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Last edited Mon Feb 4, 2019, 04:03 AM - Edit history (2)
at least , we're NOT what we were...As a black woman of MIXED background in a SUPER swirled family, I know that we've come of along way. My grandfather was born and raised in Navarro county, Texas & lived on a rural property outside of one of those "SUNDOWN" towns, (had MANY signs that said,"N****r don't let the sun go down on you!" ) . I have ALOT of bloodlines, (we've known this for almost 40 years due to a a LONG & byzantine Family history researcher. I have European, (Andalucia Spain, Central & southern France, Scottish & IRISH, Welsh, Manx, Cornish & British, Dutch, Polish & German) admixture, Middle Eastern, (Qatar, Oman, Muscat, Yemen, Djibouti, Morocco, etc), Asian, (Southern China, Guangzhou in particular & Philipines) & Native Bloodlines, (Choctaw, Osage Seminole, Creek, Chickasaw, Mikosukee, Black Foot & Mixtec & of course, West African). {We also have family in Oaxaca & Guadalajara, Mexico & they've been there for at least 155+ years} After my mom passed back in 2004, found out about the Mixtec while talking to my mom's oldest brother who told me that when he was a child, my most of the relatives on my Grandmother's, (my mom's mom) side did NOT speak english BUT Mixtec. Apparently, due to the double stigma of being black & NOT speaking English, the elders decided that the next generation would NOT be taught Mixtec nor would they be taught about that culture. This was in the Early 20th century.
Grandpa Ewey told me that we had pure D White relatives & family all through the county but that they DID NOT acknowledge the browner members of the family. When he proposed to my grandmother, she said she would ONLY marry him IF & ONLY if he moved her OUT OF Texas & to Oklahoma I.T. She told him that because she'd run across FAR TOO MANY rotting bodies, swinging from trees & she'd had enough.
Because they came of age just as the Depression was FINALLY fading away, he wasn't able to right away. He hired himself out as a farmhand, etc. Grandma & Grandpa married when they were in their late teens. the Uncle I mentioned earlier was born in 1938. Again, they couldn't afford much & even if they could have, jim crow made sure they weren't able to rent anything decent, because brown skin, dontcha know.
Anyway, Grammy told me that the only place they could find was a what was barely a shack, which set up on a hill. She said that the walls were covered with chewing gum & newspaper. She said that she used lye, (the ONLY thing which would remove it), to clean the walls & "floors". She finally got it to something near "DECENT", just in time for her first child. She had a daily schedule where she would tend to the few chickens, hogs & cattle they had AND the garden where they grew ALOT of their food. She was also actively nursing baby Robbie.
On day, it was midday & she'd just finished feeding the baby, laying down with him to rest. She said that something told her to look out of the window. She tried to push it out of her mind but try though she may, she couldn't push it out of her head, so she got up and peeked out of one of the 2 windows they had. Right away, she noticed that there was an old, scruffy white man wearing overalls, standing at the bottom of their road, glaring at the little shack, with unmistakable malice. She was used to this kind of treatment so she kind of pulled herself away from the window to lay back down with the baby. She said that she must have dozed off because she found herself jerking awake. She first thought it was the baby but when she checked the baby, he was DEEPLY asleep. So, she closed her eyes again.
A few seconds later, her eyes popped open again but this time, it was because she was SURE it was because of the acrid smell of SMOKE! Panicking, she jumped up, grabbing the baby & running out of the little house. She followed the smoke around the home to find dried grass, weeds, twigs & small branches of dried wood & the STRONG odor of Kerosene in a dying fire, (thank God), when she purposely set fire near one of the corners of the shack...the SAME SIDE that faced the evil creepy white dude she eyed looked out of the window, less than 15 minutes earlier. Luckily, this happened just about the time that Grandpa had almost earned enough money to move the Oklahoma I.T. They moved to family land for a short time to earn the rest. They shortly moved to Tulsa.
Grandpa joined the Navy right after Pearl Harbor,
which explains why my mother was born in Rice Tx & didn't know who her father was & thought he was Charles Atlas until she was almost 4 years old! In fact, she constantly asked when "that man", ( my grandpa), was going to back home..LOL!! 
Anyway, Grandpa used to ALWAYS say how he would NEVER return to TX because of the pain he experienced ALMOST to the day he died...
HOWEVER, the last family reunion he attended, (at the time, he was blind due to Glaucoma & my uncles took him). While he was being greeted by many younger relatives, 2 young ladies walked up to him. They introduced themselves to Grandpa as 2 of his WHITE cousins & that they had heard alot about him through some of their open family & that they were honoured & pleased to meet him.
Grandpa broke down into tears because he NEVER thought he would EVER hear from white relatives. he passed in May of 2002 & the reunion happened in '97-98'. I'm just so sad that he didn't live to see Obama elected president, not just once BUT twice because it was because of what the people that came before us that made that possible.
My Brother recently had one of those "where did your ancestors come from.." genetic ancestor search but this one concentrates on the African line. When the results came back, they found that the west African component of his ancestral line was Ghanaian, Senegalese, Beninese, Malian & Nigerian ...ANYWAY, with Nephews that hail from Brasil, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Italian & Pinoy admixtures from their moms, (I'm the ONLY surviving daughter) & heading up on my 18th happy year of Marriage to a Bohemian Czech, the "America" I see at the moment, worries me because it doesn't take too much to backslide into picnics @ Public lynchings & the fat citrus toned traitor squatting in the WH is doing all it can do to make things like this happen. HOWEVER, I have more hope because of the fact there are FAR MORE decent human beings than the ignorant AF troglodytes & more are speaking out each & EVERY day.
So, as I said earlier, we're NOT where we should be BUT damn it, we're NO WHERE NEAR what we used to be. NEVER STOP resisting, fighting, organising and voting. We'll get through this as we've gotten through the hatred & ignorance of the past.
