Suppressing a smirk, I inquired further: "And who is Arther Luther King, Morgan?"
"He's a man who took down signs at water fountains that said 'Whites only' so that black people could also drink from them."
I smiled and said, "Yes he did, Morgan."
______________________
It isn't often that I think about race relations or Martin Luther King's contributions. This past Saturday offered me the opportunity to give to others and get out of the house a bit. I jumped at the chance.
My church was arranging a get-together at Roseland Christian Ministries. The center offers meals for homeless, shelter for women and children and housing programs for families. It's an incredible place that mostly serves blacks. I learned the reason why:
I was informed that the city of Roseland used to be, largely, a Dutch populated place. But several decades ago, industries moved out of the Roseland, took most of the Dutch with it and left a middle class black population with no real jobs. It pretty much devastated the city.
I've been in cities where parts of the town are in shambles, but I have little recollection of seeing a city with such widespread poverty. If I were to summarize the city it would be thusly:
chained link fences, broken
dogs
bars on windows and doors of all buildings, residential OR commercial
unusual window treatments (newspaper, for some)
old cars
I know a picture is worth a thousand words, but I took no camera to Roseland. I was there to be a part of Roseland, not to document my brief stay there.
When I arrived at the center, I was told that I would be helping in the Women and Children's Center. My main job for the first few hours was to take plastic toys and wipe them down with bleach water. The cleaning water quickly turned various shades of gray as we sanitized. At one point it turned a color that was slightly reddish brown and I wanted to gag.
After a few hours of cleaning, we were encouraged to interact with the women and children. The operative word there is "encouraged" because, honestly, the women wanted little to do with us.
There was a large room with couches lining the periphery. In every couch there was a woman, maybe two, and they were all sleeping or in various forms of slouched wearyness.
I knew enough to not expect a welcoming committee from them.
A lot of emotions can pile up when one is a stranger in a shelter. I expected to feel grateful that our family had employment, or grateful that I had a home or (can I be honest?) grateful that I wasn't them.
Oddly enough, as I looked at these weary women I thought to myself that I have been in this state before.
Not unemployed.
Not squatting in a shelter.
No, these women have been through MUCH more than me.
But the emotional wearyness of being a mother, of having little means to change a particular situation... I have been there.
I didn't see women who were a different color than me.
I saw women who were mothers, doing them best with what they had.
I felt akin to them; I'm pretty sure the feeling was not mutual.
I didn't feel pity for their situation; I felt empathy for their souls.
So I did the best thing I knew to do for these women: I loved their children.
It wasn't difficult to enter into these little ones' lives. Kneeling to their level offers them an opportunity to look you square in the eye and give you a shy smile or offer a slobbery piece of puzzle. I wanted to scoop them all up and take them home with me. I wanted to make chocolate chip cookies with them and offer them a place to run. I wanted to rescue them from a world of mismatched, dirty couches and very weary mothers.
One little girl crawled up to me and a little boy followed her and picked her up.
"What's her name?" I asked him.
"I dunno," he said.
"Are you her brother?
"I never met her before," he clarified.
Children were taking care of other children who they didn't know. And most likely, their mothers were children when they had THEIR children. I knew the cycle existed, I just didn't know it started so early. I'm used to white bread women who hover constantly over their children and wipe the noses of their infants before they even BEGIN to sneeze.
This world was quite different from mine.
I'm not sure what Dr. King would say to me personally about how to improve race relations. But for my part, it wasn't about being some great hope.
It was about seeing that these homeless women were proud and weary. They were worthy of being seen.
Hopefully these women will have the courage to see it in themselves and make a voice for them and their children. That is my prayer.
