .

ME:  I know isn't that weird?  Martin Luther King Jr gave speeches to say that he believed that everyone should be able to go to school together, to eat together, to ride the bus together, no matter what color your skin is.

Feeling of comfort sneaking back over her beautiful brown face . . .

NORAH: Yeah . . .

ME:  Right.  He thought that people with brown skin should be able to eat with people with yellow skin and red skin and black skin and white sk . . .

NORAH: (Interrupting me--) WHITE SKIN?  I've never seen anyone with WHITE skin!!!! Mommy that's silly.  

YES. 

Because Black and White do not reflect who we are.  They reflect what we teach ourselves and our children about who They are and who Us is and if we teach them They are Black or Us is White, then we've gotten it wrong.  

End of Story #2

STORY #3

A few days later, I came home from work and relieved our awesome and sensitive and smart babysitter, Sarah, from her important work of nurturing this beautiful child of mine.  And she said, "Norah said the coolest thing today.  We were looking through the Box of Questions and we came across this question--

If you could be famous for anything, what would you want to be famous for? 

And Norah said, I would want to be famous for giving speeches like Martin Luther King, Jr. 

and I (Sarah) said, what would you give speeches about? And Norah said, the same things as him.  Telling people to be nice to eachother, like no hitting, no biting, no pinching, no name calling . . ."

End of Story #3

If you know me at all, you know that I have always known that as a parent, I am called to help my child, regardless of what shade her skin is, understand that we are not Black or White or Brown or Cinnamon or Cafe Con Leche or Peach or Gray (that's what color s

he says my skin is, by the way--the lovely shade of Gray).  That's what our skin may look like, but that is not who we are.  WE are people who eat together, learn together, ride the bus together, sing together, play together, read together . . . and WE should be nice to each other.  All the time.  

I know the day grows ever closer when she will understand that she is Black and I am White.  I am absolutely not raising a color blind child, please don't get it twisted.  But Norah will also understand that she is NORAH and her skin color is cinnamon in the summer and caramel in the winter and that her gray old mother believes that regardless of whose path your crossing the number one thing you should remember is that you should be nice to people, no hitting, no pinching, no name calling.  

It's a hard life to live, being a brown-skinned baby in a gray and peach family.  Because we're lucky, we get to be a part of her journey.  

I wish that we lived in a world where she was as lucky as me.  

i'm afraid

I’m afraid and I don’t know what to do about it.  I’ve thought maybe I should be more intentional about my interactions with the world—change my facebook habits, specifically.  I’ve also thought I should just go ahead and earnestly implement the two to five year plan to leave Texas and try to go to a friendlier community.  But those responses have many drawbacks, including leaving me feeling like a chickenshit deserter of things and people that are important to me.  I know facebook is not a diary.  And I know that you are not all “friends” with me on facebook because you want to be party to my inner monologue.  For those of you who aren’t interested, please feel free to move on through your newsfeed at this point.  For those of you who continue to read, I would guess that you are most likely the people to whom I am writing anyway.  If some of this sprinkles on someone else, I’m okay with that too. 

I told my brother Brian this weekend that I have some fear.  I told my Dad months ago that I was having fear.  Fear of the cultural war that comes about as a result of the backlash to the Supreme Court ruling on Friday.  I told Melissa on Friday that we should celebrate with abandon because I was sure that things would get ugly soon enough.  Shortly after I said that, Melissa told me that we drove past a church billboard that said, “The Supreme Court is not God.  Pray for the United States of America.” I didn’t see the billboard because apparently I was celebrating with abandon by averting my eyes from all things offensive or scary.  And the cool thing is, I have managed to continue to do it for the most part.  I have been very effective in weeding out contacts from my facebook newsfeed who say mean and hateful things (thanks to Chik-fil-a and getting married in Minnesota in 2013 and Ferguson, Missouri) so I haven’t witnessed the hate and violence that is coming from people who are upset about the Supreme Court ruling on Friday or from people who have inexplicably been upset about the removal of the Confederate flag from various places around the South.  And I strictly refuse to get news from anywhere other than NPR so I don’t ever hear anything ridiculous from other “news” outlets. 

And yet, despite my very intentional cocoon of (irresponsible?) blindness, I am still afraid.  I am afraid that mean-spirited picketers will picket my church, a sacred space for me, in Fort Worth.  I am afraid that some wicked group will decide to start taking a stand against ministers and justices of the peace and county clerks who are conducting same sex weddings and they will start picketing their homes or bombing those churches, or county offices.  I feel simulatenously silly even writing it.  But then my imagination runs wild and I think of how perhaps people who were at Stonewall that evening didn’t anticipate that they were going to be in a riot by the end of the night.  This stuff bubbles up sometimes when no one expects it. 

My brother says he’s sad that I live with that kind of fear.  He doesn’t have that fear for me or my father or my church.  He says the people who are upset about gay marriage aren’t the type of people who are going to show up on Sunday morning with picket signs, much less the type to make bombs.  But I don’t know.  I worked at Planned Parenthood for several years and I’ve seen lots of committed people show up everyday of the year to picket against abortions.  And they surely bombed those clinics.  Is it a lot different?  I don’t know. 

Yesterday I called to make a dentist appointment for Norah.  And the lady said, “Is she on your husband’s insurance?” And I ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS say, “No, I don’t have a husband, I have a wife.” But yesterday, I said, “No she’s on mine.”

What a chickenshit thing to say. 

Because yesterday I knew that a lot of people in the world were struggling with women having wives and men having husbands and I didn’t want to shove it in her face.  But did I pull a Peter in the garden kind of thing?  And deny the woman who I am committed to, who cares for me when I am sick and lonely, who’s raising my daughter to be an amazing funny and creative person?  Maybe not specifically.  But it was a denial for me.  And I am ashamed. 

And typing something on facebook isn’t going to change that denial.  Just like even though Peter started a giant church that is still here 2015 years later, we’re still telling that story of how he denied Jesus three times before the cock crowed.  Can’t a brother catch a break? 

No. I am afraid.  Afraid that the dentist will be mean to Norah if he or she learns that Norah’s moms are married.  Afraid that my church isn’t safe from hate.  Afraid that my dad and all of my lovely friends who are ready to do weddings with same sex couples will be harassed or harmed in some way.

I had friends yesterday who came to me and said they had rough weekends.  Because they were fighting all weekend with family members and friends and church members about their support of the marriage of same sex couples, their support of their friends, their support of my family.  And I felt bad for them because I was busy basking in the rainbow glow of my facebook and my loving and accepting family. 

I don’t think that changing my facebook habits is going to change the hatred that is out there, that may visit my church or my family.  I don’t think that moving to a friendlier locale will change that either.  Harvey Milk said you gotta give ‘em hope, but he did say that from San Francisco.  And then he died because he was working with someone who was harboring that hate. 

I’m scared.  I’m so grateful for all of you who are brave enough to stand up for me and my family and all of the others of us who are living our truth in this world.  And I apologize for being a chicken shit.  Hopefully I’ll be stronger today.