Reverend Al Telling It Like It Is

Every Wednesday on the Tom Joyner Morning Show Reverend Al Sharpton shares his thoughts on the latest hot topics in the news.  Today I applaud his commentary and appreciate him for showing us a different way to look at this issue about President Obama’s comment about same-sex marriage:

On the same-sex marriage opinion given by the president there’s been a lot of opinions on both sides.  I have said from the beginning this is a civil rights issue, not a religious issue and those that are trying to make it a religious issue I think have not answered some very hard questions.  If we guide government by the religion that we believe then what religion is that going to be?  We have a thousand different denominations in the Christian church, so according to whose understanding are we going to start doing law.  The fact of the matter is that people who don’t believe in God at all get married.  Marriage is sacred to those of us that believe.  But what about atheist that goes to the court to get married?  We don’t make it against the law for them to do it.  And when we get a divorce, you just finished talking about Deion Sanders; we don’t go to the pastor to get a divorce we go to the judge.  So let’s stop acting as if people don’t have the right not to believe as we do.  Do I agree with people who don’t believe as I do – no.  But they have a right to disagree with me.

The president gave an opinion.  He said in his opinion that people should have that right.  He did not propose a law.  He did not pass a law.  What is hypocritical to me is that nine states including Maryland recently and New York they made same-sex marriage a law where they can do it.  None of these people said that they would stop voting for those governors.  Nobody said anything about those governors and those laws.  They waited until to the president gave an opinion – not a law.

So let me get this right – if there is an opinion by the president you’re not going to vote for him so they can now appoint to the Supreme Court, they can take care of healthcare, they can take care of the economy, they can deal with your voter rights all of that because of some people you disagree with are getting married downtown.  But you didn’t take that position at home with your governor.  They call it hypocrisy; they call it talking out the both sides of your mouth.

My colleagues in the ministry some of them have sinned against their own flock and we said pray for them.  The president gives an opinion and we throw him into eternal damnation.  I don’t agree with that.

Relocation Day

For the past several months I have been planning and preparing for today’s move.  For the third time in 5 years I will be relocating my mother to a facility to take care of her while she’s living with dementia.  I remember the first move like it was yesterday.  It was the most gut wrenching decision I’ve ever had to make. At that time she was more independent, she knew who I was and even though there may have been some confusion, she could communicate with ease.  She hated leaving the comfort of her home, losing her driving privileges and living in a community of people where she felt no connection.  Thinking about this as I type brings tears to my eyes.  At that time, upon my departure after every visit, she would watch me walk down the hallway.  Before I’d turn the corner I would always turn around to wave goodbye to her. My heart would break every time seeing her yards away hanging outside her doorway just to bid me adieu.  My feelings of guilt were strong; I always felt like I was abandoning her.

As the years went on and the disease progressed, it continued to be difficult for me and I became more numb.  I’ve experienced every possible feeling in the book and had to come to terms with my new reality.  To this day I still have some feelings of guilt that she is not living with family.  I envy those who can keep their loved ones home, have the means to do so and have the family members who believe it’s normal to help with the care.  But I realize that those that are caring for her and the other residents who I’ve witnessed watching over her are now part of her family.

That is why today’s relocation will be hard…again.  You build attachments to residents and staff members – some more than others, but all the same I am saying goodbye…again.  There are many residents who I’ve enjoyed spending time with, especially since there are those who do not get many visits from their own family members.  Now we are off to a new place with a new system, new surroundings and new people who I hope will become like family to my mom.  A physical relocation is one thing, but an emotional relocation is very different.  I am praying I will find comfort with both.

Faith Restored…Slightly

Last week I expressed concerns about the choice of nursing home I made for my mom.  Listening to my gut took me on the journey of researching new options and hitting the road with my aunt to visit half a dozen new places.  After crisscrossing three counties, meeting some really wonderful administrators and learning a lot about the different nuances of elder care facilities all roads led back to my original choice.  I am happy I went the extra mile to see more places, which takes the notion I had for settling on a place off the table.  I do however still have concerns for a few of the attitudes and personality traits of some of the “front of the house” staff members I have to deal with to get my mother’s affairs in order.

I am happy these individuals will have nothing to do with my mother’s daily hands-on care.  The staff managing her care has presented themselves to me on every occasion as being warm, caring and competent.   I will continue to take the brunt of any awkward exchanges with the business manager and the admissions coordinator.

It amazes me when the people who should ease the concerns of family members during such a difficult time in their lives, don’t and continue to retain their employment.  I have chosen to take on the new mantra of The Osmonds’ One Bad Apple.  In this case there are a couple of bad apples, but I can’t let their shortcomings spoil the whole bunch.

Having Reservations

I wish I could say I secured a table for a decadent meal or I am preparing for a dream trip.  Instead I am having reservations about the choice of nursing home I plan on moving my mother to on May 1^st.  For thousands of caregivers who cannot provide the proper care at home and make the difficult decision to place a loved one in a facility it is a heart wrenching choice.  I have had to live with this decision for 5 years now.  Five years of paying the astronomical costs for care is forcing me to move her to a facility that accepts Medicaid.  The money runs out so quickly when you’re paying $6,000 to $10,000 a month.  A month.  Not all facilities accept Medicaid so that slashes your options.  Then from those options, none of them really live up to the standard of where you’d want your loved one to be.  The idea of having to settle is not a comforting feeling.  In life we are encouraged to never settle – not in relationships, not in choosing a hairdresser, a therapist, a place of employment.  You always want to find the best fit.  There is no such thing as a best fit when it comes to health care facilities.  There will always be something or someone who rubs you the wrong way.

I have a couple of days to finalize my decision on the move.  At this hour my gut is telling me not to move her to this new place.  I know I cannot keep her at her current facility because they do not accept Medicaid.  I don’t have the time or energy to write about how I feel about elder care in America and the Medicaid system right now.  Thinking about this will only upset me more.  All of this is timely and what I am dealing with today as you read this.  I pray the solution will reveal itself quickly and the only things that will become settled are my concerns.

Role Play

We all have roles in our family.  I am the youngest of three.  I am the baby sister.  I am also the little cousin to my maternal first cousin Andréa.  I am two years younger than Andréa and when we were kids we’d like to play ”restaurant.”  We’d go around and take food orders and attempt to create meals for our family members.  Our culinary skills were limited.  I recall we primarily made scrambled eggs and fried hot dogs, and maybe BLT sandwiches.  I found it funny though that it took the two of us to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  My aunt still likes to tell the story that the art of spreading the jelly was my forte and the role of applying the creamy peanut butter to the Wonder Bread went to my cousin.   In honor of today being National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day, I wanted to pay homage to this sweet little memory.    

   

 

Wanted: One Golden Lasso Ring

This is one of my favorite pictures of my baby cousin, Heather and me.  Yes, my hair is a hot mess and I am rockin’ my beloved Grease t-shirt, which I eventually made into a pillow!  We are proudly posing in front of the Wonder Woman mural my uncle painted on Heather’s bedroom wall.  I love how the three of us are color coordinated and actually my hair sort of resembles that of the mural version of this rock star shero.  Anyway, my uncle thought it was important for her to have a strong role model to look up to.  And wouldn’t you know it – my cousin has grown up to be her own real life Wonder Woman.  I am so proud of her!

To my surprise one day I met the real Wonder Woman. The summer after I graduated from college in 1992, I was working as a receptionist for the new sports radio station in the DC area called WTEM-AM, Sports Radio 570.  I was stunned when the door swung open and there was Lynda Carter standing before me.  Not only was I confused as to why she was at a sports radio station, but also her scent was so intoxicating I was taken aback.   It was Diana Prince in the flesh, and she was just as nice and lovely as she appeared on-screen.  We chatted for a while before she headed back to the studio for her interview about a tennis tournament she and her husband were hosting that coming weekend.  It’s rare when I am in the presence of entertainers that I get star struck, but she caught me off guard.  Secretly in my head I wanted to ask her to spin around, but how silly would have that been.

I knew at some point I wanted to blog about my encounter with Wonder Woman, and with the latest news events I was compelled to tie this memory in with the Trayvon Martin case.  I know I have been posting non-stop about Trayvon, but more than likely I will continue to do so off and on until justice is served.  With all the crazy tales coming from the George Zimmerman camp it’s becoming more and more insane to hear what’s being reported.  We want justice and the truth.  Who better to get it?  Wonder Woman.  We need her Lasso of Truth.  That special golden lasso forces her captives to obey and tell the truth.  If I could summon Diana Prince to spin into Wonder Woman, jump into her invisible plane and head to Florida with her Lasso of Truth I would do it in a heartbeat.  And in a heartbeat I bet George Zimmerman would be behind bars faster than you can sing and jam to the show’s theme song:

A Rite of Passage

Thirteen years ago I held my friends’ first born Christopher for the first time.  Yesterday I experienced another first.  That baby boy became a bar mitzvah.  I admit I am not learned in Jewish culture so I was excited to attend the ceremony to celebrate this accomplishment plus witness the tradition.  I didn’t even know it was proper to say, “he became a bar mitzvah” instead of saying, “he is having a bar mitzvah” until now.  I was so proud of Christopher as he read from the Torah and made his required speech, which traditionally begins with the phrase “today I am a man.”  I got a bit choked up to hear this child say these words knowing he is growing up and making his rite of passage into Jewish adulthood.

My emotions ran extra deep during the ceremony because I see this young man as another Trayvon Martin.  I have watched Christopher grow up to be a smart, responsible, loving young man who has the whole world ahead of him.  I shared a picture of him in a post a couple of days ago when I discussed the challenges of my friends who are raising young Black boys.   My friends have done an outstanding job.  Christopher is a prime example of multiculturalism.  In his short life, he has experienced more things and people from various backgrounds then I have in my four decades on this earth.

I felt a sense of hope and promise as I left the synagogue.  We have no guarantees how the outside world will perceive him or treat him.  But after a week of frustration and sadness over Trayvon, I had a few hours of joy for Christopher and his potential.  Let’s keep him and all the Trayvons in our prayers.

Universal Rhetoric

I am tired of the one-sided conversation.  I am tired of hearing about The Talk that African-American parents have to have with their sons on how to behave in public.  Don’t get me wrong – I believe The Talk is important, but it’s important for every child. Male. Female. Black. White. Brown. Yellow, Pink. Interracial.  It would appear from the response of some non-African-Americans that The Talk is something foreign to them; they had no idea this was a necessary tool in raising young Black boys.  I find that somewhat odd because since the age of slavery it has been documented in books, movies and in the news, that Blacks have always been forced to walk through the world on eggshells, and had to know how to respond to the likes of:

Are you eyein’ me boy?

Don’t talk back to me nigger!

OK.  For arguments sake let’s just say having The Talk was an unknown fact, but now it’s known and it can’t be ignored now that the lesson has been shared on multiple newscasts on multiple news outlets for the past several days.  But let’s get real here.  Our issues on race relations will never get healed if we only focus on one side of the coin.  Why are Black families holding the burden on how they need to act in the world?  Where are the discussions about how non-Blacks should be conducting themselves in public and how they should be polite, respect authority and show kindness to their fellow-man?  Trayvon Martin and countless numbers of young Black men conduct themselves as law-abiding citizens everyday based on the lessons they learned from their family, but all of that is for nothing when someone else has a different agenda – a different perception.

Education has to set precedence.  In grasping for minor solutions to this major problem I’ve mentioned to some friends that it is time to implement new curriculum in our school systems. Diversity and cultural sensitivity courses should be standardized curriculum beginning in grade school, so the awareness and discussions can begin early. I’m not using calculus in my everyday life, but cultural awareness is used on a daily basis.

If cultural awareness and understanding were second nature for the entire human race there would be less opportunity for someone like Geraldo Rivera to make careless remarks about blaming the hoodie Trayvon Martin was wearing for his death.  Should Mark Zuckerberg and Justin Bieber fear for their lives because they wear hoodies and baggy or low riding pants?

If cultural awareness and understanding were second nature then all the news outlets and their anchors would want to put the same amount of time and energy behind the injustice of all the men and women, boys and girls that go missing or are murdered.  Is Nancy Grace on vacation, or has she shown her true colors by not caring for the well-being of people of color?

Twenty years ago after the Los Angeles riots in 1992 Rodney King pleaded with the world by saying, “Can’t we all get along?” Such a simple phrase that seems so easy to put into action.

Let’s start talking, and not just with people who look like you and are like-minded.  We need to start talking with friends, colleagues and acquaintances who may have different life experience.  We need to learn and educate one another. What do we have to lose by doing this, that we haven’t lost already?

Raising Trayvons of the World

Parenting is not something I can hang my hat on.  I have not been blessed with the responsibility of raising a child.  I have always been extremely maternal and that is why caregiving for my mother is second nature.  Therefore, I know what it is like to worry and give great concern for another person’s well-being.  But I have no way of knowing the first thing of what it must be like to be a mother of a boy, especially a young Black male.

Trayvon’s senseless demise may set “helicopter parenting” into overdrive.  My friends who are raising young Black men have shared their concerns about their own children over the past few days.  They are reflecting even more so now on understanding what it was like for their parents to worry about them growing up and not knowing their whereabouts at all times.  From all reports Trayvon was an upstanding young man, who excelled at school.  He was a young man who had potential for a promising future.  Journalist Roland Martin recently tweeted:

Who says Trayvon couldn’t be president one day. Think about it. Had someone called him suspicious & followed Pres Barack Obama when he was 17 & took his life, history would have never been made.

My thoughts can’t only lie with fathers of Black boys but boys of all ethnicities.  When will the cycle be broken where we are not being judged by the color of our skin and stereotypes dictate how we treat one another?  Fact: George Zimmerman is a Hispanic male who grew up in a multicultural family.  Fact: based on the endless 911 calls George Zimmerman made over the past couple of months he had a fear and prejudice against Blacks.  I can only speculate that George Zimmerman knows what it’s like to be discriminated against.  Mr. Zimmerman has a family and was raised a certain way, but I choose not to speculate the impetus of his belief system.

All I know is this is madness and it has to stop.  Trayvon Benjamin Martin isn’t just the son of Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton, but he is a son to all of us.

Really!?!

For 37 seasons Saturday Night Live has been an NBC staple.  With that kind of longevity, it is hard to keep the material fresh and funny.  So, it’s such a treat when there are episodes where sketch after sketch you find yourself crying from laughter.  This season the shows hosted by Melissa McCarthy and Maya Rudolph filled that bill for me and were complete grand slams.  Thinking about these funny gals made me remember last year’s SNL reunion show on Oprah where original cast member Jane Curtin said that during her tenure (1975-1980) it was a misogynistic environment.

[John Belushi] said, ‘Women are just fundamentally not funny.’ You’d go to a table read, and if a woman writer had written a piece for John, he would not read it in his full voice. He would whisper it. He felt as though it was his duty to sabotage pieces that were written by women.

Speaking of sabotaging women — with the great birth control debate in the news the past couple of weeks, I loved how SNL addressed the issue in their popular bit, Really!?! with Seth and Amy.  I also loved how Representative Carolyn B. Maloney, Democrat of New York, called out the panel by asking the obvious question:

Where are the women? It’s outrageous that the Republicans would not allow a single individual representing the tens of millions of women who want and need insurance coverage for basic preventive health care services, including family planning.

If the House committee wanted to only address a panel of religious leaders why not include women?  Last time I checked there are plenty of female religious leaders that could have taken part.  So much for the expression “You’ve Really Come A Long Way, Baby.”  Oddly enough, the Virgina Slims ad campaign that brought that expression into our daily dialogue highlighted a photo in the background of how men oppressed women, while showing a colorful splashy photo of a happy model appearing in control of her life in the foreground.

Background copy says: In 1962, Mr. Lee Evans made it clear that he wore the pants in the family. But once a week, he didn't mind giving them to his wife.

Background copy says: In 1913, equal opportunity employer Richard Pittman gave women every opportunity to shine.

Looks like the background image and messages from those ads continue to be more appealing to some men and places women exactly where they want them to be — in the background.