Writing Samples: Non-Academic & Academic

IT'S NOT BLACK THING; IT'S A BEAUTY THING; I HOPE YOU UNDERSTAND

So I have been asked a few times why my site is dedicated to Black women and women of color. I was even told that “I wanted to support you and ‘like’ your page, but I saw that it was for Black women, so I didn’t continue reading. THIS MAKES ME SAD.

Yes, there is a dedication to Black women and women of color on my page because I see that there is a need, but it is not ONLY for Black women and women of color. It is for everyone to bring awareness because I see danger.

Growing up in Orange County, California, there were not that many Black people. There were pockets here and there, but for the most part, I didn’t see myself during the week until I went to church on Sundays. I can remember questioning my figure, hair texture and even being afraid to get “too dark” in the summer because of hearing family members say “don’t be out in the sun too long! You are getting too Black,” or "No, you can't go swimming because I do not have time to mess with your hair, " and SPECIAL, pretty hair was "pressed, Easter Sunday/School Picture" hair. These occurrences forced me to fear and question my beauty, and although I loved my tan line and big, bushy hair, I didn’t want to show it off because I didn’t want to hear…”OOOH you got Black today” and grunts of "Having to deal with your hair" with a stink face.

In school, I don’t recall reading ANY stories or literature with images of characters that looked like me. A lover of literature, I had to find the stories on my own. Fortunately and unfortunately, three English teachers in high school(two White men one Black woman) changed my life. When I requested to read stories with “more culture,” English teacher 1 told me, “You are a smart girl, talented with a bright future, but you have to watch out for stuff like that. You are different from the others like you, so you don’t want to be too militant, or people and opportunities may not come your way.” Militant? I didn’t even know what that meant at the time. The sad part is that I took that as a compliment, but I knew something was not right about it. A year later, I asked the other White male teacher about reading “more cultural” literature. He apologized for not knowing of any literature and asked “do you have any suggestions?” He worked WITH me, and we found some literature together. He asked me to share with the class, and my peers received it well. He thanked me later for changing his life. I didn’t understand then, but I know now what he meant. I wish I could find him and thank him.

Also, during this same time, I had an amazing woman come into my life and started the ‘Black Student Union Organization’ at my high school. She was also an English teacher but at another school. She was simply giving her time where she saw a need. This is REALLY where my life changed. She taught us so many things, the first being to love ourselves in our own skin. She would reprimand us for saying things like “Good and Bad Hair” or insults about our complexion. She introduced us to Historically Black Colleges and Universities and other college campuses. She took us on field trips to five star restaurants, every music award show you could think of, every sitcom you could think of in the 90’s, and even started a drill team because, at the time, there was no presence of Black girls on the dance team(with the exception of an alternate). Because of the training on the drill team, a year later, I was able to make the dance team along with others. She showed us a world I didn’t even know existed. My ears and eyes became open, and I saw the world different. I saw that I was beautiful and mattered too and that I could do anything I wanted. I never even considered college before meeting her, even with making the honor roll all my life. To this day, when people ask me what I want to be when I grow up, I say “Mrs. Sampson times 10." I adore her for changing my life.

Unfortunately, everyone doesn’t get these experiences. I was reminded of that when I went to visit my grandmother at a daycare. She was holding a beautiful, brown baby with the biggest eyes. I was so moved by her beauty that I just kept saying “She is so beautiful.” My grandmother’s response surprised me because she has grandchildren in every hue. “She IS pretty for a dark baby.” Because I was trained to respect my elders, I didn’t want to say anything, but I had to because I didn’t want that little beauty to remember those words. I asked Granny, “Why would you say that? Why can’t she just be pretty?” Granny looked surprised and almost embarrassed. I knew she meant no harm, but I knew I had to say something for that baby.

I was also reminded again of these harmful words at a family gathering. An Aunt whom I adore yelled jokingly that she never had another child because she was afraid that if she had a child by a Black man the second time, that the baby would not look like her first biracial child “With light skin and good hair, and I am not about to have no dark babies with naps.” Everyone laughed and just told her she was wrong. I didn’t think it was funny because there were kids around, especially her granddaughter, who does not know any better.

I see my students who come to class still saying “Team Light Skin and Team Dark Skin.” I also see them wearing weaves that do not match their own hair texture. I honestly, do not have a problem with wearing hair as an extension of beauty. I have a problem with the reliance on it. These same students, when the weave is not worn, act completely different when they do not have added hair on their head or make-up on their faces. They don’t speak up as much in class and sort of digress until the hair and make-up reappears. Seeing this hurts. So I make a point to tell them they are beautiful and even ask to take a picture. To see the expressions on their faces light up is priceless…These are college students.

Recently, at a toy store, I was looking for a doll for my goddaughter. I saw a gorgeous blond haired White, little girl with her father. She looked to be about 4 years old. When her father asked her which doll she wanted, she chose a brown doll. I smiled because children are just that way, beautifully innocent and pure minded, until we change them. He, her father, told her she could not get that doll and shifted her to choose the White doll. When he saw I was paying attention, he looked ashamed. He chose the doll for her, and they walked away while she said “but Daddy, that’s not the one I wanted.” My heart hurt for her.

With the new Annie movie, there was a resurgence of ads. Target, specifically, had ads, but none of them reflected the Black girl in the movie. I remember walking by these ads looking for her, but I never saw her. I saw little girls wearing red to reflect the movie, but not images of the lead in the movie. It forced me to remember my Blackness and being overlooked.

Tianna Parker, 9 years old, made national news, after she was asked to change her hair due to a new policy that stated” hairstyles such as dreadlocks, afros, mohawks, and other faddish styles are unacceptable," and after many more headline stories with similar situations.

These same headlines followed with masses of criticism about Gabby Douglas’s hair, Blue Ivy’s constant banters about her natural hair looking unkempt. When my niece, at 7, says she doesn’t like her hair because it doesn’t move, and my students, at a historically Black Women’s College, secretly write to me in their journals that they don’t think they are beautiful, one even said she had to go to therapy because of her self-image issues, I am convinced there is a need.

When the doll test that Kenneth and Mamie Clark conducted over 70 years ago still produces the same results with Black children choosing the White doll/image over the Black doll/image.

When Black women and many curly haired women in corporate America choose to relax and straighten their hair to look more “put together “ and Others admittedly exclude themselves from wearing anything that looks “ethnic” fearful of being too Black or ethnic and not getting a promotion.

I am convinced there is a need.

I am reminded when I see popular magazines being afraid of placing Black images on the front cover for fear of their sells going down or television shows not being supported because of too many Black faces. Again, I am convinced there is a need.

I am even more fearful of what I am seeing in education and other areas. Studies reveal:

Only 18% of Black girls by eighth grade are proficient in reading
· Only 13% are proficient in math by eighth grade.
· Black women are dropping out of high school at 40%
· Black women are leading in new HIV cases
· Black women are leading in breast cancer
· Black women are leading in infant mortality
· Black women are leading in maternal deaths
· Black women are leading in cardiovascular diseases
· Black women are least likely to marry
· Black women are most likely to give birth out of wedlock
· Black girls are most likely to be suspended from school
· Black women are most likely to be ignored for missing person's cases
· Black women are most likely to be overlooked on dating sites
Black women are most often not remembered in a crowd
Black women are most often forgotten when their comments are made in a meeting.

HOWEVER…

With the lowest median of income of all races, ethnicities and gender at about $33,000 a year in the U.S., Black women have the most buying power in hair and beauty products reaching an almost estimated $500 billion a year compared to others with at least half of that.

Bleaching skin products are still on the rise. Look at Sammy Sosa’s before and after pictures and so many others. What does this say to his children and fans?

Although I love it, the fact that there even has to be a NATURAL HAIR MOVEMENT speaks volumes. Recently, Oprah's OWN had a two part show on Colorism led by Iyanla Vanzant and aired two documentaries entitled Dark Girls and Light Girls. On Being Mary Jane, there was a show where the lead actress was almost fired and threatened to change the topics of her show because she wanted to do segments on Black people. Her boss didn’t want “Black TV.”

I even have friends, both White and Black, who are still afraid to even openly share my page or support my blog because of being fearful of what their White friends will think of them “I love your page, but why don’t you say for ALL women?”

This is for ALL women. That’s why I created the page. I am simply tired of Black women being excluded or having to apologize for it. I want EVERYONE to support us and our beauty. I think ALL women are beautiful.

My confession is that I wrote and deleted Black women and women of color so many times on my website and actually lost sleep over it because I didn't want to be judged for it. I was scared because I didn’t want anyone to think I was overlooking their beauty. I was afraid that my White friends would question me. Surprisingly, none of MY friends have questioned me. However, I was told by a friend today that HER White friends said “I started to read your friend's page until I saw it was for Black women.”

I am not ANTI any beauty. I am PRO ALL beauty. That’s why this is so important to me.

I am simply treating this like the infant in need. I remember having a friend with a child with special needs. She was crying and felt guilty that she focused more on her special needs child. I told her not to feel guilty to just explain to the other kids and ask them how they felt. To her surprise, the kids already understood but appreciated her more for explaining. This is simply my explanation with the hopes of understanding.

Black and Brown girls are in need. I speak for Black girls because I am one.

I come from mixed heritage as well, but Black is how I identify. That’s what people see when they see me. I am okay with that.

I wonder if other people/White people question when they see ads and there are no people of color represented. I wonder if it is questioned when they visit retail stores, or country clubs, parties, television shows, movies, videos, when there aren’t Blacks represented or people of color present. Blacks watch, read, and live this reality all time. Most of us don’t even question it because we really don’t know any different. However, it shows up subconsciously in other areas of our lives like when we look in the mirror and don’t think we are beautiful because of what we see or don’t see around us.

There are so many areas of discrimination for so many people, but the Black woman’s experience is different. I read an article that said: unlike Black men and White women, also two underrepresented groups, many women of color have a double jeopardy of their own: race and sexuality. They have to deal with another form of discrimination that is not shared by White women or Black men: being overlooked and invisible.

Further research revealed that these experiences possibly suggest that both self-esteem and attractiveness determine socialization, socioeconomic status, mate selection (Robinson-Moore, 2008) depression, anxiety and low self-worth. I want us to together help our girls and promote ALL beauty.

So it is my prayer that this is not viewed as a Black "Thang," but a beauty "Thang"…I truly hope you understand and support the cause. Our Beauty Matters...

CHARLESTON SHOOTING: LET THE CHURCH SAY AMEN

My grandfather has the early onset of dementia, and this is a pretty tough time for our family because he has been our Superman. I’ve never seen him meet a stranger because he LOVES to talk. Our family became aware of his disorder because of his constant repeating. He can say one thing, and a minute later, he will repeat it as if he never said it. It breaks my heart, but I listen as if it’s the first time I heard the story. However, lately, I’ve been listening closer.

The common denominator in his stories are rooted in trauma, things he never said are now seeping their way out. Understandably, as a retired veteran, he constantly revisits his experiences in the war. He served a few tours and often weaves in how he was treated during Jim Crow. Born and raised in Columbus, GA, there was no escaping it, and although he brushes over it and sometimes jokes about how he was called “boy” as an adult, watched family inventions taken and patented, treated as if he was dumb, and remembers walking by lynched bodies as a "boy," this was his reality, a reality that still haunts him to this day.

While Granny weirdly, almost removes herself from discussing experiences during Jim Crow except for nodding in agreement, Granddaddy refuses to forget yet tries to glaze over it by reminiscing about the “good ol’ days.” This sugarcoating is very reminiscent of Sweet Home in the novel Beloved where Toni Morrison provides vivid description of Black men and women savagely raped and beaten physically and psychologically during slavery. And although every inhumane possible thing happened at Sweet Home, when removed, the characters still spoke about Sweet Home nostalgically. However, there was nothing sweet about it. In fact, it was everything but that.

This "Sweet Home" trauma still lives in Granddaddy and has been passed down to all of us. I guess this can be viewed as another form of generational curses, constantly living in the “never forget” and are forced to remember through sporadic traumatic, experiences.

While I never forgot the essence of my grandfather’s stories, I became accustomed to them to the point of almost becoming numb because they were just that… “stories.” Although I have always felt a little sting, I never thought I'd feel the fire.

Jim Crow has never just been a Southern thing.

Somehow, though I did not live through the trauma of slavery and Jim Crow, I still lived it in other ways. I lived it through my mother’s anger about her own experiences growing up and my father’s advice of always being mindful, but I also had a few of my own.

Growing up in Orange County, California as a teenager, I remember being randomly stopped for unquestionable searches for just walking, being pulled over when riding in the car with my friends while driving speed limit and being asked to take our pictures by police officers just to have them on file, being watched when walking in stores, being overlooked in certain settings, and having “the talk” about having to be 10 times better because I’m a Black woman. What do these messages say to a child?

The paradox is that in a land that “sees no color,” I am ALWAYS reminded that I am Black, by what I see and don’t see in the media and by continuously seeing people that look like me being mistreated and murdered, a series of modern day lynching camouflaged by “we are all one human race” speeches…Indeed, we are one human race, but who actually believes it and lives it?

Lynching is still very much alive. Trayvon Martin, Michael Browne, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Miriam Carey, Yvette Smith, Andy Lopez, Rekia Boyd, the Charleston Massacre, and not so subtle messages in between, We are lynched daily. Many of us knowingly and unknowingly are born with a noose around our necks and death sentences waiting to happen.

Who wants to tell their child they can be anything they want to be “even the President of the United States” but have to give “the talk” behind it by having to explain double and triple consciousness (Being American, Minority, and Black)? where the child has three options: overly rise to the occasion at the cost of neglecting his own culture, do just enough to fit in so no one bothers you, or do much less because of feelings of defeat and ignorance. All are modern day slavery and psychological lynching.

I guess this is part of what Michelle Alexander speaks of when she writes of The New Jim Crow.

I wonder if America is like the functional drug addict in need of an intervention, constantly everyone around sees that there is a problem, but America, like the addict, thinks everything is okay because we appear to be functioning okay, yet we are dying, and killing the very organs that gave us life to begin with.

I’m fearful of lessons unlearned repeated and rearing its ugly head.

This time it took a Bible study of 9 harmless people to awaken us yet again.

I can honestly say that I try to see God in everything, but I am trying my best to find God in this...Perhaps, God is in all of this as a wake up call.

“Let the church say Amen?”

I don’t know, but we need to say and do something…

PRESERVED

Ever felt overlooked or like an opportunity bypassed you when you just knew you were the perfect fit? This has happened to me many times.

I remember looking for a job right out of college. I was applying for any and everything, I just needed to be employed. I went from one job interview to the next only to be met with what seemed like a line of rejections. After receiving notice that I was not selected for the positions, I would dissect whether I said too much of something or not enough, question if it was my clothing, race, gender, age, etc., I would study proper interview etiquette and attire and have mock interviews with family, friends, former professors and follow up with the companies to get feedback. I was determined to know what I did wrong.

As my "somewhat" of a free spirit self, I would like to say that I surrendered to wherever God led me, but that was not the case. I sulked and felt like I wasn't enough. After exhausting myself trying to find a company to hire me, I begrudgingly went to a temporary agency, and they placed me immediately.

Guess what? It was perfect! The office, my teammates, boss, and the atmosphere was exactly what I subconsciously desired and where I needed to grow. That position, to this day, laid the foundation for every place of employment and business opportunity I have had since. It literally prepared me for everything. I realized in being denied the other positions that I was saved for something better.

I wonder if we reframed our perceived loss (jobs, relationships, housing, loans, opportunities, etc). NOT as rejection but actually preservation for something greater.

God always protects his children...

IT'S TOO EXPENSIVE

Imagine having to hold your breath for a second and then breathe and repeating that for a minute, an hour, a day, your whole life. For the minute, the exercise may not seem like much, but for the hour or day, it can be exhausting. Many of us don’t realize that we’ve been holding our breaths our entire lives by not being ourselves. The world, tradition, religion, etc. has convinced some of us that we are to live our lives holding our breath... robotically. We do it so well that we become masters of disguise, and the problem is that we don’t know it. However, without realizing it, it can show up in different ways, such as anger, anxiety, confusion, depression. It is our mind and body’s way of responding to being out of place.

So what do we do? How do we respond to this? We take a step. This can mean taking a leap and doing that thing that is inside of you that you’ve been sitting on, but it can also mean pausing and taking time to listen to get instruction on the best way to execute. The main thing is to be you.

The world was waiting on you when you were born, and we are still waiting.

Not being you authentically is costing you your true existence.

I can’t think of anything more expensive than that.

What’s stopping you?