Gravois & MacKenzie
(Author's Note: This is a follow-on to the July 29 entry. I think it has some relevance, especially in light of the foul remarks made by Mel Gibson recently not to mention other racial and religious tensions in the world. The first nineteen paragraphs have been sitting on a "Blogger" server for a while. I've finally found the nerve to post it. One sentence was especially difficult to type. I've excised it and put it back in probably twenty times. I trust readers will understand the reason it's in.)
The title to this entry is a street intersection in south St. Louis County, Missouri about a mile from where I lived as a little kid. It's near the Lutheran High School which the official daughter will attend next year and I drive through it relatively regularly. It hasn't changed much since the late sixties.
On the northeast corner, there is a cinder block Dairy Queen where we would get ice cream in the summer. On the northwest corner is the First Baptist Church of Affton, Missouri which was not my church as a kid, but where I attended Vacation Bible School. Across Gravois Road from the church is Wolff's Florist which has been at that location forever. Moving back east across Mackenzie is a tavern, called "The Back Door," conveniently located caty-cornered from the Baptist church.
When I was a kid, we would traverse this intersection all the time on our trips to the supermarket or to buy clothes or shoes or whatever. As children grow, their world expands and this place was one of my earliest horizons.
It is also the place of one of my earliest lessons.
I remember being in the back seat of my parents' Ford Galaxy 500. It was white with a red interior and had after-market seat belts and air conditioning. I was on the driver's side. Mom was driving and we were coming home from the city. My brother and I were in the back seat goofing around as we were stopped for the light on westbound Gravois.
I was only eight or nine years old.
The light changed to green and I remember the car moving forward. At that precise moment, I decided to broaden my active English vocabulary by calling my brother a name, a name I had heard somewhere, certainly never at home, but the meaning of which was still unknown to me.
That name was the "N" word.
The moment that word left my mouth, I heard the screech of tires on the pavement and felt the car abruptly stop. The momentum of my body push me forward against the lap belt. Behind us, I heard a horn honk. As my head came back up, I saw two things. The first was the back of my mother's right hand on a vector set to intercept my head.
The second was her face.
Trust me, dear reader, I had never seen that look on her face before, nor have I seen it since. Words like "rage" or "wrath" or "fury" do not convey her expression. I can only say, it scared me more than the impact of her hand on the side of my face.
Of course, I cried all the way home. Upon arrival, I was sent to the bedroom I shared with my brother to await whatever further punishment, I was to receive.
Shortly Mom appeared, having calmed down a bit. I managed to figure out why she was angry and explained that I didn't know what I had said. As you might imagine, she felt bad about her reaction.
But she told me a story, which I relate now.
My mother's people were from Alabama. Her grandmother had moved to St. Louis in the 1920's. Her mother followed a few years later after divorcing her husband, bringing my Mom along, of course. They all lived together on the German south side of St. Louis. My mother was very close to her grandmother. Interestingly, my mother credits her grandmother for being the one to take her to church.
Mom told me she remembered riding the street car down town to a department store with her grandmother one summer day when she was nine or ten years old. As they were set to return, they were waiting to board the street car and there was a older black lady with them. When the street car arrived, my mother watched her grandmother push ahead of the black lady without so much as an "Excuse Me."
My mother had always been taught to be polite, and she wondered about this behavior. In the meantime, it seemed her grandmother had lost her footing and fell backwards out of the door of the street car. Had nothing happened, she would have landed flat on her back in the middle of the street.
My mom tried to rush forward, but the black lady who had just been mistreated stepped up and caught her grandmother under the arms and prevented her from being injured.
According to my mom, her grandmother's reaction to being saved by this kind woman, was not what one would expect. Indeed, it was most definitely not Christian.
"You keep those n***er hocks off me!"
My mom was crying by the time she got to that part of the story. She could barely enunciate the words, herself.
Her grandmother boarded the street car, without further ado, grabbing Mom's hand in the process. Mom told me she turned and looked directly into the eyes of this lady who had saved her grandmother from injury, and saw a look of sadness. It was a look not born of insult, but of dignity and pity for my great grandmother who uttered those foul words. Because of the circumstances, my Mom was unable to apologize and it bothered her then.
It bothers her to this day.
Anyway, Mom composed herself and reminded me of a song we kids learned in Sunday School, Jesus Loves The Little Children. The last two lines of the song are:
Mom's parting words to me were, "If we're all equal in Jesus' eyes, we're all equal, period."
I've tried to live my life according that, since that day. I've reared my children to believe that and to act accordingly.
Indeed, some years ago, I allowed the Official Daughter to watch Schindler's List with me.
From beginning to end.
There were a few raised eyebrows by some well-meaning relatives at the thought of an eleven year old girl watching an R-rated movie, complete with violence, F-bombs and nudity. My response?
"Eleven year old girls were sent to the gas chambers. Their age did not save them in the face of Evil. Why not let her see what Evil looks like? Maybe she won't let it happen again to anybody."
This is why the behavior of a Mel Gibson or the inane statements of the Seattle Public School District trouble me so much. On one hand, Gibson shows me that there continue to be mouth-breathing idiots out there who invoke their "faith" and misperceived theology as a cover for vile behaviors, thereby tarring me with the same brush in the process.
As for the other side, the worthies in Seattle tell me that what I've learned, i.e. that we are equal in God's eyes, is somehow wrong. They tell me that my mother's guilt about something she had nothing to do with and her implicit vow to make sure the attitudes of her grandmother were stifled in my brother and me is worth nothing. They tell me that her hand across my face and the rage in her eyes and the lesson I learned from that, mean nothing.
In point of fact, solely based upon the color of my skin, they maintain I am incapable of learning what I've learned and therefore, I am lying or mistaken about what I think I believe.
I cannot accept either alternative.
I will not.
And as long as I have anything to say about it, neither will my family.
R. Sherman
The title to this entry is a street intersection in south St. Louis County, Missouri about a mile from where I lived as a little kid. It's near the Lutheran High School which the official daughter will attend next year and I drive through it relatively regularly. It hasn't changed much since the late sixties.
On the northeast corner, there is a cinder block Dairy Queen where we would get ice cream in the summer. On the northwest corner is the First Baptist Church of Affton, Missouri which was not my church as a kid, but where I attended Vacation Bible School. Across Gravois Road from the church is Wolff's Florist which has been at that location forever. Moving back east across Mackenzie is a tavern, called "The Back Door," conveniently located caty-cornered from the Baptist church.
When I was a kid, we would traverse this intersection all the time on our trips to the supermarket or to buy clothes or shoes or whatever. As children grow, their world expands and this place was one of my earliest horizons.
It is also the place of one of my earliest lessons.
I remember being in the back seat of my parents' Ford Galaxy 500. It was white with a red interior and had after-market seat belts and air conditioning. I was on the driver's side. Mom was driving and we were coming home from the city. My brother and I were in the back seat goofing around as we were stopped for the light on westbound Gravois.
I was only eight or nine years old.
The light changed to green and I remember the car moving forward. At that precise moment, I decided to broaden my active English vocabulary by calling my brother a name, a name I had heard somewhere, certainly never at home, but the meaning of which was still unknown to me.
That name was the "N" word.
The moment that word left my mouth, I heard the screech of tires on the pavement and felt the car abruptly stop. The momentum of my body push me forward against the lap belt. Behind us, I heard a horn honk. As my head came back up, I saw two things. The first was the back of my mother's right hand on a vector set to intercept my head.
The second was her face.
Trust me, dear reader, I had never seen that look on her face before, nor have I seen it since. Words like "rage" or "wrath" or "fury" do not convey her expression. I can only say, it scared me more than the impact of her hand on the side of my face.
Of course, I cried all the way home. Upon arrival, I was sent to the bedroom I shared with my brother to await whatever further punishment, I was to receive.
Shortly Mom appeared, having calmed down a bit. I managed to figure out why she was angry and explained that I didn't know what I had said. As you might imagine, she felt bad about her reaction.
But she told me a story, which I relate now.
My mother's people were from Alabama. Her grandmother had moved to St. Louis in the 1920's. Her mother followed a few years later after divorcing her husband, bringing my Mom along, of course. They all lived together on the German south side of St. Louis. My mother was very close to her grandmother. Interestingly, my mother credits her grandmother for being the one to take her to church.
Mom told me she remembered riding the street car down town to a department store with her grandmother one summer day when she was nine or ten years old. As they were set to return, they were waiting to board the street car and there was a older black lady with them. When the street car arrived, my mother watched her grandmother push ahead of the black lady without so much as an "Excuse Me."
My mother had always been taught to be polite, and she wondered about this behavior. In the meantime, it seemed her grandmother had lost her footing and fell backwards out of the door of the street car. Had nothing happened, she would have landed flat on her back in the middle of the street.
My mom tried to rush forward, but the black lady who had just been mistreated stepped up and caught her grandmother under the arms and prevented her from being injured.
According to my mom, her grandmother's reaction to being saved by this kind woman, was not what one would expect. Indeed, it was most definitely not Christian.
"You keep those n***er hocks off me!"
My mom was crying by the time she got to that part of the story. She could barely enunciate the words, herself.
Her grandmother boarded the street car, without further ado, grabbing Mom's hand in the process. Mom told me she turned and looked directly into the eyes of this lady who had saved her grandmother from injury, and saw a look of sadness. It was a look not born of insult, but of dignity and pity for my great grandmother who uttered those foul words. Because of the circumstances, my Mom was unable to apologize and it bothered her then.
It bothers her to this day.
Anyway, Mom composed herself and reminded me of a song we kids learned in Sunday School, Jesus Loves The Little Children. The last two lines of the song are:
"Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in His sight. Jesus loves the little children of the world."
Mom's parting words to me were, "If we're all equal in Jesus' eyes, we're all equal, period."
I've tried to live my life according that, since that day. I've reared my children to believe that and to act accordingly.
Indeed, some years ago, I allowed the Official Daughter to watch Schindler's List with me.
From beginning to end.
There were a few raised eyebrows by some well-meaning relatives at the thought of an eleven year old girl watching an R-rated movie, complete with violence, F-bombs and nudity. My response?
"Eleven year old girls were sent to the gas chambers. Their age did not save them in the face of Evil. Why not let her see what Evil looks like? Maybe she won't let it happen again to anybody."
This is why the behavior of a Mel Gibson or the inane statements of the Seattle Public School District trouble me so much. On one hand, Gibson shows me that there continue to be mouth-breathing idiots out there who invoke their "faith" and misperceived theology as a cover for vile behaviors, thereby tarring me with the same brush in the process.
As for the other side, the worthies in Seattle tell me that what I've learned, i.e. that we are equal in God's eyes, is somehow wrong. They tell me that my mother's guilt about something she had nothing to do with and her implicit vow to make sure the attitudes of her grandmother were stifled in my brother and me is worth nothing. They tell me that her hand across my face and the rage in her eyes and the lesson I learned from that, mean nothing.
In point of fact, solely based upon the color of my skin, they maintain I am incapable of learning what I've learned and therefore, I am lying or mistaken about what I think I believe.
I cannot accept either alternative.
I will not.
And as long as I have anything to say about it, neither will my family.
R. Sherman
posted by R. Sherman at 3:30 AM
11 Comments:
Words fail, Randall. But I had to acknowledge in some way that I read and was very very moved by this. I was also reminded of this poem by Countee Cullen.
Randall i agree with John that {and his poem} was very moving. What a splendid Mother you have and it's great that her influence will live on. Sadly I think Mel Gibson probably suffers from his father's influence.
Thank-you for posting that Randall. Your mother was, quite clearly, a very decent woman and you are, just as clearly, a very decent and thoughtful man and father. My grandpa, always taught me, not explicitly but by example, that to have fairness, humanity and nobility of thought in one's soul was one of the highest aspirations of man - he called this simply "being decent" and valued it above all other things. The story of your mother in the car at the crossroads is a reminder of that. Decent people are the foot-soldiers in the intolerance wars and in the small skirmishes hearts and minds are often won, one way or the other.
I thoroughly agree with your decision to let your daughter watch "Schindler's List". We are responsible for introducing the world to our children and helping them figure out how to move through it. We do them a disservice if we pretend it's all hearts and flowers. That is no preparation at all. By watching a film like that with her you have put the chill of that time in her soul forever which is as it should be, but she was at home with you and safe and so able to contrast all the more clearly horror and normality, war and peace, stability and instability and recognise the need to squash out hatred before it runs loose again.
That last paragraph may sound a bit precious or earnest and be stylistically crude, but I firmly believe these things and firmly held beliefs always tend to come out a little clumsily with me.
I liked that link too, John. I'd never heard of Countee Cullin before.
Great post, Randall.
Thanks for the comments, all.
John, thanks for pointing me to that poem. I'd never read it.
Pat, both Mom and Dad felt the same way about things. Sometimes, I wish I could cut through a lot of the background noise and let them know they did OK as parents.
Sam, re: Schindler's List, there's a scene in the BW part of the movie where a little girl in Krakow is trying to escape the move to the camp. One can only see her red jacket which is the only color in the scene. Later, Schindler sees the jacket on a pile of clothes.
I remember telling Kate, "that could be you or one of your friends. Don't let it happen."
This post was difficult. Thanks for reading.
Cheers.
Randall,
A very fine post, thank you.
Mel Gibson is a sad object lesson: don't join cults.
When you cut yourself off from the discipline of genuine spiritual authority, you get into bad, bad trouble.
It's also sad, but necessary, to admit that people we love can be bigots/or paranoid to the point of crazy, like Mr. Gibson, Sr.. My folks worked very hard to not pass on the racism they were brought up with - we accepted that as a character flaw in the g-parents. Didn't mean we didn't love them, but it was still behavior that you couldn't approve. Mel hasn't gotten to that point.
Thanks for the comments, Sal. Given that the EMBLOS is German, she deals with some of those issues, as well.
Cheers.
Amen, brother. I can think of nothing better to say.
Keep fighting the good fight.
Thanks Will.
Cheers.
I found your story online by accident when I was searching for information on the First Baptist Church of Affton. I attended this church when I was young, and was also a part of the vacation Bible school. The old brick Dairy Queen is very dear to me.
I think your story is expressive and honest. The honesty in your writing will carry the message.
Thanks.
Christie, thanks for stopping by.
We attended Bible school there for several years although we were members of a different Baptist Church. I still go through that intersection regularly, as it's near my daughter's school. When I do, I always remember that lesson.
Thanks for visiting and come back anytime.
Cheers.
Randall, thanks for the link to this post. You tell the story very well and I can feel your mother's pain over the incident. Growing up Presbyterian in NC, we sang that same song in Sunday School, but here were no "red, yellow or black" children there then and probably few today...
I remember my sixth grade NC history book had a picture of a lynching in Moore County (where I grew up), taken back in the late 19th century. I was ashamed and didn't want to admit that I was from there--what if one of those men was my great-grandfather.
thanks for posting this piece, although the memories are painful, they are also hopeful.
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