My village

It takes a village to raise a child African proverb

The village, or neighborhood in which I was raised included my grandmother, uncles, aunts, grandaunts and granduncles, older women and men who were friends of my grandparents so they may as well have been grandparents, first, second, and third cousins (including adopted cousins), and members of local churches.  Children, because the watchful eyes in the neighborhood, rarely got away with misbehaving.  And, if a child misbehaved away from home, more than likely, an adult would make verbal correction with the warning "I am going to tell your grandmother..."  It seems, we have gotten away from doing things the "old fashioned" way but I believe, the old fashion way of doing things still work.

Now, my maternal grandfather, very early in my life, was a part of my village.  My grandfather passed on when I was about 7 months old and I have been told I was passed over his grave.  The passing of a child over the grave of a deceased family member is an African burial practice.  My grandmother was born and raised in the Lowcountry of South Carolina so presently, I understand why I was passed over my grandfather's grave.  As a child, however, when I was told this happened, I did not understand why and no one in my family could or would tell me why.  All I was told was:  That's what mama wanted done.  Back then, elders were not questioned about anything.  You did as you were told and that was that.  I found some interesting information regarding African burial practices.  Check it out.

DEATH AND DYING AMONG THE GULLAH by Joseph E. Holloway can be found here:  http://www.slaverebellion.org/index.php?page=death-and-dying-among-the-gullah

Peace! and Love

until next time

Thank you!

If you were kind enough to take the time to read DNA Menagerie after I posted it:

Several people contacted me to share their own childhood stories and I am happy to  know I was not the only person afraid of the outhouse.  How do we get to know others if we do not share our stories and make authentic connections?  I say "authentic" because sometimes folk have ulterior motives to get to know other people so we have to be discerning when accepting others into our lives.  And, sometimes, it is difficult for others to believe what is being said to them because of their own life experiences.  For example:  when a friend and I discussed our childhoods, some years ago, and the subject of schools came up, I told him I attended a segregated school.  My friend did not believe me because the schools he attended were always integrated schools.  He is only a year or so older than I am and he told me what I was saying could not be true.  We grew up within an hours drive of each other but in different counties and what I said to him was hard for him to believe.  I will put it simply, people:  Listen.  Ask questions.  Enjoy the exchange of ideas and experiences.  And, do not devalue the experiences of others simple because your experiences are different.

Peace! and Love, ya'll! 

Until next time

DNA Menagerie

You are welcome!

DNA Menagerie?  What is DNA Menagerie about?  DNA Menagerie is about my ancestry...my DNA...me!  Before we get to DNA, though, I will share a bit about me and what I know of my family.   Lets' get to it...

I was born and raised in Sumter, South Carolina.  The Midlands of South Carolina. 

I was born, and raised on the South Side of Sumter.  Across the tracks, some might say.  My earliest memories are living on G Street with my grandmother.  We lived in a house I remember well.  The house was what was called a clapboard house with a red tar covering.  The roof was tin.  The house was actually a two family home with two front doors and two back door.  However, since our one family lived in the house we only used the front door on the left side and one back door, on the left side.  And the front porch was high enough for children to sit beneath it to search for doodle bugs.  There was a rhyme which went along with a stick twirling in the dirt for the doodle bug to come out.  The rhyme escapes me now but the memories of sitting beneath the porch are clear in my head.  The first room in our house was called the front room. 

The front room was where company sat.  There was a sofa and a record player with radio and speakers combination.  Our heating unit was also in the front room.  What was our heating unit?  Our heating unit was a black pot bellied stove with the stove pipe which went to the roof.  The adults always kept a pot of water on the stove.  I have early memories of not believing stories about Santa Clause because of that stove.  The Santa stories didn't make sense to me as a child.  I was told, by more than one adult, that Santa did visit us and I would be taken from the house to the dirt road in from of the house and be shown slay tracks.  I had enough sense to know the adults took tree branches and swept the road to make it look like slay tracks. 

The room after the front room was a family room/bedroom or middle room.  There was a table, a small black and white TV with rabbit ears and there was a high bed in that room.  The room after the middle room was the kitchen.  I spent a lot of time in the kitchen.  I clearly remember standing on a stool in order to be tall enough to reach into a plastic container to wash dishes.  No, there was not a sink but there was a stove and a fridge. 

What about the rooms on the right side?  The two rooms on the right side were bedrooms.  My mother's bedroom was next to the front room.  My mother had a bookcase headboard and she kept Charlie Brown books to read to us.  My mother also had a sewing machine in her room.  My grandmother's room was the middle room.  My grandmother had the highest, springiest bed!  And, beneath my grandmother's bed was the slop bucket.  What's a slop bucket?  There was not a bathroom in the house so if my grandmother needed to relieve herself she used the slop bucket.  Funny, my grandmother never emptied that slop bucket.  One of the children were always tasked with that job.  The room after my grandmother's bedroom and next to the kitchen was a room a was afraid to go into.  that room was dark and the adults always kept the door shut.  Several years ago I asked one of my uncles what was in that room and he said that room was a store room.  Ha!  that room scared me to death and it was only a store room.  Back to the kitchen because that is were the back door was...

Out of the back door was a back porch.  On the back porch was a washing machine with a roller.

That's it!  Ours had legs, though.  And, from what I remember, ours looked as if it had seen better days.  It worked, though.  I never thought about how it worked, until now.  I didn't know those old fashioned machines were electric.  All I know is I had to stand on something to put the clothes through the rollers.  You need water to wash clothes, right?  There was a pump right next to the washing machine.  Yup, we pumped our water.

That's a pump.  Yes, children worked around the house.  I remember using that pump.  How else were we to drink water?  Down the back steps into the back yard was the clothes line.  I never minded hanging out clothes.  Hanging clothes during Spring and Summer was one of my favorite things to do.  However, come Winter clothes on the line freeze.  Your hands feel frozen hanging them up and bring frozen clothes inside after they have "dried" only to hand them in front of the stove to actually dry...  I am shaking my head now thinking about it.  The other thing in the yard was something I hated with passion.  I was always afraid going near it but I had to go near it.  I had to go inside of it to empty my grandmother's slop bucket and to relieve myself.  The outhouse was in the back of the yard. 

Our outhouse looked exactly like that!  There is a hole in the ground.  You sit on the board with a hole cut in it and you handle your business.  I was always afraid of not only falling into the thing but there were spiders in there.  And, since lots of trees were around it and field mice I always thought snakes were in the area.  Image using an outhouse in the heat of summer.  The adults would put sulfur in and around the thing but still...  imagine using that think in the dead of winter.  Kind of gives new meaning to freezing your butt off, huh? 

These were some of my early life experiences.  We attended a church which was within walking distance in the neighbor.  We walked to the grocery store.  We walked downtown to buy stuff and pay bills.  And, I attended a segregated school until I was eight years old.  I attended savage Glover School from head start up to third grade.  

I know, Brown vs The Board of education was May 17, 1954.  I was born in 1966 and I attended a segregated school, in the heart of Sumter County, South Carolina until 1974.  The Confederate flag went atop the State House in Columbia, South Carolina, as opposition to integration, in 1962.  When the powers that be in Sumter County decided they would integrate the schools, I, along with school age children in my neighborhood, were bused across town to Millwood Elementary School.  The only thing I will say about Millwood is brown children were not always treated fairly or kindly.  We went from seeing happy brown faces which looked like our faces to pale faces which stood in opposition to us.  My math teacher, through her actions, made it known brown children were not welcomed at the school.  To this day I hate math.  Back to Savage Glover School...

I was always in awe of the tall white pillars and the high steps leading up to the door.  The floors inside the school were always shiny.  The playground was huge!  There were swings, sliding boards and plenty of room to run and play.  There was also a Maypole and every year we did a Maypole dance with ribbons attached to the pole.  Each child had a ribbon and we ran around and in and out wrapping the ribbons around the pole.  Present day, I know the Maypole has German, pagan roots.  No issues with German roots but I do not have German roots.

Peace!  and Love, ya'll!  Until we meet again!