GARDENS CORNER |
One of the pleasures encountered in the reading of Gardens Corner is hearing the clever and lively voice of Little Speedy Copeland as he articulates his humble and perceptive view on a variety of topics like Religion, Race and Love just to name a few. Heres a little taste.
Little Speedy on Race
I threw my bag over my shoulder, grabbed my cane and got ready to go. First, though, I had to stop and give Jimmy Lee the pound. "Thanks for everything," I said. "Thanks for not selling me out to the cops and thanks for convincing Mr. Grimes to drop me off in Gardens Corner."
Homeboy gave me one of those "Aww shucks" kind of shake of the head. He said, "No need to thank me." I started to reach for my wallet to pay for the milkshake but my man said, "Keep your money. You just go on your way. God bless you, son."
That was the second time during my trip that a white person used a tem of affection with me. First it was that old white lady on the train who called me "dear" and then it was Jimmy Lee who blessed me. I felt kind of bad that I had possibly insulted him and asked him about the Klan and back country rednecks. I felt kind of bad that I always walk with my guard up when Im around white people as though I can never trust them. Its not like I ever had a whole lot of bad experiences with them. I mean, the main one would have been with that dude Blair at the basketball camp. But still, I know what I know. I know whats out there and just because them experiences may have never happened to me personally, its not as though I have to be blind to the experiences of others. They can still affect me in an indirect sort of way. I mean, theres no getting around that brothers and sisters have been dissed by The Man. And because I know this, a lot of times I walk around trying to block them out as though they dont exist. And so, sometimes, I get to thinking that only our own can show us some sort of compassion. Its gotten to the point where Im thinking that it aint in the blood of a white dude like Jimmy Lee to be understanding like that. Thats why Im always shocked when a white person is nice to me, even when they do something as simple as call me "son" in a real chill way. Im thinking, like, "are they trying to trick me somehow?"
I wish I wasnt like that. I try to draw inspiration from this poem I heard from a play that I went to on a high school trip. The pay was called TWILIGHT and this one black lady Anna Deavere Smith played a whole bunch of different characters who all comment on them L.A. riots that they had out there. Some of the people she portrayed were women, some were men, She played black characters, white characters, even a Korean one too. Well, one of those characters was this black guy called Twilight Bey. He ended up being my favorite character in the whole play. The way that this lady acted it out, he seemed like a little man, like me. That was the way I was envisioning him at least. And he was a young dude who wasnt afraid to think about something constructive. He said some really deep shit near the end of the play, but the only thing is I wasnt able to pay close attention to all that he was saying because my knucklehead classmates were getting restless and were distracting me. You know, flicking me behind my ears. They think I have little ears and a big head. And they were calling me corny because I was trying to pay attention to what homegirl was doing on stage. It was hard to tune them out and so they ended up ruining the play for me. But me and Twilight Bey were able to connect because that Miss Smith made a book out of that show and I came across it when I was hangin with my moms doing Christmas shopping at Macys in Manhattan. I was crazy mad happy when I saw it on the bookshelf. I pretty much knew where to find the quote in the book. It was near the end. And when I found it, I took out a piece of paper from my wallet and I wrote the quote down. I did it on the sly because I didnt want to take the chance that somebody Id know would see me. Fellas would think Im soft if they saw me doing that writing down a quote. You can get beat up for being soft. Anyway, this is what that Miss Smith lady said as that Twilight Bey character:
In order for me to be a true human being
I cant forever dwell in darkness
I cant forever dwell in the idea
Of just identifying with people like me and
Understanding me and mine.
Whenever I dont feel like dealing with white people, or some Korean, or whomever, I think about Twilight Bey and that poem. And it helps me to act nice or, at least, cordial around them. Because, yo, I want to be a better person you know. I dont want to seem like some close-minded militant. But as much as I like the meaning of that poem, its real hard to live it on a constant basis because, yo, the past and history has helped to build some pretty tall walls that me and a lot of my people have gotten comfortable standing behind. And so who knows how many times Ive missed making a connection with a chill and decent white person. I walked out of Jimmy Lees telling myself that maybe I ought to look over and beyond them walls Ive set. The only thing is, Im scared that Ill be the only one doing it.