OUR TALKS ARE MORE FREQUENT, URGENT
Most of my adult life I have tried to live by the Bible and an old deodorant tagline, “Never let them see you sweat.” It’s one of two phrases that served me well after a lupus diagnosis in my late 20s. The other — “Life is too short. Don’t sweat the small stuff. It’s all small stuff ” — I quoted every time I signed off the radio during my work as a DJ at KSDS Jazz 88. It wasn’t something profound that I had come up with, but the combination of two ideas Dr. Robert Eliot wrote about in his book, “From Stress to Strength: How to Lighten Your Load and Save Your Life.”
When my daughter came along years later, I had no doubt those two phrases would help me keep my sanity. I would use them as my daily mantras and later I thought to use them as a couple of guiding principles for her. What I hadn’t really considered preparing for until the last few years were “talks” to protect her from the ugliness of others.
When my daughter was in the first grade, she would come home from school, upset by something that had happened — a chastisement from a teacher or some perceived slight from a classmate — and we had the first of our “talks.”
It was rather benign, with the introduction of my deodorant mantra: No matter what was happening, no matter how frustrated she might be, no matter how much her feelings might be hurt, she had to keep cool. She couldn’t let anyone see her sweat. Whatever she couldn’t resolve with the help of a teacher, she should brush her shoulders off and let it go until she got home. Then she could cry, she could be angry, she could share her frustration with me, in the comfort of our home. Together, we would figure out a way to make it better.
A couple of years later, I moved her to what was considered a better school, where she was one of a handful of Black kids. We had another of the
“talks,” but this one was more specific. This one involved issues
I knew I could not always help her make better. We talked about not being that girl. That girl couldn’t react negatively to perceived or real slights, that girl couldn’t be too loud or too boisterous, and that girl couldn’t be caught up in girl drama. Like it or not, that girl would be the first person some people would look at if there were issues at school.
Any time we talked about that girl, it was understood what I meant: that Black girl.
It was important for her to understand that as good as she might be, some people would not see beyond the color of her skin and would judge her accordingly. To help her remember what I expected of her while at school, we had a short phrase we said every day, right before I let her out of the car and she walked into the schoolyard: “Be kind. Be respectful. Be a blessing.”
Now that she’s in middle school, the “talks” are more frequent because she has a much greater awareness of life around her at her age than I ever did. These talks have become more important, more urgent and often more frustrating. They are talks her friends may never know, discussions that because of privilege they will be blessed to never experience.
The talks are much less about protecting her fragile, child’s heart and more about giving her tools to protect her mind, body and soul. The talks are about things she’s heard, read or experienced, and include how to best navigate this sometimes unfriendly and racially divisive country and world. These talks are about helping her appreciate what makes her different from her friends, and standing up for herself when others may try to put her down for that difference. And as much as the talks are an opportunity to discuss her questions and concerns, the talks are also a way to allay my fears as the mother of a Black child growing up in America in 2020.
We’ll continue these talks along with other ones, until I believe she is able to handle herself in whatever situation she may find herself in. I want to make sure I do everything in my power to keep my baby from becoming another on a list of senseless and inexcusable deaths like Breonna Taylor, Botham Jean, Trayvon Martin and George Floyd.
In the meantime, as we continue down this road called life, we’ll continue to do what we do. And you’ll never see either of us sweat.
I gave her some guiding principles that have helped me keep my sanity. What I hadn’t really considered preparing for until the last few years was my need to protect her from the ugliness of others.