Backstory - When Renee Met Steven (1977 NYC Blackout)

Writing this is hard because I've been binge watching Empire after listening to Taraji P. Henson's autobiography, and not too long ago, I watched Southside With You about Barack and Michelle Obama's first date. I don't want to replicate other stories when I think about how Renee and Steven first met. I've spent so much time thinking about Subria's story that I never thought about how her parents met. It makes sense, though, to explore this, because it could shed some light on why Renee stays with Steven despite his challenges.

Renee doesn't stay with him for Subria or the twins (if they end up staying in the story).  I think she stays because, in addition to loving him, she understands something about him. Maybe she understands what caused his challenges, and it creates an empathy for him that blinds her to how Subria is impacted. It has to begin somewhere, though. Hmm . . .

In order to create a backstory, I needed to figure out the answers to some questions, which, of course, created more questions:

1. How old are Renee and Steven in the story? When she's born can inform where she may have met Steven. In the story, Subria is 14 in 1994, which means she was born in 1980. I wanted Renee to be in her early 20s when she has Subria, so I'm thinking Renee was born in 1957. I want Steven to be older than Renee, but not by much, so let's say Steven was born in 1955.
2.  Now that we know how old Steven and Renee are, and I know that they're both African-American living in New York City, I need to figure out what part of New York City they lived in, and what things were like for African-Americans in New York City in the mid-late 50s, and also in the 60s when they were growing up. 
3. When should they meet, and how? I want them to meet in 1977, get married in 1978, and have Subria in 1980. What's special about 1977? That's the year of my first memory - the blackout in July, 1977. Could they have met during the blackout? That could be interesting . . .
4. If I want them to meet during the blackout, I need to do some research on what happened on July 13-14, 1977. What part of the city were they in? Were they impacted by looting and rioting? Thankfully, Dishon and I just watched a documentary about the blackout last week, so that will help.

In 1977, depending on when her birthday falls, Renee will be 19-20. That means that if she went to college, she would likely be in school then. Steven would be 21-22, so he might be close to finishing school if he went to college. I have a special place in my heart for Brooklyn College since I spent my first year of college there. I'm not sure if anything significant happened on the Brooklyn College campus during the blackout, but I think it might be interesting to play with the idea of them being on the campus during the blackout and having to walk home together because the trains weren't working and I can't imagine that the buses were running without working streetlights. 

The blackout happened at around 8:40 p.m. on July 13th. If they met at school, there would need to be a reason that they were at school on a summer evening.  Turns out that Pratt Institute in Brooklyn was not impacted by the blackout because the school had their own generator. I thought of maybe having them on that campus, but I'd need to figure out what they'd be studying, and if it would make sense for them to be Pratt students. 

Considering that in the future, Renee owns a natural food store, she could study nutrition, and work at a natural food store while in school. When I was younger, my mom used to shop at Perelandra Natural Food Center downtown Brooklyn. I was always fascinated by that store - the colors, the smells, everything so different from what I saw in C-Town, Key Food and Associated supermarkets in my neighborhood.

What if Renee worked there? Looks like the store closes at 10 p.m. Maybe Steven was a customer there when the blackout hit? I should think about where in New York City they both live, why he'd be there, and what happens after the lights go out? Why would she go with him anywhere? Why would she trust him? Perhaps he was trustworthy then. Do someone's personal challenges make them untrustworthy, or just broken like we all are in some way?

Maybe he offers to walk her home to make sure she gets home safely? Depending on what section of the city she lives in, this could be a long walk. I love the idea of them walking across the Brooklyn Bridge together. Romantic. What if she lives in Greenwich Village? Him walking her home over the bridge has some cool possibilities . . .

Subria and Track - Learning to Fly

I used to love running when I was in elementary school. I remember doing pretty well on field day at Wingate Park in Brooklyn when I was finishing fifth grade. I think there was some talk of me participating in the Colgate Women's Games back then. There's something in my memory about my parents having a friend who was involved with the CWG . . . a woman named Carol Rainey. But that never came to be.

That's me in the back on the right.

It's not so fun to do something when you're compelled to do it. Even worse, when you're not properly prepared to do it. I had loved running when I was in elementary school, but a few years later, everyone in my church youth group had to participate in all of the sports on the church teams. This included basketball, cheerleading (for the girls - we wore blue and white saddle shoes 😫), volleyball and track and field. I pretty much hated all of it (except volleyball). I wasn't a great player. In fact, I barely moved my feet, and never quite learned how to set or spike. I was pretty good at bumping and serving though.

I'm behind the girl with the red jacket with the Cairo face.

When I was on the track team, I was chosen to run the mile - not because I was good at it, but because I would gain more points for the team just for completing the race. I was decent at the long and triple jumps, and I did get a bronze medal for running the mile, but again, not because I was good at it. There were four people running in my age group, and one person stopped running. I got the bronze medal by default just for finishing 😐. Sadly, that wasn't the end, either. I had to run again at the finals. My mother had just had surgery, yet she came out to support me. It was blazing, and my event was just about the last one of the day. I think we were in Pennsylvania. I didn't place very well. I caught a cramp during the first 400 meters, and was happy to just finish the race. I never ran competitively again after that. 

Dishon was a track star. A record breaking athlete. I never got to see him run or high jump. If I had a time machine, it's one of the first things I'd go back to do. I'd be in the front, his biggest fan, feeling the wind against me as he flew by. He was that fast. I'd be trying to keep the sun out of my eyes as I watched him soar above the high jump bar. He could jump that high. One of the ways I tried to connect to this part of him was to have Subria be a track star, too. He was my mentor as I wrote this scene:

 

September, 1994

Brooklyn Technical High School was an impressive building.  When Subria had come to the school to register during the summer, she only got to see the main office, and a large classroom.  Even then, she was amazed that the school was as wide and long as a whole city block.  On her first day of school, a team of seniors took Subria and a group of nine other freshmen on a tour of the school.  The center lobby had a fireplace, and the school's auditorium was the second largest in New York City, after Radio City Music Hall.  She had definitely never seen any school auditorium with two balconies before.  There was a massive library, and gyms on both the first and eighth floors, with an indoor track in the mezzanine of the eighth floor gym.

As she walked down the hall toward her homeroom, she marveled at the high ceilings and trophy cases.  Subria would have to check all of this out more carefully another time.  She heard that students received detention for being late, and she definitely didn't want that to happen. 

There's another part of the story that will appear here, but I want to stay focused on the track theme.

 

***

 Track try outs finally took place at the beginning of November.  Subria stayed after school to

talk with the coach about trying out for the team.  Like most junior high schools, her old school didn’t have a track team, so Subria kept up her times by preparing for and competing in the Colgate Women’s Games every year.  She regularly ran the 55 meter dash, and had taken third place at the Madison Square Garden finals in January with a time of 7.4 seconds, but she had never run 100 meters competitively before.  Subria knew she was up to the challenge.  Despite the long practices and constant pressure, she knew her father would be disappointed if she didn’t try.  It was his dream for her. 

Subria walked into the first floor gym and looked around to figure out where the head coach’s office was.  The basketball team was in the gym running sprints, so she didn’t want to interrupt them.  Subria walked underneath the bleachers to the other side of the gym.  She saw the doors to the locker rooms, and then a few doors down, there was Daniel Morgan’s office. 

Trying out for the Brooklyn Tech Engineers was more challenging than Subria thought.  She wasn’t really sure what to expect, but as soon as she approached Coach Morgan about being on the team, he wanted to see if she was really as fast as she said she was.  Thankfully, none of the other team members were there.  She changed out of her school clothes into her sweats and sneakers, and stretched in the center of the track for about ten minutes until she saw Coach Morgan walk on to the track. 

He motioned for her to go over to the starting blocks, so she walked in that direction, putting her hair up into a ponytail as she went.  Subria kissed the cross on the chain on her neck as she always did before running, and then positioned herself on the blocks.  She concentrated on slowing her breathing, and listening to the sound of her own heart beat, knowing that for every beat of her heart, her feet would need to hit the ground four times in order to run under thirteen seconds.

Watch your breathing, Subria.

She looked over at Coach Morgan, who was standing next to the track at the finish line with a timer in his right hand and his left hand in the air. 

Subria looked up at him, waiting for his signal, and as soon as she saw his arm drop, she took off.  Like most sprinters, Subria was focused on getting her right knee up as fast as possible to be quick off the blocks.  She kept her head down for the first ten steps, with only a fraction of a second separating each one of those steps.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

Head up, goal in sight, stay in your lane.

Push, push, push. 

Subria crossed the finish line, and when she finally brought herself to a stop, she began to walk back over toward Coach Morgan to find out what her time was. 

"How did I do?" she asked, trying to catch her breath.

"How do you think you did?" he asked.

"I think I did okay.  I know I can do better, though."

"Okay.  Take a breather.  Walk back to the starting line, and do it again."

Subria walked slowly back to the blocks and thought about the look she always saw on her father’s face after her races.  She couldn’t remember him ever smiling so much at any other time.  His office at the laundromat was filled with community newspaper clippings about her performance at the Colgate Women’s Games, and he talked about her track performance whenever he had a chance.  She had to get on the team. 

She ran again, and she knew that she had run a little faster than before. 

"Not bad," Coach Morgan responded, showing her the stopwatch.  It showed 12.53.

Coach Morgan tried her out for a few other events.  It turned out to that she had some skill in the long and triple jumps.  Subria was beside herself when she made the indoor girls varsity team.  In addition to long and triple jumps, Coach Morgan told her that she would compete in the 55 meter relay and the 4 x 100 meter relay. 

***

Although she had track practices every day after school for 2-3 hours, Subria excelled in her academics.  In addition to joining the National Honor Society, she ran in the Public Schools Athletic League, the Big Apple Games, the Pilgrim Games and the Jim McKay Games at the Armory Track and Field Center in Manhattan, and easily made the outdoor track team in March.  She was even invited to participate in the 101^st Penn Relay Carnival at the end of April - the week after her birthday.  Renee wasn't able to come because she didn't want to close the store.  But the night before Steven drove Subria down to Philadelphia, he told her that she could invite Gina and Kenya to spend the night with her the night before they left. 

"Subria," Gina asked just before they fell asleep, "can you tell me why sprinters don't run full out to the end?  It's almost like they slow down at the end sometimes.  I hate when they do that!  It seems like they'd make better times if they ran as fast as they could until they reached the finish line."

"I used to hate that too before I started running track," Subria said, "but that only happens in quarter finals and stuff like that when people are just trying to qualify for the finals.  It reserves your energy and reduces your chance of injury.  It’s also psychological for everyone else, because then the other runners don’t really know how fast you can run." 

"I guess that makes sense," Gina said. "So, are you ready?"

"Ready as I'll ever be," Subria said, sighing. 

      In order to prepare for the relay, Subria and her teammates warmed up by stretching and running an easy mile.  Seeing all the other sprinters there made Subria nervous, but not enough to impact her performance.  As always, Subria was the anchor.  When she initially got on the blocks, she envisioned the race, and pictured herself running faster than her competitors.  An essential part of her pre-relay mental prep work was imagining her team winning the race.  Once she heard her teammate Vanessa yell "stick," she reached back for the baton, and pushed to the end.  At the last possible moment, she dipped her stride to get her head and chest across the finish line.  Subria and her team won the first place 8" bronze plaque, and gold medals.    

Steven was beside himself with excitement for Subria's success.  He went hoarse cheering for her, and he ran out on to the field after her team won the final race.  He embraced her so tightly that it was hard for Subria to breathe.  Although Subria appreciated her father’s support of her accomplishments, she couldn’t help but wish, sometimes, that he would pay as much attention to her off the field as he did when she was sprinting.   

***

I need to do a lot more work on this scene. My writing coach encouraged me to include much more dialogue, which I will. I want there to be a clear connection between Subria/flying in the beginning of the book on the observation deck of the World Trade Center and Subria/running on the track team. What is she running/flying away from? I'll do this even while in my mind's eye, I'm picturing my best friend flying through the air, impressing me in the timeless space our love occupies. I am, and always will be his biggest fan. I can write about love because I know him. 

Weird Halloween

It's May, so it feels a little weird to be writing about Halloween. This topic was sparked for me this week, though, when one of my teachers shared what she had done with her hair for crazy hair day. I remember a crazy hair day when I was a kid. But first, the backstory . . . 

I don't have any pictures of myself in any Halloween costumes before my family stopped celebrating the holiday in 1985. I was 11, but it wasn't because I was too old. It was because the church we started attending that fall was against it (as well as celebrating birthdays and Christmas). Most 11 year olds don't know or use words like pagan and worldly. I used them expertly, and sadly. You would think that a group of folks who claimed Jesus as Lord would be excited about an opportunity to connect with the community in a fun way.  I understand not wanting to dress your kid up as a serial killer or bloody monster, but look at Serena and Cairo in this picture! Could they be more cute? But I digress . . .

Dishon, Serena, Cairo and I have been living in the suburbs since the kids were just about three and four years old. Before that, we lived in a very suburban section of Boston (West Roxbury), so taking the kids Trick or Treating was always easy. Typically one of us would stay home to give out candy while the other took the kids out. A few years ago, the kids started going Trick or Treating with friends, so now we just gave out candy. Sadly, our block doesn't get a lot of traffic on Halloween anymore. The kids who do come get a ton of candy, and we still usually have a bunch left over.

I would imagine that Trick or Treating was challenging for my parents when I was a kid, since we lived in a pretty large apartment building, especially with the warnings to be careful about what Halloween treats to let kids eat after Trick or Treating. I wonder if it was even true that people were putting razors in candy and caramel apples, or if that was actually the beginnings of fake news/urban legends? 

There are only a couple of Halloweens I remember before my family stopped celebrating. I think I was Wonder Woman one year (I could be mistaking a costume for the Wonder Woman Underoos I had, though 😂). The other memory is this one year that always kind of baffled me. Let me first say that I think my mom and sister did an extraordinary job dressing me so creatively for a Halloween party. I think I was around 9 or 10, and they made me a beautiful dress out of material that reminds me of the night sky in Texas - dark and twinkling with stars. I also remember them straightening a hanger, bending it into a u-shape and then pinning my hair around the hanger. I think I was dressed as an alien.  

The part that confuses me is that the party was in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn. My grandmother (dad's mom) lived near the hall, and my family lived in the Flatbush section. These neighborhoods are not close, and we didn't have a car. I don't remember being dressed like that on public transportation, so we must have gone in a cab. We didn't go to my grandmother's apartment, which surprised me because it was so close to where she lived. We went straight to this party, and my family dropped me off there. I didn't know anyone at the party, so I remember feeling really lonely. I'm a pretty strong introvert, so going up to strangers and making small talk makes me ache. I tried to make the best of it and entertain myself, but as I was running, I tripped and fell, all sprawled out on the ground with my glittery dress and alien hair.  Not cute. Not at all. I wanted to curl up in a ball and disappear. Instead, I just got up and waited until someone came to get me.  That's all I remember.

When I'm writing my novel, I need to think about what role holidays will play, and any funky scenarios I can embed. Will they celebrate . . . not celebrate? If they celebrate, how will it be? If not, why not? As I'm writing this, how cool would it be for Subria, Shiloh and Primus to go Trick or Treating together as little kids? Hmm . . .

Little Homies

Subria and Shiloh are the main characters in my novel, and they meet when they're in second grade. Kids are usually around seven-years-old in second grade. Dishon and I have been so blessed with Serena and Cairo. Watching their very special friendship develop over the past 14 years has been such a sweet journey, so when I'm writing about young Shiloh and Subria, these two are who I have in mind.

Dishon and I are both youngest children with a significant age gap between us and our older siblings, so we didn't have what these two have - ready made best friends. Until about five years ago, they shared a room, and even the rooms they're in now are connected by a crawl space. They were together in school for so long! First at Kindercare and then at Academic Fun Day Care Preschool when we still lived in Boston. Then they went on to Playgroup Plus when we moved to Randolph before transitioning to Thacher Montessori School (we were crushed when that financial aid ended. Their Montessori days were the best). They were together at Parkside Christian Academy in Boston and then started attending public school in Randolph when Dishon and I were no longer working in the city. When Serena went to middle school a few years later,  and Cairo stayed in elementary school in fifth grade, I think it may have been more traumatic for me because I was so used to them always being together.

They were back together for a couple of years in middle school, and this past year Serena has been at the high school, and Cairo is finishing middle school this year. They've even been kind of together this year since they're both in the Academy of Global Studies and Leadership, and that means that Cairo finishes his days at the high school for advanced classes. In the fall, we'll have two high schoolers, and they'll be together again for another two years until Serena leaves for college. It's crazy to think that this time is passing so quickly!

Before Serena and Cairo became teens, so many people cautioned us to enjoy them because, according to them, they'd turn into different people in a few years. This has been true, but not in the ways they meant. They have become different people - sweeter, funnier, more insightful, generous, thoughtful, spiritually mature and wise. Because of them, I continue to have a deep well of beautiful experiences from which to draw on for my own nostalgic purposes, and as inspiration for Subria and Shiloh. Being a mom is absolutely one of the best parts of who I am.

Happy Birthday, Afrika!

It's almost time for my birthday! April 18th. Sometimes I'm tempted to feel sad as my birthday approaches because of all the tragic things that have happened around this time of year.

April 15, 1912 - The Titanic Sank
April 4, 1968 - MLK Assassinated
April 19, 1993 - The Waco Siege
April 19, 1995 - The Oklahoma City Bombing
April 7, 1994 - The Rwandan Genocide Began
April 20, 1999 - Columbine Massacre
April 16, 2007 - Virginia Tech Mass Shooting
April 15, 2013 - The Boston Marathon Bombing

There's that, plus the fact that for several years, from the time I was 12 until I was 16, my birthday wasn't celebrated because my family belonged to a religious organization that believed it was vain to celebrate birthdays. I didn't have what other kids had. No bat-mitzvah, no rite of passage, no quinceanera. Even when there was a doctrinal shift, and birthdays weren't as frowned upon, my birthday sometimes fell during the Days of Unleavened Bread where we had to remove all leavening agents from our homes. That made having a birthday cake a challenge.

Before all of that happened, though, one of my favorite memories was my 9th birthday party. It was a slumber party where all my favorite friends and cousins came over to spend the night. My mom made me a Pac Man and Ms. Pac Man birthday cake, and a ton of homemade french fries - one of my favorite things to this day.  We had a grab bag for the guests, we listened to scary stories from Alfred Hitchcock and stories my dad told that caused so much delightful terror.  Nothing like a bunch of 9-year-old girls screaming and laughing.  I remember the Strawberry Shortcake dolls I got and the Vectrex game system my sister bought me (I still have that Vectrex, it still works, and I can still rock it!).

Why any religious group, despite all the Biblical and experiential evidence to the contrary, would choose to believe that God would be against us celebrating the day He blessed us with life in this world - the day we began our journey here - is beyond me. So with Serena and Cairo, we go out of our way to make every birthday special, and when Dishon turned 40, I threw him a massive surprise party beyond what I even thought I was capable of. Our presence in the world matters, and is worth all the confetti canons, songs, balloons, fireworks, joy and laughter we can imagine.

That's how I feel about my birthday. I have decided to take my birthday off from work each year if it falls on a week day. No matter what day of the week it falls on, though, I try my best to fill it with all the things I want to do. What I want to eat, drink, watch, where I want to go, or not go . . . it's my special day. In fact, all throughout the year, I yell out 4:18 when I see that time on the clock, because it reminds me that my presence in this world changed things for the better and it matters. I caught a Pokemon the other day with a CP of 418 (I think it's Bulbasaur), and I won't transfer it, power it up, or evolve it. I like that number. 

When I'm revising my novel, I want to think about what birthdays mean to the characters. Do they celebrate? Not celebrate? Look forward to it? Dread it? No matter how people perceive their birthdays, there is a passage of time that we can't avoid. We only live this earthly life once, and it's a precious gift. We should party like it's worth something big. Our unique journey around the sun. April18th, I hope you're ready for me, because I'm definitely ready for you 🎉🎁🎈🎆😉🎉. 

Where You're Not Supposed To Go

My dad tells me that one day he found me sitting in the window with my legs dangling outside. I think I was three. This was when we lived in the projects in Brownsville/East New York before moving to 201 Linden Boulevard in Flatbush. No one knows who opened the window. I was too small. My little hands couldn't manage it. Daddy crept up behind me slowly so he didn't startle me into falling. He grabbed me. Kept me safe. I shouldn't have been sitting there, but I was. I wonder what had captured my mind that day and called me to the window?


I guess all kids are drawn to the things they're not supposed to do, and the places they're not supposed to go. The signs say Keep Out!, and my mind wants to know Why? What don't you want me to see? What don't you want me to do? What don't you want me to know? Is that Adam and Eve's curiosity about the wrong tree pulling on me? Maybe. But what if it's not?

Imagine little eyes looking outside, wondering. Little hands up against windows curious about that space behind the buildings. The space I could see from the hallway window and my brother's bedroom, but couldn't get to because of the big, black, ornate locked gates. Back there where there were fire escapes. Back there where I could see my friend's window on the fourth floor of the B building from our apartment on the second floor of the C building. What was that back there? A handball wall? Seemed like a place to play, but why was the gate locked? Hmm. Little watching eyes figured out that it wasn't always locked. Sometimes they forgot and I'd go back there and run! Run the whole length of the block and hope there was another way out so I didn't have to go back where I came from. I saw the back of 179 and 221 Linden Boulevard, and even the apartment buildings on Lenox Road. I felt free and wild and scared and breathless. Lots of broken glass and trash, true, but man it was fun. Sometimes I was with other neighborhood kids. Sometimes it was just me. Just Afrika, as if the whole continent that is me could be "just" anything.

Always curious.

Always jumping over fences, even in Kaisha's building on Fenimore.

Going into Downstate Medical Center's student lounge, playing video games, throwing rocks, walking that road behind King's County Hospital, passing the J building where they kept the scary people. Buying Now and Laters, Swedish fish, lemon and chocolate chip cookies from the jar, Lemonheads, Alexander the Grape, Big Bol candy gum, candy cigarettes, Sugar Daddies and Sugar Babies and that weird wax candy with the juice in the middle.

Saying goodbye to Fiona as she made the left turn on Nostrand Avenue toward where she stayed.  Wondering what new adventure the next day would bring. 

I love watching movies like Crooklyn and shows like The Get Down because they capture that New York City before gentrification changed everything. It'll always be like that in my mind even if it's not like that anymore. 

As I'm creating my characters, I'm wondering where are the places they'll end up because they wouldn't let anyone keep them boxed in? Most of the time when I write, my characters go to places I wish I had allowed myself to explore if I hadn't let other people draw borders in my mind - not let other people colonize Afrika. There's been far too much of that for far too long.

Festivals Like Home To Me

On this snowy first day of April, 2017, I find comfort in reminiscing about festivals in New York City - events that served as bookends to my summers for so many years.

Dance Africa - takes place during the Memorial Day weekend in the streets around the Brooklyn Academy of Music near the Atlantic Avenue train station. So much good food, Afrocentric books, kente and mud cloth, cowrie shells, incense, so many oils - Night Queen, Egyptian Musk, Coco Mango . . .

There have been so many times in my life that I've gone to stores and felt invisible - not enough books telling stories like mine, so many products designed for hair not like mine, clothes that didn't feel at home on my skin, smells that don't remind me of anyone close to me . . . but not at Dance Africa. The event carries my name and makes me want to move. The drums speak a language that is completely familiar to me.

Grant's Tomb

A little over a month later around July 4th, there was the African Street Festival at Boys and Girls
High School in Bed-Stuy, and a month after that was the festival at Grant's Tomb in Harlem. Harlem - where my parents come from. Same music, same laughter, same drums, same smells, same belonging.

Naturally, my novel takes places in Brooklyn. When I'm creating and recreating scenes, nostalgia will help me to transform the colors, sounds and smells that these wonderful memories give birth to into words.