E3: Dear Mrs. White Lady, It’s My Birthday and #47 Just Pardoned Me!
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Dear Mrs. White Lady,
I have news. Guess what? It’s not just the J6-men who Trump is pardoning.
Tonight, the President of THESE United States will call to confirm a pardon for me. 🎶 “Sisters are doing it for them-seeeelves….” 🎶 (Singing)
This is good news because, you know, I’ve had a run of bad luck. I’ve not been lucky.
When my parents thought to pack us up in the back of the station wagon and head to D.C. for a family trip, it was nothing like the trip you made to D.C. for the Inauguration.
We didn’t do much of anything, as I recall.
I’m sure the station wagon would have traversed the route from Pennsylvania Avenue to the Lincoln Memorial, then taken the long drive over the Potomac to Arlington National Cemetery while we ate our soggy tomato sandwiches. Which, if memory serves, oozed with an obscene amount of Dukes mayonnaise that I can only guess was meant to serve as some sort of dietary fortification.
I’d like to think that we’d have walked the Mall or entered the lobby of the Smithsonian, which Mom would have called the free exhibit.
But I recollect many of these moments only through photographs.
There in Kodacolor were my four older brothers mugging for the camera in overlong wool coats that they’d eventually grow in to. And me, saluting like little John John, dressed in an over-tight puffy white coat and tights—squinting at my parents in the winter sun with a detectable amount of impatience—the kind that strangers give to those who have too many children to reasonably account for at any given time.
Released from the confines of the wood-paneled POS we rode in on, we stretched our legs. Read the inscriptions around the U.S. Marines War Memorial. I don’t remember what else. I expect I learned a lot.
But, I still harbor qualms about my education as a child. If only my parents had stepped up more. Mom, who almost certainly would have known that I was reading Rousseau with a flashlight under the blankets at midnight, could be forgiven for letting me ruin my eyesight.
But I’ve since discovered that under their tutelage, my education was, for lack of a better word, wanting.
Oh, snap!
Did I tell you I have family coming next week? My sister-in-law will want to repatriate her sourdough starter she entrusted me with during Covid. I feel like an idiot admitting this, but instead of feeding the starter like a normal person, I pushed it to a blind spot in the back of the fridge. And because I’m insane, I forgot about it.
So, I’m restarting the starter to (um) cover my tracks.
brb
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Ok, cool. I’ve managed to get that sticky, yeasty concoction to rise to an acceptable volume. She won’t suspect a thing, wink wink.
Oh, back to my parents. No oversight on the books I was reading. No queries about the nature and quantity of the Public Library periodicals I was checking out. No admonishments even for deficiencies in penmanship and subtraction.
Much of the familial drama unfolded or was settled at the dinner table. My brothers were making some appreciably solid arguments on the Vietnam War, earning the occasional nod of approval from the powers that be; as for me, I got nothin’.
My habit of preceding any counterpoint in a conversation with the phrase, with all due respect—did not endear me to my family at these times.
I had one ace up my sleeve. I was poised to turn that uniquely formative assignment, What-do-you-want-to-do-when-you-grow-up?—into a watershed moment.
“I want to be an orator.”
When the answer came, I understood my miscalculation immediately. Not knowing what an orator is or does, what sort of living one might make from such work or whether any special tools or clothing would be required—my parents understandably afforded me a wide berth after that.
My feral education continued. I didn’t know until recently that mail delivery in the 1800s was unreasonably slow—I mean arthritically slow. It took more than two years for Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation to reach Texas. And he was President. (Not for nothing, but even email would have been a godsend back then.)
Oh and then there’s the folklore around The Alamo. Turns out I had this all muddled.
To hear Texans tell it, you’d think we won that battle; (um, first of all, we lost). And you’d think we conquered Texas in one fell swoop, when the truth was complicated. Towards the end of the Mexican Civil War, the Mexican commander was arrested and imprisoned. He’s the one who ceded the Texas territory to the U.S. in an unsuccessful bid to save his own life. And the rest is history.
I’m sending you some links and stuff to Google, Underground Railroad, Path South to Freedom, Annexation of Texas, Civil War, Slavery+the Alamo, Mexican Civil War… blah blah blah…
🕧 Oh my Word. Look at the time. I was going to grab lunch downtown and pick up some roasted coffee beans while I’m out. Be back soon.
(the incident at the coffee shop)
I was surprised that my friend Linda wasn’t interested in hearing about any of this. She wouldn’t even look at the article I had stashed in my tote.
I don’t always understand maga.
It’s not like I was regifting her a collection of Harry Potter novels. But what came next gave me pause. She said, and I quote—
“I’m not really what you would call a “reader.”
Mind you, my exposure to Black history amounted to images from tv of Harlem in its heyday. Architecture, soul food, big band music, jazz, blues. And performances of Porgy & Bess, which aired on PBS every Spring.
Even more egregious is I didn’t even know there was such a thing as Black Wall Street, nor did I know anything about race massacres in Tulsa and Greensboro. And my knowledge of the Tuskegee Airman—is spotty at best.
Oh, Sugar…
I’ve been so distracted with my sourdough starter, I nearly forgot to tell you about the pardon. (And the mess I’ve got myself in to.)
Right before Christmas last year, I was detained by the Government on charges of Dissent Against the State. (Don’t ask.) Luckily, my godparents in Jersey are mega mega maga and were able to make a call to the WH.
From what I understand, they dropped an ungodly chunk of cash on $Trump’s crypto memecoin. The upshot is: I’ll have no criminal record and I’ll get my life back.
Do you suppose this is what they mean when they talk about white privilege, especially for us white ladies? All I know is, I dodged a bullet.
Oh, hey I’m planning to stop by next week with a boule of homemade sourdough for ya’ll. And maybe some coffee.
Talk soon! -m.
P.S. bummer about the D.C. weather
P.S.S. and to be fair to Linda, she’s hated me since college
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The first in a series.
I remember the ol 1970s station wagon as well. 3rd youngest of 8, I was facing the rear window...trying to survive traveling backwards. That was great...on to E4 and another pardon perhaps, we'll see.