Walking back through time ...

It appears that my son, Bob, also recently engaged in nostalgia for times past. On the occasion of his Del Valle high school reunion -- he took the time to do something I've never had the courage to do. He returned to the home of his childhood and took his camera along. I've only driven past that lovely home twice in all the years since we left it. Both times were accidental in that I was a passenger in Tom's car and tried to pretend I didn't notice as we took the curve at Boulevard Way. He lives within a quarter mile of 2501 Warren Road in Walnut Creek.

I'd forgotten how lovely it was -- and of how much life we lived there ... times both awful and wonderful beyond measure. This lovely view of Mt. Diablo from the property often returns in dreams ... .

The house was on the market when Bob visited so he had a chance to walk around among the trees and let the memories lead him back. I'm not sure that I could do that, even now. But then I've never returned to the house that Bill and I shared on the topmost ridge of Berkeley; high above the university campus during the 80's. For reasons I've not given much thought to; I've never willingly retraced my steps -- not even to the home where I grew up in East Oakland. Wonder what that means?

I've lost track of the architect, Sewell Smith, the courageous Quaker who designed it. He would hardly recognize his masterpiece at this point. Over the years the redwood 4-bedroom home has been painted and the interior completely altered (according to Bob who managed to walk through). The swimming pool has been bulldozed and filled in and many of the fruit trees removed or replaced by ornamentals. No more wisteria nor any sign of the huge English walnut tree that overhung the deck. The Las Trampas creek which borders the back acreage still meanders through though I'm sure its bed has changed many times since we left. And it's no surprise that Bob thoughtfully included snapshots of a place where raccoon families shared the land with us and where tadpoles could be found in spring.

I'm sure that he remembered those hot summer evenings when he and David (and sometimes Rick) would drag their sleeping bags out behind the pool to bed down under the giant oaks. I remember how disconcerting it was for their less than courageous young mother who watched them traipse out for their starlight adventure knowing that I was almost too timid to go out with a flashlight to check on them should there be a call in the night; certainly not without my eyes cast downward and fingers in my ears! The sound of an owl or the sight of a possum could send me into sheer panic!

Looking at these snapshots reminded me how Biz, a neighbor's loving cocker spaniel used to sneak in at night and join the kids as they slept out. I remembered Helsa, our wonderfully protective German shepherd -- then later Barnaby -- the hilarious Old English Sheepdog we loved so much. The puppies, cats, turtles, rabbits; pets galore who shared that home with us for years on end.

Found myself wondering, while dropping off into troubled sleep last night -- just how well did we prepare our children for the world they would grow into? The pain inflicted by racism surely left its scars on their lives; pain we were unable to protect them from. How fair was I in so stubbornly demanding my rights to full equality at the expense of their well-being? I'm not at all sure that our good intentions compensated for the psychological and emotional damage they were exposed to. Yet -- despite all -- I love the people they've grown up to be. We're good friends who enjoy one another -- and being together when time and distance allows; Bob, David, Dorrie, and me. If only we'd been able to save Rick ... and if Mel had lived long enough to have known all of his grandchildren.

I see what are sincerely affectionate feelings being expressed for Sasha and Malia Obama, and great admiration for their parents. It's heartening to see, but for some of us it has come at least a generation too late.

...but one thing was perfectly clear in looking back at these idyllic photos. Mel and I surely did our very best to provide a good life for our children. Our world at that time didn't support us in that effort.

Would I want to do it all again? Only if I could live it this time with the acquired wisdom and courage that came with years and years of growth and change -- both for me and for the country.

Maybe we were just too far ahead of the curve.


Still missing Rick today, but a visit back to our early days as a family through Bob's photos seems to make it all a bit less painful. Maybe this can be considered a part of letting go ... not only of a son, but of memories of the good, the bad, and the ugly -- all essential parts of life, and in Rick's case, death.

Next week it's back to "rangering," with a panel at Santa Rosa Community College.

How wonderful to have meaningful work with which to anchor a life.

How strangely doth the mind work ...

I've been feeling weary. Listless. Not quite "in or of this world" ... all day.

Just noticed the date as I closed out that last entry.

Today is March 11th. It would have been Rick's birthday -- had he lived to celebrate it. Has it really been ten years?

I'm making progress in a small way. Ordinarily I would have been aware much earlier in the day -- or anticipated a renewal of the pain for at least a week leading up it.

I suppose one never really lets go of a son whose life was cut short.

In a few hours it will be March 12th, and the memory will again fade and life will go on as before.

Writing on my journal has moved down on my list of priorities ... and I've missed it (and you) ... .

There have been many demands on my time of late, and I must admit to some creeping fatigue. Am not ordinarily at such a low ebb as I've felt these past several days -- not sure just why that is, but it could be simply the demands of the past two months.

Found myself a couple of weeks ago sitting before an assembly-hall filled with little ones. I was the centerpiece for the Black History Month celebration at the invitation of the African American parents of Quail Run Elementary School in San Ramon, California. There were two assemblies; the first for K-3rd grades and the second 4th & 5th. Beautiful children who filed into the room and seated themselves on the floor in a most orderly fashion.

It was lovely to notice that this collection of bright little faces was quite possibly the earliest evidence I've actually seen to date -- of the non-majority-majority status now enjoyed by this state. I noticed on their website that one-third of the student body is East Indian. The racial groups in the room represented not only East Indian but other Southeast Asians, Native American, African American, European-American, in almost equal numbers. I suspect -- a number of kids were from below our borders in South and Central America and Mexico, though they were not nearly as visible among these children. It was a veritable rainbow of faces -- the world as it is fast-becoming.

Since this is a very new community with the new school isolated on otherwise empty acreage for at least a mile around -- bordered on one side by newly-built homes giving way to a vista of empty fields for as far as the eye could see. It was a safe guess that these were children of Silicon Valley techies and scientists from nearby Mountain View for the most part and pretty much of a relatively privileged class. San Ramon is also the corporate base for Chevron-Texaco worldwide operations.

One of the parent planners who emceed our assembly presented a PowerPoint on a large drop-down screen of black icons (Dr. King, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, W.E.B. DuBois, etc.,) -- asking the children to identify each and introducing those unknown with brief bios. This was followed by a choir of little ones singing "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" (the poet James Weldon Johnson's Negro National Anthem) followed by another small group performing "step dancing," an art practiced in historically black colleges throughout the south. They'd been coached lovingly by another of the moms.

I was delightfully surprised at how well-informed these children were with many hands raised excitedly -- great participation! These were far and away the best informed kids I've seen at these grade levels.

It was my turn, finally. So, seated at the edge of the stage looking "rangerly" in full uniform including my impressive Stetson and gold badges and name plate, I read 3 poems to them -- poems written by black poets (I liked the Nickie Grimes poem best) -- and was well received. I asked as an opening how many poets did we have in the room? Three fourths of the children raised their hands. Great!

Then it struck me: This roomful of beautiful multiracial-multicultural children were only one part of what was before me. As I looked out at the adults in the room, I noticed (seated around the edges of the audience) that every member of the teaching staff and the few administrators in the hall were white. There were 4 African American mothers (the planning group), and one or two fathers.

I'd originally wondered how this assignment fit into my outreach role with the NPS but as the programs came to a close and the children filed out, the African American children and parents remained behind and gathered 'roun with their cameras. It was picture taking time and everyone wanted to be photographed with the park ranger.

I knew then why it was important that I accepted this engagement. In this San Ramon school on this day I was the only authority figure (besides their parents) who looked like the audience! Small wonder that I was feeling almost revered. They'd listened in total silence as I read the poems. It certainly was not because I was a reader of the caliber of Maya Angelou or Nicki Giovanni. Those young ones were awed by the uniform. Maybe (as I often suspect) my garb was announcing a career choice to some who might not ever have considered such. Something that was unattainable to me during my own childhood. I hope I never forget that; or of just how dramatically the world has changed.

The teachers had obviously done a great job in preparing their students for this day. It was evident in their responses. Yes, they were white teachers. But in these days of increasing costs of training -- fewer people of color are coming out of the schools of education, right? Maybe it matters not how open our institutions are to the need to democratize the teaching profession -- if only those who can afford to get into the colleges and universities get to become teachers and if fewer and fewer students of color can do so -- our good intentions will be pointless. Given the 52% dropout rate among minority high school students in this state -- what hope for change is there really?

I'm accustomed to occasionally working before school audiences in the inner city. How different this was. Appearing before an obviously middle-class audience of children who enjoyed privileges afforded by attentive parents and a good teaching staff -- offered a very different environment than some of the classrooms I've been exposed to in Richmond. It gave lots of food for thought on the long 45 mile drive home.

It felt good in many respects to have been a part of something of meaning to those children, and for that I was grateful. I'd had a glimpse of what is possible -- given enough resources, attention from parents with the time and the energy to participate in their children's school lives -- and teachers willing to go the extra steps to satisfy the need for cultural identification ...

It was another good day.

Adventures in the Media ... or, Betty in Television Land ...

The call had come shortly after our return home from the east -- one of several requesting appearances for a variety of Black History Month programs. Nothing unusual. It has been so for the past few years and I've begun to look forward to them now that I've lived long enough to be black history.

One of the early calls came for an on-camera interview to be done at the Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco where I would participate in a video on lifelong learning for the Centennial Commission of the National Park Service. My segment will be combined with others in preparation for a national conference to be held at Gettysburg in August. I was asked to be in uniform and would be filmed for about an hour for what will end up as a brief part of the final presentation. Easy. I've gradually become more comfortable with this aspect of my work.

Because these interviews were all related to either my recent visit to Washington or to Black History Month, I was not prepared for the call from KPIX - Channel Five, in San Francisco. I'd agreed -- expecting more of the same -- only to find myself sitting in the lobby of their building the day after the Medical Center taping, learning that I'd agreed to serve on a panel on the subject of bi-racialism! This had apparently grown out of the feature article which appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle on the eve of our trip. Yes, the same article that had caused me to object to as being out of sync with my self-identification.

It wasn't until the other panelists arrived that it slowly dawned - what I'd gotten myself into inadvertently. And -- here I was in full ranger regalia at an assignment that really required my conservative black crepe suit with pearls -- conservative dignified older woman garb. Chalk one more up to confusion caused by events-moving-far-faster-than-I.

Dana King, news anchor, (also bi-racial), had brought together a small group (4) of light-skinned "African Americans" to discuss "living as bi-racial citizens in today's national scene." This, being clearly related to the racial status of our new president.

I felt totally out of place. I did not feel appropriate to the subject or to the panel since I do not identify as bi-racial. This may seem nuanced to others, but it's very basic to me. Had this happened in any other decade of my long and varied life I might have given any number of answers as to my skin color's effect on that life. In these final years I'm quite clear about who I am and of what it means in the scheme of things. I am African American. Black! No ambivalence about that. I would have it no other way. As stated during the interview, I'm no longer becoming. I'm now simply being, and it matters greatly to me just how that is viewed.

My problems around skin color come from external sources. I look out of this casing, not at it for the most part. Were it a matter of race being determined by the degree of melanin in one's skin, tanning salons would have taken care of this debate long ago. It is not. If it were, actor George Hamilton and golfer Vijay Singh might find themselves with a lot of 'splainin' to do!

I am Black because I've lived the Black Experience. That cannot be changed. The ultimate test for me is that -- if suddenly out of nowhere the sound of Marvin Gaye's "What's Goin' On;" Aretha's "R-E-S-P-E-C-T!": or anything by Ray Charles or James Brown were to fill the room my head would begin to bob to the right; my middle fingers and thumbs would itch to connect, and my chromosomes to leap up in a grand high five! I can join any conversation in the middle of the fourth paragraph with any other black person who walks into my presence (providing they're not speaking some other language) ... and ... though I've acquired enough culture to know not to applaud at the end of a movement during a chamber music concert ... (along with other folks like me), I secretly suspect that there is no Bach composition that couldn't be improved upon with a little Miles on trumpet, Max Roach or Joe Jones on drums, and Charlie Mingus on bass!

At this age, I'm convinced that there are more cultural than biological elements to race and that they're produced by life experience. I will forever be marked by having grown up under the "one drop rule."

So be it.

I could only vaguely identify racially with the beautiful brown-skinned curly-haired young panelist seated to my left during the interview -- whose mother was "a green-eyed fair-skinned blond" and whose father was obviously not. She made it a point to mention that she operates a camp for bi-racial children (suggesting race as pathology?). Her plight was as alien from my life experience as could be; more like that of our new president. She stated during the course of the interview that she now identifies herself as a "barack."

Bi-racialism occurred in my family during the mid-19th century but we (like most other people of color) are by now polyracial and forerunners of what the world's people are now or will become within the lifetimes of future generations.

But I'm praying that -- what is culturally rich and distinctly different from all others -- will not be lost to the whole. That -- as has happened with my magnificent African-French-Cajun-Creole New Orleanian heritage -- what is African American in the culture will not be sacrificed upon the altar of acculturation.

If we could strip all of the black jazz/gospel/blues influences from America's music -- there would be little left but Lawrence Welk!


Photo: Dana King, news anchor - KPIX-Channel 5.

This has been a memorable week, even more than is usually true in my extraordinary ordinary life ... .

We're in the middle of Black History and at the onset of Womens' History Months; both tend to move me front and center due to my increasingly visible role as a national parks ranger. Since returning from Washington there has been a rise in public interest, furthered by the article published in the S.F. Chronicle just before we left for the Inauguration. I came home to a full calendar of events to which I'd committed before leaving and then spent the last couple of weeks fulfilling those obligations.

Returned late on Thursday evening, so stayed at home on Friday to try to move myself through the time zone glitches and emotional fatigue. On Saturday I'd promised to meet with the Rosie the Riveter Youth Corps -- a group of young high school students for whom I'd done an interview some weeks earlier. They're learning to use media to collect oral histories and I'd been one of their subjects. Today they would be videotaping for a later presentation to the community. Still later (last Saturday) I would be photographed for their project. Easy. Right. It was an unmitigated disaster!

Keep in mind that this on-camera interview was taking place within two days after returning home and before I'd spoken a word to anyone about the experiences in Washington. I'd not even called in to my office on Friday so all of the affect that had built up over the previous week of larger than life experiences was dammed up behind my eyes and in my heart and right in the middle of answering one of my young interviewer's questions I found myself sobbing uncontrollably! Fortunately it came late enough in the interview so that I could simply stop and call it a day. I left the kids looking confused and me -- feeling miserably embarrassed, but hoping that we could have a do-over in a few days when the dust had settled and some kind of normalcy had returned. Offering to come back to re-shoot, I walked to my car across the empty Saturday afternoon school parking lot in the light rain and headed for home dejected but recognizing more fully my very real limitations.

Interestingly enough, they've since decided to not re-shoot the interview. I've agreed as long as they agree not expect me to ever have to watch it. I'm not sure I could bear that, but I'm not persuaded that "keepin' it real" for young people is a bad thing. By mutual agreement, we'll let it stand.

I don't think that I'd realized before the incident that so much pent-up emotion was lying in wait ... and that I really needed to process the experience before I tried to share it.

That's where you come in. It was sitting here at my keyboard that the real debriefing began; culling through the photographs and re-living the moments. I'm not sure what I'd have done had I not been able to share the experience where no one can see the tears or sense my vulnerability ... .

A few more of my 2,000,000-plus new best friends ... .

"The lifetimes of three women" ... starting with Mammá who was born into slavery in 1846 ... freed at the age of 19 with the Emancipation Proclamation ... .

(Still having problems -- have no idea how to get rid of the clone image -- but am posting anyway and will work it out later.)

Have been trying for days to upload the PodCast that was created at the National Park Service headquarters in Washington ... no luck yet ... but I'm still trying.

The reason I'm so anxious to post it here is because I'm having such a hard time making any sense of the actual experience at the Inauguration ceremony. I believe that -- in those few words (the video is about 5-minutes) on camera -- I may have described it all. No amount of thinking improves on those few sentences.

Unfortunately, my camera didn't work for reasons I still don't understand, but that appeared to be true for others seated around me. It may have had something to do with the frequencies in the atmosphere. I simply don't know. Tried to take some photos with my cell phone but it was very new and I'd never tried to take pictures with it before. They're in the phone somewhere, but I haven't the foggiest notion of how to transfer them to my computer.

I've reached the point in my technological development that there are wires and cables and transformers scattered throughout my den -- and I've completely lost control over the entire domain! They've been separated from their "parent" apps, and at this point I have no idea whether they're meant to service the cell phone, my computer, my portable DVD player, the printer, scanner, little rechargeable battery charger ... see what I mean?

The very thin veneer of technological expertise that I've been hiding behind for lo these many months is beginning to give way to Doofus-ness, and there seems to be very little to be done about it.

Until I either figure this out, or, am able to find some Nerd upgrade somewhere buried in my aging persona, I'd suggest that you go to www.nps.inau/ then follow the link for "The National Park Service, Where History Happens." I know it's there but I can't figure out how to bring it here. Tomorrow I'll call public relations and ask them to send a DVD. That may solve the problem and bring back my badly-damaged self-confidence!

Incidentally, except for the staff at the National Park Service, these interviewers seemed to be approaching anyone who they thought might be a "story." They had no idea who I was or how important I may or may not be. It was not personal at all. They were simply searching for the story and I caught their eye; probably my obvious senior status. We're the ones with the memories and the obvious connections to the struggles of the past. On January 20th we became relevant to the young as the carriers of the lore of our times. These encounters with these young black media professionals had the quality of respect and status in this new age that stretches somewhere far beyond cynicism. It was a good feeling; an experience I thoroughly enjoyed. It felt as though in some way I was invited into a partnership in their work. I didn't need to see the final product. It was enough to be involved in the process -- together recording history.






Photo: Top left Jody Lyles, producer of the PodCast at NPS.
Center left: Interview at Lincoln Memorial for Canadian Television.
Bottom: One of several on-camera interviews done at the Lincoln Memorial for various channels.

Visit to the Museum of American History ... and into my own past ... .


It felt as if I'd stepped into a time warp ... and that young Betty might pop up at any moment. Strange experience. There was that sometimes feeling of standing outside myself looking at my process. Crazy!

I thought of Les Williams and Francis Collier, two young men who would later serve as Tuskegee Airmen,and whom I once dated as a teenager. Thought about my young husband, Mel's, vain attempt at serving his country; finding himself a victim of discrimination in the Navy that would have made him a messman when he'd volunteered to fight! And he'd left his senior year at the University of San Francisco to do so. Thought about his lifelong feelings of disappointment at having failed his country when his young friends had managed to bury their humiliation and give it their best. (These are thumbnails so you may want to click on the picture to read the newspaper headline.)

Those feelings in juxtaposition with the historic happenings on the Capitol Mall -- the feeling that -- despite all contrary logic, it has all happened so fast! The illusion that within the past few hours time had collapsed into some alien dimension that sharpened my sense of the pliancy of our Constitution that would have allowed us -- within my lifetime -- to have moved from that awful truth to this new reality. How could this be?

In front of the White House with a few of my two million new best friends... .



Lunch at the Corcoran Gallery. Along the walls is the Richard Avedon exhibit.

On Tuesday morning (Inauguration Day!) we woke to another frigid day; an icy cold grayness ...

The phone had screamed at around 5:30 a.m. The voice at the other end was that of Kathy Hoffman, field rep for Congressman George Miller. She was to be my guide for the day. Martha had no ticket for the seated area and would be standing in the purple section, a place we'd checked out the day before. Kathy was coming in on the Metro and we needed to make some decisions about where to meet in the crowds we were sure to encounter. Our tickets had carried the warning that we had to be prepared to go through security and be in our seats no later than 9:30 for the 11:30 start of the ceremony. Kathy's call served as the alarm to get all that started.

With sleep no longer possible after the shrill awakening, Martha and I (having timed the walk the day before) began to prepare. For me it meant getting into uniform but Martha had decided to not get into full ranger dress since that would subject her to being stopped for directions by the public at every turn. I hoped that - by being uniformed -- I just might be recognizable to my kids back home should there be a camera anywhere around. (Ya nevah know.) Besides, we were theoretically on a working mission and I was on duty -- besides being the congressman's invited guest.

I showered and slipped into my very expensive long johns (guaranteed by the label to protect me from the cold), exchanged my polyester black regulation turtleneck for my black cashmere sweater that I would wear under my government-issued gray long-sleeved shirt. For the second time I wished fervently that I'd thought to slip my little flag pin into my jewel case. I'd never ever thought of wearing it before now. I knew that it was optional -- something added after 9/11, I believe, except for this day when I'd have given anything to have had it with me.

I remember looking into the bathroom mirror and seeing my mother there which brought a grin as I recognized her. Where on earth had Betty gone to? Maybe it was a sign of fatigue that made me look and feel so much older today than I did yesterday ... but I quickly pulled my hair back into its clip (have I ever worn it otherwise?), brushed on some eyebrows with a little stub of a pencil marked "charcoal", and completed the look with a little blush and lip gloss. Slipped into my hip-length regulation raincoat with down innerlining zipped into place against the bitterness, topped it off with my very distinguished dimpled ranger Stetson, packed tissues into my pockets and .. and, dropped the little snapshot of "Mammá", my enslaved great grandmother, Leontine Breaux Allen, into my breast pocket for the long walk past Mary McLeod Bethune and the Lincoln Emancipation sculpture, "Freedman," joining the thousands of folks snaking their way along the 13 blocks -- through crowded sidewalks and empty streets now filling up rapidly with eager "new best friends" from Everywhere, U.S.A. Mammá would share this day with me. It was for her as much as for myself that I was here at all. I was very much aware of her presence every minute of that historic day.

All auto traffic had been barricaded out. The crowd grew to what I would have described in the past as almost alarming proportions as we neared the Capitol, but the feeling of love and anticipation overwhelmed any apprehensions I may have been harboring. This would be beautiful and warm and caring and I had to be open to it. The long blocks may well have been automated since I had the distinct feeling of being carried along on a kind of people conveyer with little sense of effort or strain. It was like being caught up in a great tidal wave with resistance being replaced by something I couldn't name -- as we neared the site where history would be made on this day.

It was now about 7:30. Kathy met up with us at the agreed-upon intersection. We would spend the next two hours walking, lining up, waiting, waiting, waiting, being processed through security, and -- eventually -- finding ourselves seated in Section 15 within sight of the Podium but even more importantly, with a JumboTron close by -- watching this unlikely, previously unimagined pageant play out before us for the next several hours.

Magical!

Top right: Little snapshot of my great grandmother, Leontine Breaux Allen, 1846-1948, enslaved until the age of 19.

Bottom: Homeland Security!

Martha and I arrived at Dulles airport late Sunday evening, January 18th ... .

The flight was pleasant -- the plane filled with Californians flying in for the Inauguration. At landing, the pilot sent back a message over the PA system welcoming us to Washington and the great event. A general round of applause went up from throughout the plane. We were all on a mission!

We had the evening to settle into our little apartment and a full day before the historic ceremony. On Monday we rose early expecting to preview tomorrow. I layered on "smart" wool long johns with a specially-insulated long-sleeved top, added a black cashmere turtleneck sweater then the down inner-lining that zipped up inside my green trench coat, plus black wool scarf, plus ear-warming woolen head band topped by a pure wool beret and wool-lined leather gloves. I was ready for whatever lay ahead. We took off to brave frigid 17 degree weather for the 4 mile walk toward the Capitol Mall. We would visit museums and galleries -- all new for me. Martha had spent considerable time in and out of Washington recently, and had lived there for a time while doing a 3-month detail for the NPS. In the bitter cold, that day, we walked the entire length of the Capitol Mall from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial. Having her as guide removed all signs of fear at being in a strange city among greats crowds of humanity (I'm seriously claustrophobic). Anticipation pushed all of those distractions away. Being phobic just wasn't an option. Not this day.

During the walk I was able to put names on many familiar Greek-columned federal buildings that gave a majestic feel to our walk. Martha provided identification for the rest. We were taking the time to scope out where we would be sitting/standing tomorrow; where the security stations were; to marvel at the thousands of PortaPotties that were standing in wait (all locked tightly to prevent folks from sleeping in them overnight, we were told). We would learn on Tuesday that many had camped out in the cold the night before, and that tens of thousands had arrived on the Mall by 5:30 Tuesday morning.

Learned from the PR staff at National Park Service Headquarters on the day after the Inauguration that the crowd was estimated to be the largest in Washington, D.C.'s history. The next largest being at the gathering on the Mall of the Promise Keepers some years ago. Though the official count published by the Washington Post and accepted by the NPS was 1.8 million, the actual count had to be far higher since tens of thousands never made it onto the Mall to be counted. Martha would be among them since her standing-room space (purple ticket) never made it at all (along with many others including many legislative aides and campaign workers who'd given two years of their lives to see this day). But that's a sad story for another day.

On day two we visited the World War II Memorial and made the discovery of the bas relief that are relevant to the homefront story. By prearrangement we were able to have an NPS guide who filled in much information that was new and which made the visit really memorable.We stopped in to hear a presentation by a trio of African American gospel singers singing songs of liberation at the Museum of American History. I was struck by the huge numbers of young people (teens) among the listening crowd. There was also something intangible but nonetheless clearly evident in the fact that half the visitors to these museums were African Americans from everywhere who would never before have explored these important resources with the new sense of ownership that was now clearly theirs. Whole families were wide-eyed and actively involved in "our" nation's history. In the near future we should anticipate a huge increase in visitation at the country's historic sites and that bodes well for us all. Education will finally hold real relevance to ordinary young children of color. There is now the feeling that -- after a long and painful past -- America's promise has finally been kept. I remember silently hoping as I watched eager young faces -- that the warmth I was experiencing in those moments could be radiating from here out into world ... .

On the Mall were elaborate "encampments" for the news media. It was interesting to note that the largest crowds were gathered 'roun the MSNBC facilility. ABC has a similar arrangement but at that time there was no program in progress and it appeared deserted. Watched for a few minutes when Andrea Mitchell was anchoring a roundtable featuring prominent African American leaders. It was fun to see Usher ( teen idol) for the young who crowded around the trailer that was serving as a Green Room. They were obviously hoping for autographs. It was one of those times when I felt old and irrelevant because I no longer am able to spot current celebrities and am still haunted by the face of an older gray-haired man that I was sure was someone important but I simply could not put a name to. I might have lined up for his autograph had I been able to call it up from memory ... .

After watching for a few moments we proceeded past those gathered around one of the many JumboTrons where re-runs of the Sunday Dr. King concert were being viewed. I was captivated for a time by the giant image of Marian Anderson singing "America" on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial long ago. I stopped for a few minutes to watch and listen. Almost dissolved into tears but the feeling was fleeting. The coming together of so much history was overwhelming. Disorienting. Surreal. Found myself wishing I'd picked up one of those little flags from one of the many vendors along the way ... or that I'd at least have worn the little lapel flag pin that was still sealed in its little plastic bag, in my jewelry box back home.

It's all so different now; as if the world has shifted noticeably under our feet and that a total re-balancing is in process.

I was beginning to understand about "patriotism" in ways previously unknown to me. It is love of country from the inside.



Bottom right photo: Taken at the Lincoln Memorial where my friend, Ranger Kawther Elmi, ( we met at Albright Training Center at the Grand Canyon in February) gave us a grand tour. The Washington Monument in the background stands at the head of the reflecting pool that was frozen over.

Several weeks before we were scheduled to arrive in Washington ...

Martha managed to secure a small basement apartment for us to rent for our 4-day visit. It was just about a mile from the Capitol in reasonable walking distance. It wasn't sheer luck but required some diligence on her part to find a place at a time when there were no hotel rooms left between Washington and Baltimore! It was located on East Capitol within the District of Columbia and was just a block away from Lincoln Park where the Freedman's statue as well as that of the great black educator, Mary McLeod Bethune were located.

The Freedman's statue was new for me. It was commissioned and financed by former slaves to honor Abraham Lincoln. The campaign was launched by a woman who contributed the first five dollars that she earned once emancipated. The plaque is so moving (see below).

I've now lived long enough to have memories that include encounters with iconic figures who are now a part of history. Mrs. Bethune is one such.

I remember being a teenager when she visited Oakland as a guest of a church group or PTA (I'm not sure which), but I recall hearing her speak at the Highland elementary school auditorium in our neighborhood. All I can recall of that day was that she looked an awful lot like one of our neighbors and that she wore a big hat and had a booming voice. I can hardly imagine that one day I'd be standing before this great sculptured likeness in awe of her contributions to black life.

It is the same way that I remember hearing the late great Langston Hughes read his poetry in that same humble setting. Can't remember that I was all that impressed at the time, but then how in the world would I have known that I was listening to greatness? Makes me wonder who among us today will be memorialized one day in statuary and murals 80 years from now? Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt or Steve Jobs and Maria Montessori? Could be.

In preparation for the trip I'd picked up a portable DVD player and a copy of the 7-hour video of John Adams; the HBO documentary. I intended to watch it on the flight in preparation for witnessing the Inauguration ceremonies. I wanted to prepare myself for this adventure in every way possible so that it would be as meaningful as I could make it. Heaven knows there's enough information in every form so that there was no excuse for not being prepared. What little I knew about the life and times of the founding fathers had atrophied over time, and I was about to witness the inauguration of the 44th president of these United States, and needed to know what that means in relation to the original intent of those men who laid the groundwork for this progressive, inventive, colorful, painful, dramatic, and sometimes horrific history that I am so much a part of. John Adams might be key to that understanding. It worked magnificently. I watched succeeding chapters each night at the end of long days of museum and gallery visits ... and, of course, on the night after the Inauguration. I felt that I pretty well understood the intent and the process before falling asleep exhausted but ecstatic at the end of that memorable day, at least to the extent that one could capture all that in a 7-hour series.

Text of plaque:

The idea and first donation for this monument was by Charlotte Scott a freed slave from Virginia, who was residing in Ohio. Having heard of Lincoln's assassination, she told her employer "colored people had lost their best friend on earth". She told her employer that she wanted to honor Lincoln with a memorial and to donate the first money for it. Along with the first $5 Ms. Scott had earned as a free woman, the employer forwarded her request on to the Western Sanitary Commission in St. Louis where the suggestion was taken up enthusiastically. The commission then offered Thomas Ball the work for the $18,000, which had taken two years to collect, all from freed slaves. The slave statue was modeled after Archer Alexander, who is said to have been the last man captured under the Fugitive Slave Act.

Still chewing on that Bi-racial thing ... so before I let it go ...

I remembered why it's so important to me.

It has always been beyond understanding that the country continues to see the issue in future terms -- as if some dire circumstance will befall humanity at some future time, if we don't take heed and maintain those walls of separation between the races ... .

Silly! There's nothing new here, folks, we're as old as time itself.

For as many centuries as we've been deploying armies throughout the world, we've been creating mixed race children. We did it during slavery when the importation of African slaves was outlawed -- slave masters began creating their own "livestock" by impregnating black slave women and eventually selling their own children (yes!) into slavery. After every one of the endless military invasions and occupations in every corner of the world, we've left children behind -- often to be abused for being different from homogeneous populations. And you can bet, in the many foreign countries where today's armed forces are based, there are mixed-race children being born and -- as often as not -- abandoned when occupation ends and servicemen return to the United States, England, France, Holland, Germany, etc., when the dread of non-acceptance back home wins out over honor and responsibility. I do, however, believe this is diminishing in our time.

There are Mulattoes, Eurasians, Indo-European, Mestizos, Creoles, and every other conceivable racial mixture on every continent where conquering armies have ever lived for any amount of time in occupation. Many children were conceived from unions based upon love, but many more were born of sexual exploitation -- as a part of the spoils of war.

Is there really anyone out there who doesn't know in their hearts that we long ago broke through those walls of separation, and that any attempt at restoring or clinging to racial purity is beyond any hope of attainment?

Why, then, is there so much fear of miscegenation when it is a simple fact of life?

That being said ...

Photo: My granddaughter, Rosie, an example of poly-racialism. (See her blog under Creolebelle's weblog listed in the links above the archives.) Alicia Keys, Mariah Carey, Jessica Alba, Hallie Berry, and Keanu Reeves, Tiger Woods, all of my beautiful children and grandchildren, and a host of other public figures can be counted among the bi- and poly-racial population.

The last day of the Grand Adventure ...

There is no possible way to describe the past week's events and communicate what it was like. You've read all the obvious things already, of course. CNN, MSNBC, and the New York Times has covered it all. Never has an event been so completely reported. What more can be added? Except, that is, what my experience was like and what it meant to me. And, having said that -- how on earth can I ever get all that into mere words?

But I'm reminded that "words" are all we have, really, and an important part of my experience involved the utterance of no more than ten sentences that were returned to me yesterday in a PodCast that would surely deny the ineffectiveness of "mere words."

On Wednesday, the day after the ceremonies at the Capitol, Martha and I visited the National Park Service headquarters at the Department of the Interior. It provided an opportunity to see the heart of this huge system of parks, monuments, historic sites, and wilderness areas and to meet those who are the senior planners and administrators for the entire system. It was amazing!

During a visit to the public relations department a young woman entered the office to tell us that they were working on a PodCast of very brief interviews of park staff that would express reactions to the Inauguration and the NPS's participation in all that occurred. She asked if I would be willing to say a few words for their camera -- to add my impressions of the experience for their piece. Of course. With that she ducked out and returned a moment later with her equipment and -- in a matter of no more than perhaps ten sentences -- twenty at most -- I said my piece on the fly. No planning. No rehearsal. One take.

Yesterday I received a link to the NPS website where the completed PodCast has been placed with access to the entire NPS system. I was stunned!

Those "ineffectual" few words had been transformed with dramatic images that brought tears! It is beautiful, and true, and real, and wholly the work of creative and imaginative skilled technicians. It will be available at some point perhaps on the public NPS.com pages. When I have the proper linkage I'll post it here. The title is The National Park Service - "Where History Happens."

I will never again underestimate the power of words nor the ability of media experts to interpret them with such sensitivity.

Tomorrow I'll try to begin to describe the week and what it meant to me -- this time with more of Martha's pictures to illustrate and the words that are beginning to form themselves in ways that just might do justice to the experience. After watching that lovely piece, I'll never again underestimate the power of the spoken word when enhanced by appropriate images.

I'll try... .

I must; for my family, at least.

Photos: Top left with Martha Lee, Superintendent of our 4-park consortium, Rosie the Riveter WWII/Home Front National Historical Park and Acting NPS Director, Dan Wenk.
Middle photo: I'm standing before a beautiful mural of Yosemite National Park that graces the entrance to the National Park Service Headquarters.

Where does one start ... ?

Yes, I'm home again, but only part of me has actually landed. Most of me is still up there hovering in space waiting for the rest of me to catch up!

So much to respond to ... beginning with that really generous featured article in the S.F. Chronicle on the day that we flew off to the Inauguration. Not sure who that 87 year-old Rosie was that he was referring to, but it bore little resemblance to me. I've learned that a 2-hour interview is no guarantee against a good reporter being pressed by the demands of the story that he wants to tell. One tends to become the vehicle against which this can happen, and little more. The woman in his story reads like someone I might like to know, but she and I share little in common.

Let's deal first with that bi-racial label I acquired when I wasn't looking:

I am African American. Some years ago during the Sixties I was "Black" (the non-compromising politics of the times demanded no less), and before that, "Colored." And my New Orleans-born father, Dorson Louis Charbonnet, would insist, "Creole." During the Fifties, there were a few other labels that might have applied, but never in mixed company and not without a whole lot of pain and suffering. But bi-racial never got tacked on for whatever reason. That's new, and never before applied to me, except descriptively and perhaps externally.

We're all going to run into a lot of this stuff because of our new president's rightful claim to that designation, and of the continuing need of folks to categorize by skin color, and that's a conversation we all probably need to have, and maybe now's the time. Reporter Kevin Fagan has provided a great way to do just that. (And I might add that I've never "had to drink from a white's-only water fountain," nor do I recall ever "hearing stories of slave whippings from my great-grandmother," sorry, Kevin. Made for a good story, though.). Funny, I've come to believe that my own extraordinary ordinary story is dramatic enough, and that little embellishment is needed -- but I'm apparently alone in that belief.

First, President Barack Obama's black Kenyan father and white Kansan mother brought together two parents of pure strains which (if we were to apply the theories of the Monk Mendel, the renowned geneticist) would make him truly "bi-racial." The basic theory of Mendelian Law when applied to botany states that the first hybrid is superior to either of the primary subjects. That would mean (if we were talking about roses) that we would have produced a super specimen through such an experiment.

If applied to biology (and this is pure speculation on my part), it might be that President Obama is more than incidentally the remarkable person that he is, or that his ethics, intelligence, morality, compassion and empathy, are not accidental but are inherent in his being. I like that.

The front-page lengthy article that came out on Monday with the headline, "87 year-old Bi-racial Rosie heads for the Inauguration" or words to that effect appeared to be the reporter's attempt at making me more relevant to the story of the day. I consider myself neither a Rosie nor bi-racial, however, except very peripherally. Somewhere, far back in the mid-1800s, that Mendelian link was probably forged and bi-racialism occurred in my Breaux-Charbonnet-Allen family tree. That would have been the result of the African-Creole-Cajun-French-Spanish links (white/black). I'll need to look more closely at that history in order to confirm that for myself. What I do know is that we certainly didn't befoul the human gene pool.

However, by the 15th generation that our huge and multiracial multicultural American family has become, we can no longer be described so simply. If anything we, like millions of people of color in these United States, have become poly-racial, forerunners of what the world's people will someday be in the not so distant future.

And that brings us to two days ago on the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C. There we had the full spectrum of what America has become over the generations since those founding documents were created by some first class idealists and dreamers whose vision was simply not yet large enough to fully realize the scope of what they'd created. How could they have guessed -- in the days of month's-long sea travel across oceans, that one day mobility created by undreamed of technological achievements that would reduce travel time to hours and days and would have brought new visionairies from faraway places throughout the world to settle in this place -- to continue to build and dream new dreams that would one day extend us into the heavens and beyond!

I felt an undeniable kinship with President Obama when -- in his inaugural speech -- he mentioned that "...60 years ago my own father would have been refused service in the resturants of Washington", and I recognized that -- whatever else one might be said about his bi-racial heritage -- he was one of us, because he'd lived the black experience. It was then that the tears came and the kinship to power reigned down. I searched for my cellphone and connected myself to my children back in Berkeley -- in some magical way -- to extend that power to them, too. And to my great grandmother, Leontine Breaux Allen, whose little picture was in my jacket pocket next to my heart. I knew my family was watching, and the unbelievable reach of technology in our times brought us all together -- I, sitting before the fantastic panorama unfolding before us at the nation's Capitol (in my cold metal folding chair in Section 15) -- and my family back home at the outer edge of the continent on the shores of the Pacific ocean!

My identity as a black woman comes from the fact that (despite my ambiguous skin coloring which might make me appear to be almost anything) I have lived the black experience. That can never be erased, no matter how long I live. But I also suspect that my grandchildren may have lived into an era (as have yours) where that will no longer set them apart or bring them together (I've seen both) -- any more than will Sasha and Malia have need to claim it. The "Black Experience" has some years yet to go before we've grown past it as a nation, but in the meanwhile, it was impossible to walk among those millions of America's new best friends on the Mall, and not feel that we've entered the age of poly-racialism and that we're going to have to find some new ways to discriminate if we're determined to keep alive the embers of inequality that has cursed this nation for so long.

But for now, I remain a product of the "one drop rule" which I cannot shed. I've lived too long and too painfully to allow myself to lose what is my greatest source of pride in these days of racial ambiguity. I've paid my dues to be able to survive on my own terms as a black woman. My children and grandchildren will confront their own times in their own ways. I pray that I've provided them a model of how that might be done, and that -- however they identify -- it will be with pride and dignity.

It's important to me -- in the telling of my own story -- to never forget that on both paternal and maternal lines is the awful reality of slavery. This is an authentic and shameful era of American history that is yet to be fully processed. Using that as a baseline, I can feel the enormous pride of having attained the right to have been witness to the swearing in of the 44th president of these United States in the full realization that my chair was sitting but yards away from the dais -- and upon land which countless slaves had labored without hope of freedom. They'd been hired out by their masters for the building of the magnificent Capitol building and the White House -- the home that our new president and his young family were about to enter in this, his first term as the Leader of the Free World!

As crazy as it sounds, through tears of joy and disbelief, I felt a kinship with this remarkable young man and his family -- knowing somewhere down deep that he will be stretched to the limits of his considerable capacities -- but that his varied background (like my own) has prepared him well for all that lies ahead.

Wish I could put into words my feelings at the visit to the Lincoln Memorial, but maybe by tomorrow the rest of me will have joined the part that landed at SFO yesterday. For right now, I'm still partially "up there" hovering in space-- looking down upon a brand new nation that was reborn on January 20 in this year of 2009. And I was feeling an essential part of humanity -- this time without reservation; only unspeakable pride and joy and such a sense of humility and inadequacy in the face of what is yet to come.

Photo: The little boy who is now the president of the United States of America. Being one of the 2 million stand-ins for the countless others watching and listening throughout the world was an unanticipated thrill of a lifetime. The awareness of that honor was with me every minute.

I'll post my own photos from this historic adventure as soon as I can get them downloaded and posted. Meanwhile, back to unpacking ... .

Find myself lingering over an earlier entry -- the one about the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag (see January 10th) ... .

In thinking back I realize that even as early as those tender years I was unable to place blame for the dilemma. It was as that precocious teenager that I first came into contact with those feelings, but there has been a persistent denial throughout my life -- an unwillingness to place blame upon those around me. It's true, however, that I've not been nearly as forgiving around other issues as I've been about the Pledge. Is it possible that I was already aware at some subliminal level that we were all victims? That I was able to see my schoolmates as blameless and my teacher as unknowing is the pattern that I"ve continued to extend to others -- a pattern that followed me through life? Whenever I find myself faced with the need to rise and proclaim my patriotism, the confusion kicks in. I resent it, but I do not resent those around me. I'm not sure that I fully understand what any of that means.

I wonder now if that didn't have a lot to do with my having grown up in the west without the obvious signs of discrimination that southern black children were so enured to? Those whites-only drinking fountains, and schools, and cemeteries, etc.? It really wasn't until the devastating experience of moving to the suburbs that I came into the actual brutality of racism at a personal level.

The home front workplaces during WWII had certainly prepared us for segregation, but that was in the aggregate. Every person of color around me was suffering similar humiliation so it was in many ways not nearly as toxic and far easier to express resistance to and to organize against. We were not facing it alone. But even then, I may have sensed that "The Lie" was systemic and of no living person's creation, and that those with hands over heart reciting the Pledge were sincere in participating in a ritual that held great personal meaning. Their pride is unquestionable and I, as an African American, can accept that as real and enviable. It is always with a sense of guilt and some loss that I've withheld the actual voicing of those deceptive words, "...with liberty and justice for all". As I've grown older and wiser, I've gradually become aware that at the time that those words were written we were not a part of the all. And, apparently, most Americans (except for maybe John Brown and those who fought so valiantly with him at Harpers Ferry) hadn't yet taken the time to notice.

Even today, I tend to see the problem as less one of human (white) failure as much as a systemic flaw in our institutions. Not so much the sins of Jane or John Doe, personally, but as unknowing and unsuspecting heirs to "White Privilege," therefore individually innocent. I suspect that the reason that I was able to face down that crowd of hostile home owners in Gregory Gardens was because in some way I believed that those white folks were culturally deprived and that I could be of help -- if they would only allow me to. And how insane is that?

But white privilege requires black acquiescence in order to work, and the conflict between those concepts have only recently started to be confronted directly. At least the process has been introduced into civic life. Perhaps that's what occurred on November 4th when we the people went to the polls and overwhelmingly demanded change -- and brought it into being.

The next four years will bring forth conversations that were never before possible, certainly not across racial lines. Those conversations have already begun.

Maybe this is one of them ... .

And to this -- I will bring full voice!

Photo: This was taken at Dorian's dedication ceremony, before we were at all aware of her mental handicap. A pretty ordinary American family, right? Hardly one that should have caused the near-riot by moving into an otherwise all-white community. Fortunately for us, we all survived it and life went on -- eventually and after much pain.

I can't wait to share it! This official invitation -- suitable for framing ... .

This beautiful invitation to the Inauguration of President Barack Obama and Vice President Joseph Biden. Found it in my mailbox only a few moments ago.

It's letter-sized on heavy ivory stock and looks impressive enough to turn heads and soothe hearts, even those of the socially wounded.

Now I'm going to go out to the Mall to buy myself a bigger hat!





Photo: (Can't figure out why it scans lopsided when it isn't) but in order to read the text you'll want to click to expand to full size.

Some housekeeping details on how to use this blog ... .

Since I didn't create it in the first place, I was late in discovering that there are some hidden features that are really helpful in finding one's way around.

By the way, it was created by a gifted artist, the late Sage McKenzie, of Austin, Texas, a member of SeniorNet, the online community where we were both active. It was Sage who used her professional expertise to extend my reach into blogging. I miss her. She became terminally ill and passed away before we could manage the much-needed tutorial. I think that I just (ever-grateful for her generosity) closed my eyes and started to type. Unfortunately, we never met except in the virtual world of the Internet.

But back to the process:

I recently made some accidental discoveries when a friend suggested that I write a book about life with my mentally handicapped daughter, Dorian. As a former director of a school where such children were main-streamed -- she knew of parents who were struggling with similar challenges. Our obvious ability to co-exist relatively painlessly seemed to hold some interesting promise for others, in Careth's opinion. It occurred to me at the time that I may have already written that book, and that all that was needed at this point might be some editor willing to pull that story together into publishable form. The thought has never occurred to me to do so since I've never had any way to assess how others might be living their versions of "Life With Dorrie."

And, no, I cannot see myself ever having the time necessary to become a serious writer. The catharsis and sheer pleasure of blogging is a welcome release, but ambition stops just about where we are now.

One day I looked up above the banner (across the top of the screen) and noticed at the far left above my picture and the archives/directory, that little white search bar. Slipped Dorian's name into it and all of the posts that mentioned her by name (from 9/2003 to the present) popped up! Tried again with "Rosie the Riveter" then "National Park Ranger" then "Papa George" and "Mardi Gras", "Hawking", "Einstein," and "DJ Spooky and Hip Hop", "Unitarianism," and Voila!, up they come, magically. In these almost 700 accumulated entries there may be enough separate stories to fill my bookshelf at least once.

Not being a professional writer, I'm not sure that I could ever do that, but I do know that it's possible. Having lost all sense of where my fingers have rambled on this keyboard over the years; and what adventures, trials, and triumphs that I've dealt with over time, discovering that precious search bar managed to magically bring it all under my control for the first time. I'm sure it is what Sage intended.

I've rarely bothered to go back to re-read older posts, but have chosen intentionally to remain in the present for the most part after an attempt in the beginning to recapture personal history. I eventually found that the past tends to roll out quite naturally from the present and doesn't need more than that to come alive again.

Maybe you, too, will find it so, in the reading.

And -- if you're interested in seeing my park ranger persona in full bloom, try "Civic Engagement" for a place to start, then scroll down to the post for August 26th, 2007. And don't be confused by the fact that this entry appears at the top -- it will, but if you'll scroll down you'll find the relevant others.

Photo: Dorian at 19 working at the Children's Zoo on the shores of Lake Merritt in Oakland, California.