I recently flew across the ocean with Tv on The Radio (best rock n roll band on Earth!) gratefully employed as a guitar tech. You know, it's been a while since I've flown anywhere and since I last flew apparently planes became flying cinemas with loads of on demand goodies to watch.
On this flight the film 12 Years a Slave was being shown. I had put this one off for years now, I can't handle slavery films. I had heard about its brutality and after seeing the film Sankofa 20 years ago then Beloved I had sworn off watching another. But I decided to watch this one. I knew what I was going to see and I knew I'd cry on a plane full of strangers. But what I didn't know exactly was what would move me.
The scenes of beatings, rape, lynchings, horrible.... I watched Roots when I lived in Germany in the 70's. Yes, a similar horror show, a similar of survival. But the 2 scenes that really brought me to the brink of screaming were the one on the slave ship where the protagonist is talking to Michael K Williams character (one of my favorite actors!) and another slave. Michael K is not going to lie down, he is alive and set on escaping even if that means killing his captors. He dies 4 minutes later as he is trying to save a young woman from being raped by an evil slave trader. But it's what the other slave says that made me so furious. He gives the protagonist advice for survival: Keep your head down and don't let anyone know you can read or write or that you are intelligent at all. If you do that is your death sentence. In a later scene the protagonist Solomon Northrup (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor) is talking to Brad Pitts character, a decent man. Pitt ask him to tell his story and he's afraid to do so, fearing for his life. That is the scene that brought tears. Not being able to tell your story, to live a life of hiding. There is no greater horror story than this.
One day as I was putting my life into a storage facility in Los Angeles I had a nice conversation with the manager there. He had some lovely silver jewelery and he admired my silver ring. He was a handsome black man. He said something to me about how he just keeps his head at water level as to not be seen otherwise, he will be beaten down. This cat was well dressed, had some status in his job and whenever I went there he brightened my day which was full of fear at this point and yet, he's diminishing his life for fear of being beaten down. Beaten down by who I wonder?
I read a book by Swiss child psychologist Alice Miller about oppression. She shares a story about a family she counseled. The parents were partisan fighters during WWII. They lived in the woods hiding, eating rats and stolen potatoes, surviving as best as they could. They met each other, fell in love and did what they had to do to survive. When it was over they started a family and never spoke of the horrible war days. They had 2 kids, a boy and a girl. When there was stress in the house the 2 children would run away.....to the woods and hide for days or weeks at a time, living on whatever they could steal to survive. They had no idea what the parents had lived through. It wasn't until the entire family worked together in therapy that the past was revealed and things changed quickly. No more running off to the woods. The wounds needed to be out in the open. But it is interesting how the pattern gets passed from one generation to the next even if it isn't spoken of.
I knew my mothers family came from South Carolina. We had land near Myrtle Beach in some little town I'll never see. I knew that in the 1920's my Great Grandfather got into some trouble and the KKK wanted to end his life. The story I was told was that he was a bit of a rascal and was accused of moonshining which as the story goes, was probably true. He fled, and my grandmother who was a little child at that time got her earliest memory of getting into a big old car in the middle of the night and fleeing to Baltimore. My great grandfather became a much in demand wall paper man who wore one of those railroad engineer caps.
It was the cap that seemed a mystery to me. Why a railroad cap? Hipster Luddites wear them today cause they look cool. Not too many hipsters around 80 years ago. Something about that didn't add up but I went through life re-telling the story as it was told to me. I also went through life keeping my head down, thinking I wasn't the brightest bulb in the lamp post and diminishing my chances at success by thinking I didn't deserve it or this world is hostile so why really put the effort out there. I don't know why I had these peculiar negative attitudes, they are so contrary to my own true nature......
When I turned 39 I learned the truth about my great grandfather. He worked on the railroad and travelled all over the country. He was a brilliant man, well spoken, an orator. He would come back to his little town, go to the barber shop for 'coloreds" and tell stories of a better life elsewhere. He was what those Klansmen called "Uppity". He owned a piece of land in South Carolina and had a bit of status. He was marked to be murdered because he was smart, well spoken and decided to help other people choose a better life. He was a bright light in a sea of ignorance and intolerance. A beacon of hope and love. That's why they wanted him dead. He was a threat. A rebel spirit. Not a moonshiner and certainly not an idiot.
When I learned the truth I was furious, then I was quite depressed for some time. Why was the truth hidden for so long? Yes, I'm smart and my true nature doesn't allow me to fit in to this stupid society yet, I've lived much of my life as a lie, hiding out and trying to fit in much like my storage space manager. That is the essence evil: destroying oneself to fit in. This is what evil does.
I can choose to sit in resentment of those Klansmen, those southern ways, my family for not telling me the real story but I forgive all of them. I look at it this way. If this didn't happen I would not exist and I love this life I have been living. It keeps getting better too. If they had stayed in South Carolina my mother wouldn't have been born and my father certainly would not have met my mother. It is fate. And if for some reason I would have been born in South Carolina, I couldn't survive there. Do I feel entitled to a piece of stolen land there? I could get into that idea but, ask me if I want to live outside of Myrtle Beach and the answer is a solid "hell no". There is nothing wrong with it but it's not the life for me.
And besides, it's enough to know that my Great Grandfather was an ass kicker. He was a brave soul who stood up to a monstrous world and made the best choice he could make for the survival of himself and my family. Best thing about the past is the past is dead. It's a corpse and it cannot hurt me or anyone else. We get to start over right this very moment if we so choose. I choose to start again every day now and I feel so blessed that I live in a world where I can do that now. My great grandfather chose to live and for that I am grateful.
JB
On this flight the film 12 Years a Slave was being shown. I had put this one off for years now, I can't handle slavery films. I had heard about its brutality and after seeing the film Sankofa 20 years ago then Beloved I had sworn off watching another. But I decided to watch this one. I knew what I was going to see and I knew I'd cry on a plane full of strangers. But what I didn't know exactly was what would move me.
The scenes of beatings, rape, lynchings, horrible.... I watched Roots when I lived in Germany in the 70's. Yes, a similar horror show, a similar of survival. But the 2 scenes that really brought me to the brink of screaming were the one on the slave ship where the protagonist is talking to Michael K Williams character (one of my favorite actors!) and another slave. Michael K is not going to lie down, he is alive and set on escaping even if that means killing his captors. He dies 4 minutes later as he is trying to save a young woman from being raped by an evil slave trader. But it's what the other slave says that made me so furious. He gives the protagonist advice for survival: Keep your head down and don't let anyone know you can read or write or that you are intelligent at all. If you do that is your death sentence. In a later scene the protagonist Solomon Northrup (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor) is talking to Brad Pitts character, a decent man. Pitt ask him to tell his story and he's afraid to do so, fearing for his life. That is the scene that brought tears. Not being able to tell your story, to live a life of hiding. There is no greater horror story than this.
One day as I was putting my life into a storage facility in Los Angeles I had a nice conversation with the manager there. He had some lovely silver jewelery and he admired my silver ring. He was a handsome black man. He said something to me about how he just keeps his head at water level as to not be seen otherwise, he will be beaten down. This cat was well dressed, had some status in his job and whenever I went there he brightened my day which was full of fear at this point and yet, he's diminishing his life for fear of being beaten down. Beaten down by who I wonder?
I read a book by Swiss child psychologist Alice Miller about oppression. She shares a story about a family she counseled. The parents were partisan fighters during WWII. They lived in the woods hiding, eating rats and stolen potatoes, surviving as best as they could. They met each other, fell in love and did what they had to do to survive. When it was over they started a family and never spoke of the horrible war days. They had 2 kids, a boy and a girl. When there was stress in the house the 2 children would run away.....to the woods and hide for days or weeks at a time, living on whatever they could steal to survive. They had no idea what the parents had lived through. It wasn't until the entire family worked together in therapy that the past was revealed and things changed quickly. No more running off to the woods. The wounds needed to be out in the open. But it is interesting how the pattern gets passed from one generation to the next even if it isn't spoken of.
I knew my mothers family came from South Carolina. We had land near Myrtle Beach in some little town I'll never see. I knew that in the 1920's my Great Grandfather got into some trouble and the KKK wanted to end his life. The story I was told was that he was a bit of a rascal and was accused of moonshining which as the story goes, was probably true. He fled, and my grandmother who was a little child at that time got her earliest memory of getting into a big old car in the middle of the night and fleeing to Baltimore. My great grandfather became a much in demand wall paper man who wore one of those railroad engineer caps.
It was the cap that seemed a mystery to me. Why a railroad cap? Hipster Luddites wear them today cause they look cool. Not too many hipsters around 80 years ago. Something about that didn't add up but I went through life re-telling the story as it was told to me. I also went through life keeping my head down, thinking I wasn't the brightest bulb in the lamp post and diminishing my chances at success by thinking I didn't deserve it or this world is hostile so why really put the effort out there. I don't know why I had these peculiar negative attitudes, they are so contrary to my own true nature......
When I turned 39 I learned the truth about my great grandfather. He worked on the railroad and travelled all over the country. He was a brilliant man, well spoken, an orator. He would come back to his little town, go to the barber shop for 'coloreds" and tell stories of a better life elsewhere. He was what those Klansmen called "Uppity". He owned a piece of land in South Carolina and had a bit of status. He was marked to be murdered because he was smart, well spoken and decided to help other people choose a better life. He was a bright light in a sea of ignorance and intolerance. A beacon of hope and love. That's why they wanted him dead. He was a threat. A rebel spirit. Not a moonshiner and certainly not an idiot.
When I learned the truth I was furious, then I was quite depressed for some time. Why was the truth hidden for so long? Yes, I'm smart and my true nature doesn't allow me to fit in to this stupid society yet, I've lived much of my life as a lie, hiding out and trying to fit in much like my storage space manager. That is the essence evil: destroying oneself to fit in. This is what evil does.
I can choose to sit in resentment of those Klansmen, those southern ways, my family for not telling me the real story but I forgive all of them. I look at it this way. If this didn't happen I would not exist and I love this life I have been living. It keeps getting better too. If they had stayed in South Carolina my mother wouldn't have been born and my father certainly would not have met my mother. It is fate. And if for some reason I would have been born in South Carolina, I couldn't survive there. Do I feel entitled to a piece of stolen land there? I could get into that idea but, ask me if I want to live outside of Myrtle Beach and the answer is a solid "hell no". There is nothing wrong with it but it's not the life for me.
And besides, it's enough to know that my Great Grandfather was an ass kicker. He was a brave soul who stood up to a monstrous world and made the best choice he could make for the survival of himself and my family. Best thing about the past is the past is dead. It's a corpse and it cannot hurt me or anyone else. We get to start over right this very moment if we so choose. I choose to start again every day now and I feel so blessed that I live in a world where I can do that now. My great grandfather chose to live and for that I am grateful.
JB
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