Us and Them

You know we all speak from the person we are. We try to speak from our hearts if we are honest and true. There are those - many - who don't care about that and say whatever they want to whomever they want to because they think they have the right to do that. Those are people who don't matter. I really believe that if you don't care about other people, you aren't worth a dime.

Black people have had to live our lives not saying what we really mean. Not saying what we feel. Not being able to express ourselves for fear of alienating, offending and making white people "uncomfortable." We have to had to worry if what we said would get us lynched, threatened, fired, banished, ostracized, etc. We have had to smile when our hearts were breaking, we have had to act like we were happy when we weren't and we have had to swallow insult after insult after insult without saying a word in response. 

Black women are branded “angry” if we say how we truly feel. Same with Black men. White people claim to be afraid of us if we don’t put on the “go-along-to-get-along” mask. “I was afraid for my life,” they say.

White people freak out when we call them on their racism. “I’m not a racist!” they scream, right after they did or said something so racist it makes your head spin. White women start crying and of course that makes white men want to comfort them, and so they blame us for making her cry and suddenly we are the antagonist in a situation where we were attacked and insulted. But we are not supposed to show our emotions. We are supposed to just take it.  

We are tired of that.

Others, like me, have tried to educate and explain so that our words are understood but that has been hard too because often, our words have fallen on deaf ears. It's only now that people are paying attention after seeing videos of what we have been trying to address for years.

So, we are struggling to try to work together and, in this environment, we find we are still being stifled when we express ourselves.

Reality - we don't speak the same way. We don't say the same things and sometimes if we do, it means something different than what the common thought is.

All this back and forth about the n-word for example. Black people don't use it as a negative term. It's a form of a greeting, a sign of shared experience or heritage, friendship, etc.

Yeah, we shouldn't use it and many of us are actively trying not to. It's a pejorative established by non-white people who used it as a weapon against us. It was one more term to deny our humanity. A lot of Black people want to take it back and make it our word for our relationships.

And so, now white people want to use it too.

No.

I don't think there is a Black person alive who hasn't had a white person (or a child) bristling with anger and hate who couldn't think of anything else to say to hurt us spit that word at us. Write that word to us. They wanted to say the worst thing they could think of to say to us and so they used that word.

White supremacists enjoy saying it to us. It brings back those “good old days” when they could address us any way they wanted and knew they would get no reaction.

Yeah, rappers use it in their “music” and so folks think now they can get away with it by claiming they are just “singing” what they hear in the “songs” they listen to.

Because of the negative connotation of the word, there is no situation where a white person can say this to a Black person without bringing up a very negative reaction.

Why? Because white people made it that way. By making it a weapon, it gets a very strong reaction from us. White people say it to hurt us and we know it. I don’t know a single white person on this Earth who knows me well enough, who is close enough to me to address me with that word and not expect to get cursed out or slapped.

Just don’t. I know white people don’t like being told what they can’t do, but add this to your list of words to just never ever use like those words in the dictionary that you don’t know and don’t use.

Just don’t.

Now, the word coon. Once again, there is a cultural difference. White people have used it just like the n-word. It’s a negative thing, racist and offensive in origin and when white people say it, we know what they mean.

When Black people say it, it has a whole different meaning. When we call someone a coon, it’s like we called them Benedict Arnold. It’s negative for us, but in a different way.

We use it on Black people who have seemingly turned their back on us. People who are struggling to identify as white and to get white approval and we find that to be treasonous. We also recognize the truth that those people who adopt that attitude are usually being used as tokens by white people who don’t really care about them and really do see them as coons. When they are done with them, they kick them to the curb and go back to their white supremacist buddies without batting an eye.

So, if we call someone a coon, it is not the same as if a white person says it. Understand that.

Facebook doesn’t get that. If we are in a group with white people, and one of us refers to Candace Owens, or Ben Carson, for example as coons, there will always be that one white person who will immediately think, “I can’t say that and so they can’t either!” and report us. And FB will punish us for it.

A lot of times, we are repeating what someone said to us, or a post that we saw by a racist, but it doesn’t matter. The bots that look at the posts only see that word and respond accordingly.

Look, racism is a white people problem. White supremacy is a white people problem. Neither will go away until white people stop whining, crying, blaming and not accepting responsibility for what has happened since this country was born. It doesn’t matter that it makes them uncomfortable or that they don’t want to be seen as “the bad guy.” White people have to work this out among themselves.

Several years ago, I was involved in creating an anti-racism group. A white woman and I decided it was time to address the issue in an open way, giving people the forum to talk about racism in an effort to kill it.

We had meetings and invited friends and soon friends invited friends and our meetings grew from a couple of people to dozens. We had Black and white people involved for the same purpose we thought.

I had an experience when teaching college classes years before that opened my eyes. At first, my students separated themselves by race and there was no interaction. But as we talked about racial issues, as they got honest about how they felt, things got emotional and almost heated. I was nervous that things would erupt into a fight, but that didn’t happen.

What did happen was after getting those very uncomfortable things out in the open, the students grew closer. They became friends. They sat together and talked to each other. They stopped looking at each other as “the other.” It was wonderful to behold.

So, I thought the same thing would happen with this anti-racism group. Our meetings got loud and emotional and instead of letting it play out, the white people got intimidated and uncomfortable with the reactions they saw.

Talking about race and racism isn’t easy. It’s hard. It’s difficult to hear people relate stories about things that have happened to them, how they have been treated, how their families have been insulted and affected by white supremacy. It’s hard to listen to people who resent white people because of it. It is hard to hear that people bear years and perhaps generations of anger and hatred against people who aren't like them. Some people have been raised to believe that Black people aren't even human. But all that has to come out in the light for the demons to be exorcised.

The white people complained to the white woman who co-created the group with me. She was uncomfortable with it too. Our political differences came into the mix as well. She was conservative and I am liberal. We were in the middle of a difficult election in our area and all that was brought up.

I remember once an older couple came to a meeting. They didn’t understand why Black people were angry. They wanted things to go back to the way “used to be.” The 50’s they said, were the best time. Everything was peaceful and everyone knew how things were.

I said something like, oh, when white people could call us names and get away with it? When we had to ride in the back of the bus and train and weren’t allowed to sit where we wanted? When we couldn’t stay in hotels and eat in the same restaurants? Where we were not allowed to buy houses where we wanted and we had to go to separate but unequal schools? When interracial marriages were illegal? Those the days you mean?

That wasn’t what they meant, they said. They were outraged that I brought all that up. It wasn’t fair. They just didn’t understand. We didn’t understand. They got mad and left after other people there agreed with me.

Some of the white people just couldn’t handle us saying what we felt. I don’t know if it was guilt, anger, or what, but it was just too much for them.

I had seen progress in our meetings until the white people decided to make rules making it difficult to honestly and openly express your feelings.

They wanted to keep it civil and quiet and they wanted to stop the outbursts and tears. They were afraid of the rage and resentment. They were more comfortable with no emotions, no real feelings, just being logical and racism isn’t logical. It’s emotional and it’s full of anger and hate and fear and ugliness.

Black people were outraged and insulted and many stopped coming to the meetings. They felt they were once again being stopped from speaking the way they wanted to. We had to alter our emotions to make people feel safe. Comfortable. 

The group still exists, but it isn’t nearly the force it could have been or should have been without that rule. It should have been a safe place for everyone to speak to racism but instead, it was defanged and declawed and it was basically a place for white people to complain that they didn’t understand what Black people wanted.

We can’t get past this if we cannot be honest and say what we mean. Black people have to listen and look at white hatred almost every day. But white people cannot stand to look at our reactions to it, don’t want to hear our rage and our pain. It makes them “uncomfortable.”

I say grow up and put your adult panties on, sit down and listen. Don’t take what you hear personally, don’t get defensive, just open your heart and mind and listen. Learn. Grow.

Look in your own heart. Who are you when it comes to race relations? Do you have Black people in your personal lives? Do you regard them as whole entire people? Are they your friends, but in a way, you still consider yourself better or superior to them? Or do you just sit with them at restaurants, at bars, at church but you don’t really interact with them? Are they welcome in your home? Can they speak to you about their lives without your “getting uncomfortable?”

Do you worry what your friends will think if you are close to a Black person? Are you afraid or loathe to date interracially because you are concerned about what others will think?

You really need to study your own thoughts and feelings and decide if you want to merely not be a racist as opposed to being anti-racist.

Listen to us with your heart. Step outside of being white and trying to defend yourself. Listen as a human being. Our anger isn’t directed at you. If you are truly our friend, you will want to hear how we feel and know what hurts us and you will want to embrace all that we are just as we want to embrace all that you are.

Only then will we really believe that you are an ally and that you have our back. Only then can we share our lives and become the one human race that we were always meant to be.

Are you ready for that?

 

 

 

 

 

Not Like This

I was visiting a friend for the weekend. She and I had always had a lot of fun together so I thought I would go hang with her.

We went to a club we had always gone to and we had had a few drinks and had danced till closing time. One of the men who managed the club used to flirt with me and I flirted right back. It was nothing serious to me. He was an okay guy but not someone I would have considered getting close to. It was just playful fun. He joked about wanting to get with me and I managed to laugh it off and keep it light. I don’t remember but there may have been a time I sat in his lap or even hugged him. I know I didn’t do anything to make him think I wanted him for more.

I didn’t want to have sex with him. He really didn’t turn me on like that and I liked him for a friend but not someone I wanted in bed with me. I really didn’t want that with him. I just wanted to be friends. I told my friend that. I wasn’t interested in him like that.

So that night, we came home and I was in bed asleep. I was wearing a flimsy little nightie because that is what I usually wore. I toss and turn a lot and I have torn up nightgowns when they got caught under me. I liked something light and loose because I also got very warm at night and I wanted to be able to get out of it easily.

I don’t remember what caused me to wake up, but I did and there he was, in the bed with me. He had taken off his clothes and he was under the covers with me and he had pulled my gown up above my breasts so it was nearly around my neck and he was kissing and licking me while holding that gown tight. He was on top of me and I couldn’t move.

Was I dreaming? Was this an awful nightmare?

No. It was all too real.

He was large – probably 6’3” or so and muscular and very strong. I could not push him away nor could I get out from under him. I was trapped.

My mind was racing. What could I do? I wanted to get away from him but at the same time, I didn’t really want to scream or anything. I just wanted him gone.

Meanwhile, his hands were all over me, his mouth, touching me in places I didn’t want him to touch. I didn’t want him in bed with me. I didn’t want this. Not with him. Not like this!

I tried to joke with him or say something that would defuse him but it wasn’t working. I asked him to stop and he said no. He had wanted this with me and he was going to have me. He told me to stop fighting and enjoy it. I said I didn’t and he said “Fake it. That’s what you women do all the time anyway, isn’t it?

”

He had obviously put on some cologne before he showed up and I could smell it all over him. His body was hard and like stone. I could not move him and I couldn’t get away. I was furious. I hated the idea of having to have sex with someone I didn’t want but there wasn’t anything I could do. I just lay there and let him have his way.

When he was finished, he wanted to joke and play and tried to kiss me again and I told him to get his clothes on and get the hell out. He said he wasn’t finished and wanted to do it again. I said no. I slid out of the bed and wrapped the sheet around me and called him names and demanded that he leave.

I remember that he looked hurt and sad and said he didn’t understand why I was so angry. He had only wanted to make love to me.

That wasn’t love making! I hadn’t wanted it!

I was so mad I couldn’t think. I just wanted him to go

.

My friend was standing in the doorway as he left and she looked puzzled too. Didn’t I want him to come visit, she asked.

Maybe I would have earlier. Maybe if she had asked me. Maybe if it was to just sit and talk and get to know each other better. Maybe I might have liked him more later.

But to let him in without asking me and show him where I was sleeping and then leave me alone with him, no, that wasn’t what I wanted.

I had not wanted to have sex with him.

I was angry with her too.

The next day, I got dressed and I went home and I never spoke to her again.

I saw him years later at another club in another town with other friends. I made sure I stayed out of his line of sight though by then, he probably forgot me and what had happened.

But I hadn’t.

I didn’t think of it as rape. I didn’t want to make a big deal of it. I was a young woman who had had sex with men as I wanted, I went out drinking and dancing and I smoked weed and on top of it all, I was black. Who would believe me?

I thought about my life being broadcast in court and having all those self-righteous white people looking down their noses at me if they were in a jury. I thought about people staring at me and those thinking I had asked for it even though I hadn’t.

I had had a couple of the local police make a pass at me and I had said no. One of them had tried the same thing but I had been lucky enough to get away from him before anything had happened. They would not believe me.

And I had been flirting with him even though to me it was meaningless. What would they make of that?

I didn’t think anyone would believe me and so I just kept quiet about it.

As time passed, I told a few friends about it but mostly, I put it out of my mind.  

I was more careful though. I wasn’t as playful with men as I had been. I didn’t smile and kid around with them if I didn’t know them and I made sure I wasn’t alone with them unless it was what I wanted. I didn’t accept rides nor did I let men in my home unless there were other people there too.

I had several men get angry with me because they said I was treating them all like they were rapists. Perhaps I was. I just knew that to protect myself, I had to be far more cautious than I used to be. I didn’t intend to ever get caught like that again and I never was.

Last week, as my brother and I discussed Brett Kavanaugh, he asked me if anything like that had ever happened to me and I told him about it.

He was quiet for a long time and then he said, “You just told me that you were raped.”

We both sat quiet, not sure what to say. I really had never thought of it that way, but he was right.

I had been raped.

A man had held me down in the bed and had sex with me without my permission or my cooperation. I had said no, please no and stop and he had not stopped but had gone ahead and forced his way into my body against my will. And it wasn't my fault. I hadn't done anything wrong. 

I felt the tears burning but I didn’t want to cry and I fought them back. And I thought of all those other women who had had something like that happen to them. All those women who like me didn’t think they would be believed. All those women who had kept quiet for so long and had tried to forget it because they blamed themselves.

All of them who like me, had been with a man who was more powerful, who felt like he could do anything he wanted and did.

I looked at Brett Kavanaugh on television and I saw that anger, that rage, that how dare you tell me I was wrong look on his face. No one had ever challenged him and how dare a mere woman try stop him from getting what he wanted. I knew he didn’t think he had done anything wrong. But I knew he was lying. I knew he did it.

I looked at those men sitting there smugly agreeing with him and calling her a liar among other horrible things.

All those feelings of helplessness came back and once again, I fought off the tears. The anger came back.  

But that large lump of pain is still sitting there in my chest.

I don’t think it will ever go away.

The Night We Lost Dr. King

I was 17 when Dr. King was killed. I will always remember when it happened.

My brothers were paper boys and we had dropped off their money and they had their pay and my Mom loaded us all in the car and we were driving to Chicago to spend the weekend with our Aunt Bootsie and Mike and Keith. We were on the road when we heard that Dr. King had been shot. We were all stunned, shocked and for a moment, none of us spoke. We were listening to the radio and it just seemed like it sucked all the air out of us. Who would have done such a thing?

I remember that I had tears in my eyes and that I felt bereft and painful. We had lost someone who meant a lot to us all, but I didn't realize at that moment just how much we had lost. 

We were halfway there when the first reports of unrest in Chicago came up. Should we go home or should we keep going? Mom thought we would be all right, so we kept going. When we got there we knew we should have gone back home. We could hear gunfire and we saw smoke and things did not look good. Our Aunt lived on the west side where the rioting was happening and somehow we made it to her house. We parked the car and ran in the house and then we heard more gunfire. Should we have left the car there? Our Uncle Robert moved the car to the back of the house and we all huddled inside.

It seemed like gunfire was going off every minute. We didn't sleep in the beds near the windows. We slept on the floor just in case. It was terrifying.

While I don't condone rioting, I understand the rage that makes people do it. When you have been suppressed and oppressed and no one listens to you and you feel hopeless and powerless, and the rage just builds until you just explode. I get that. 

But this was my first time being in the midst of it and it was frightening but the little rebel inside me understood their rage and anger. Dr. King was a man of peace. Why would someone want to kill him? We knew it wasn't a black man who did it. But again, why?

We left Chicago after the National Guard came and settled things down. I wasn't so sure this was a good thing. People had a right to be angry. We had lost someone who meant a lot to us and as usual, Mayor Daley just decided to shut it all down and make everyone behave. We saw burned out buildings and lots of soldiers on the street and people did go inside but I knew the anger was still there. 

We were glad to get home where it was quiet and we could think about what had happened. I knew this was going to change the way we lived and that it wasn't going to be for the better. Dr. King spoke for the poor and the disadvantaged and nobody cared about us. Things were just beginning to get better. What would happen to black people and civil rights now?

But my biggest revelation was yet to come.

Back at school, we talked about it. We didn't understand why someone would want to kill him unless they just hated black people and hated what was happening. That had to be it.

The white people acted like it was no big deal. They didn't care about him. They had no idea how hurt and devastated we black people were. We were together in school physically, but we were still disconnected from each other in reality. This became apparent in the following days. 

The day before his funeral, the school administrators decided that if we wanted to stay home and watch the funeral and honor his memory, we black students could take the day off of school. I recall the anger that the white kids in my class exploded with. I recall I tried to explain to them then that they didn't know who he was or what he was trying to do and nobody wanted to hear it. These were people I had considered my friends and they showed who they really were with their reaction to that simple day off to honor Dr. King. I never looked at them the same way after that.

Fifty years later, I cannot recall names and faces but I clearly recall the rage and anger they expressed thinking we black students were going to get something they weren't going to get. But over the years, I have seen that same reaction every time white people thought we were being favored or chosen over them or given something they didn't get or just treated as equals to them.

Dr. King was a complex man as most people are. He tried to do good things but he wasn't perfect. He was just a man. Back then, not that many believed he was an agent for good. I heard more sneering nasty comments from white people than I want to think about. I got into many arguments about him.

Even my parents were afraid that somehow white people would get mad at us and would treat us even worse than we had been in the past. They grew up and endured horrible treatment because of Jim Crow laws. It was why they left the South during the Great Migration.

But now, everyone, even racists who do not believe in what he tried to teach us use his name. They quote him even if it's only part of what he said. He is recognized for what he tried to do.

I just remember how hollow and awful I felt looking at that casket on that mule drawn wagon, going down the street in Atlanta that day. I looked at the faces and I remember seeing Bobby Kennedy walking along in the procession. It was hot that day and he had taken his jacket off and he and Ethel were walking together. She was pregnant. He was going to run for President and I was sure he was going to make things better. I had faith in him.

Two months later, he was gone too. I gave up all hope for what our country was going to be. I didn't care anymore. I went to college but I didn't care. I just wanted to have fun. All the people who cared and tried to change things got killed. Nothing mattered.

Fifty years later, are we any better off? I feel that hollow and empty feeling every day when I get up and look at the news. Whatever progress we had made has been lost in the past year. So here we are.

What would Dr. King say about us now?

LISTEN TO ME!

A friend wrote a very impassioned post a few days ago about how her friends seemed to be so very resistant to dealing with the mere fact that racism exists.  I thought about what she said and I even posted a response but sometimes, things just stick in your mind, you know?

There have been a lot of articles written about how deeply in denial a lot of white people are about racism. It makes them uncomfortable to talk about it and they wish we wouldn’t bring it up so much. I mean, after all, none of them are racist, right?

With the exception of some diehard white supremacists, white people as a rule will deny that they are racist even after they have been seen doing or saying something extremely racist.

“That isn’t me,” they protest, “I’m not like that. That isn’t who I am,” they whine, the ink on the page where they called someone the n-word barely dry.

I don’t understand that one. 

I used to think it was because the image of a racist was some guy named Billy Joe Jim Bob who drove a truck with a confederate flag on the back with his dog named Rufus and his gun rack in the back of the cab.

I know now that a whole lot of white folks drive trucks with the flag and their dog and gun rack and they don’t think they are racist at all. (And his name is Will, thank you very much.)

It’s like they suddenly realized that racism exists and that it is more widespread than they believed and now they know it’s bad but don’t seem too willing to do much about it. They don’t want to discuss it because it’s too hard for them.

People just shrugged and said, “It’s just the way it is.”

For years, Black people have protested about their treatment. We were lynched for no real reason other than we were black. Sometimes folks told a lie and that got a man or a boy lynched. People brought their children to watch. They even fixed lunch baskets and posed for pictures with the victims. I still think of the pregnant woman who got lynched. They cut the baby out of her and stomped it to death.

But it’s black people who are violent, right?

We get harsh treatment from the ones who were supposed to protect us. We go to jail in higher numbers even though we are only 12% of the population. Cops were more likely to shoot us because they “fear for their lives,” even when it’s just a little boy with a toy gun.

We get pulled over and fined for minor offenses when white people just get a lecture and are let go. Sometimes we even got killed for them.

But I don’t need to bring up all the injustices because you know it, and you don’t want to hear it anyway, right?

But when we tried to tell other white people about something racist that happened to us personally, we were told it wasn’t true. Officer Bob is a good guy and he wouldn’t do anything wrong. It had to be us. We should have obeyed his every command even if it was wrong. Race had nothing to do with it, we were told.

“That kind of thing doesn’t happen now,” they told us, “it’s 2017. People aren’t like that anymore. I can’t believe it’s still happening. Maybe it’s something else. It’s not always race, you know.”

No one listened to us because it had to be our fault. Racism just wasn’t that big a deal.

Well, listen now because this part is on you.

Remember that friend of yours that said he didn’t like black people?

“Oh, he’s ok. He just has a thing about it, you know.”

Or your Uncle Joe who always told racist jokes and made it a point to say racist things at family get togethers.  He didn’t mean any harm, did he?

And that woman who clutches her purse into her body when black people get too close. It’s not her fault. She got robbed by a black man so she is afraid of all of us now.

How many times did you try to check them? Did you tell your friend that you have black friends and you don’t appreciate his being racist to them? Did you tell him that he’s a racist and that he needs to look into his own heart?

Did you stop Uncle Joe? Did you tell him his jokes aren’t funny and that you don’t want him to say things like that in front of the children because they will soon learn that it’s all right to say those things? Did you tell him that you want your children to treat everyone with dignity and grace and that his behavior is crass and ugly?

Did you remind your friend that black people have far more reasons to be afraid of white people? Did you tell her about the lynchings and the murders that happened for no reason other than the person was a racist and knew he could get away with it?

You didn’t did you? Not ever. You just kept quiet because you didn’t want to make a big deal of it and you didn’t want people to think you were soft or that you are a n-word lover. You still wanted them to think you were a fine upstanding member of the community and you weren’t going to call them on their ugly behavior.

You realize that by always being quiet, you allowed that kind of behavior to persist year after year, person after person. Racism flourishes in the dark, quiet places we don’t want to address. We don’t want to go there, we don’t want to say anything, so we find a way to justify it and hope that everyone moves on.

You try not to acknowledge the hurt you see in your black friends’ eyes. It’s not your fault. You didn’t say anything wrong. We are being too sensitive.

But you didn’t say anything at all. You didn’t defend us and you didn’t try to see why we were hurt.

For years, people like me didn’t say anything either. We swallowed hard – that big lump of racism is hard – and we told our friends and family who shook their heads and shared instances of the same behavior with you. They didn’t tell you that it was all in your head and that Bob is really a good guy. They knew that Bob was a racist and that you were complicit in his racism because you didn’t say anything.

We wanted to stay friends so we just didn’t say anything to you though we never forgot it. We wondered if it was just us or if you weren’t the friend we thought you were. But it stayed with us.

Now you want to say that you are “woke,” too. You are our “allies.” You finally understand where we are coming from. You don’t want to identify with the groups of people in the streets yelling racist chants and you see them calling us names and taunting us openly now. You are offended and appalled and you want it to stop. You act like this is all new.

Maybe for you. Not for us.

You want this to end? It’s on you.

You need to step outside of your comfortable space and try to look at the world through our eyes. Listen to what we tell you. Pay attention to our pain. Hear us when we speak. Don’t get defensive. Don’t say you are being attacked. Yes, it’s uncomfortable but stop and listen to us.

And when you see or hear racist behavior or language, stop it. Don’t assume it’s all right. It’s not.

And now, this pretend president that we are suffering with, he has emboldened the racists so that now we know who they are. When he said racist things, instead of disavowing him, white people rushed to vote for him. “He says the things that I am thinking,” they said.

And then they had the nerve to be shocked when black folks were appalled with them. After all, voting for him meant that you were okay with the offensive things he said, right?

So now the incidences of hate crimes have increased since November. People of color are being openly harassed and everyone is nervous.

People of color aren’t comfortable much of anywhere anymore. More of us are buying guns but you know what that means: Officer Bob/Betty sees you have a gun and suddenly, they “fear for their lives” and you end up dead.

And yes, this is something YOU can help fix.

What is it they said about the terrorists, “if you see something, say something.” Well, these days, the terrorists aren’t immigrants. They are Americans, right here among us, festering in their rage and hatred.

We have to find some way to get past all this. We have to get to know each other and we have to talk to each other and we have to understand what is being said. It’s the only way things can even begin to change. Otherwise we are going to go deeper down the rabbit hole of hatred and I don’t know how we will ever find out way out.

The Grand Tour of the South

I hadn’t been anywhere in a long time. Actually, I hadn’t been traveling much over the past 10 years. I am used to taking off and going here or there to visit family and friends and I had not been doing that much. I missed a good road trip.

My brother and I had gone to Philadelphia once and Savannah, GA twice to visit his son and his family. We’d taken short trips from Chicago to Galesburg to visit friends and family but that was about all. And since I’d been in Florida, I really hadn’t gone anywhere so I was overdue for a trip.

Blountstown, Florida is a nice little town in the Panhandle of Florida. Nothing much happens here and if you don’t have a car, you are really stuck. We lost our car late last year and we had only been going to the doctor either in Tallahassee or Panama City and I was very bored.

Eddie is living in Tucson, Arizona and we hadn’t seen each other in nearly 2 years. He had been diagnosed with multiple myeloma and amyloidosis in 2011 and we had gone though all of his treatment and chemotherapy together in Chicago.  In 2015, we both left Chicago; he went to Tucson and I went to Blountstown.

Eddie also has severe glaucoma and we had to deal with multiple eye surgeries as his doctor was determined to save what sight my brother had left so it had been a long and difficult process for him but he had been a true warrior and went through it all barely complaining.

I was honestly concerned about his health and I wanted to see for myself how he was. He is kind of stoic and will say he is all right even when he is in pain so I wanted to be sure he really was all right. He was pretty much alone out there so I figured a visit was in order. I had never been to Texas so I thought it would be fun to take the bus out there.

Now I don’t have a problem riding the bus. When I was a child, we often took the bus to go to visit family. We took trips from Chicago to Detroit, Washington, D.C., New York but mostly to Vero Beach, Florida, where our grandparents lived.  I loved those trips on Greyhound.

And after I was grown, I still didn’t mind taking bus trips so it wasn’t unusual for me to do it again. Most of my friends and family by then swore they could not do it but I didn’t mind. As long as I had something to read, music and something to drink between stops, I was good.

This was going to be a different route than what I had initially looked at when I was deciding when to go. It would have made sense for the bus to stick close to I-10 and go through Destin, Pensacola, Mobile, New Orleans, Houston, and San Antonio.

Instead, it went to Houston then up to Dallas and then down to El Paso and then Lordsburg, New Mexico and then to Tucson. I was leaving from Panama City, Florida so the trip would take about 2 days. It was a longer trip than I had taken for a while. Usually, my trips were about 24 hours in length. But I was fine with it. I had packed most of what I needed in a handy carryon bag.

Now I am not a person who travels light. I try but I always seem to take too much. I was taking my laptop with me and my backpack to keep with me. My carryon was just a bit too big to go in the overhead bin so I checked my suitcase and kept the rest with me.

I am a senior and I do have some health issues that make some travel a bit tricky for me, so I always request to sit in the front seats and I ask for priority boarding so that I don’t have to wait in line. Usually, the ticket agents are good about it and I get my seat before most of the other people get on the bus. They also check my bag granting it “special handling” which means that when I have to change buses, I don’t have to go get my bag. The baggage people will put it on the bus for me which really helps a lot.

We don’t have a car, but Harmon, my husband, was going to the doctor in Tallahassee the day I planned to leave. I always go with him to the doctor and we get picked up by the local senior transportation service. I asked if I could be dropped off at the bus station in Tallahassee which meant I could get a bus to Panama City sparing me having to get someone to take me to PC. That went smoothly, even though a one way ticket to PC cost me more than I had expected.

I got to the station earlier than I had planned and had to sit there for a few hours waiting for the bus. I hadn’t gotten any cash so I couldn’t get something out of the vending machines and the charging station there didn’t work and I needed to charge my phone so I had to use the one connection they had there.

The bus station closed for an hour or so in the afternoon so we all had to leave the station. There was no place near where we could wait so I went across the street and sat at the bus stop because it was the one place where there was a bench with shade. And yes, it was hot. But it was better than sitting on the ground so I sat there. I was letting my friends and family know where I was and how my trip was going on Facebook.

The bus arrived late but finally, we boarded and took off. I was going to be on the same bus all the way to Houston so I was delighted. The driver was a black woman and she was a really good driver. She made up the lost time and got us to Mobile on time.

I hate it when we get to a station and the restaurant is closed. I figure if buses are going to arrive there all times of night, they should keep something open so that we weary and hungry travelers can get a sandwich or something. I got some cash from an ATM and hit the vending machines and that had to do till we got to Lake Charles.

The stop there was actually a gas station, which I discovered is what many stops are. They had fried chicken and meat pies which I love so I got some and a cup of coffee and that was my breakfast.

I had ridden along pretty much sitting alone all the way to Houston but when I had to get on my new bus, I found it was packed and I had to put my carry on under the bus and tuck my backpack under the seat. It was really uncomfortable. My legs were stiff and I could barely move my knees so each time we had a stop and could get off the bus and stretch, I did. Unfortunately, I had to ride that way all the way through Texas, which was no fun.

I had to change buses in Dallas and that was a trip. There were a few customer service agents whom I called the Seat Nazis. There were some seats reserved for Priority Boarding and they insisted that you pay the $5 for that privilege.

Now Greyhound policies state that if you are elderly or handicapped, you qualify for Priority Boarding and no one had asked me to pay for it.

Not the Seat Nazis. One of them walked through the station yelling at people telling them they couldn’t sit in the Priority section unless they had their ticket stamped Priority. She didn’t want you to sit on the floor and she was clearing folks away.

That bus station was crowded so there wasn’t enough space for anyone to sit down. I went to the ticket counter and paid the $5 and they stamped my ticket Priority all the way to Tucson and also from Tucson all the way home. I felt better about that and the Seat Nazi allowed me to sit peacefully till my bus left.

I got to Tucson as scheduled and got an Uber to take me to my brother’s apartment. His place is small but really nice and very clean. We were glad to see each other. We often sit and talk for hours about political issues, social and racial issues and then we laugh and share family memories. He and I have always been close and we had missed each other. I wanted to go with him for his chemotherapy and talk to his doctors myself.

I decided to spend a few more days with him and I changed my departure from Tuesday to Friday. It wasn’t until that night before that I realized that if I had left that Friday, I would have gotten caught right in the path of Hurricane Harvey who just happened to be visiting Houston about the same time I would have arrived.

I endured a visit from Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and that was about all the time I wanted to spend with a hurricane so I postponed my trip again to the following Wednesday.

I called Greyhound that Monday and asked if leaving would be all right. The person I spoke to had a very heavy accent and was hard to understand and he apparently didn’t want to talk to me so he was trying to hurry me off the phone. He told me that I would be rerouted after I got to Dallas and I asked him again if it would be all right to leave Wednesday and he assured me it would.

Looking back, I wonder if there was some kind of communication gap between us, but I did ask him more than once and he kept saying it would be fine.

Right.

So Wednesday, I showed up at the bus station and the ticket agent told me there were no buses going that way and that I should not travel for a few days. I told him I had called and spoken to someone and he said, well, you will get to Dallas anyway. 

I should have listened to him. But he took my bag, checked it through to Panama City and off I was again, on my way home.

When we got to El Paso, a baggage clerk there told me I could not take my carryon on the bus.  The bus wasn't that crowded so he was just being a jackass. I had only paid for one seat he rudely reminded me and I had to go check my bag. That was going to cost me $15 and I had already paid to change my ticket and I didn’t want to spend any more.

Thankfully, when I went to the ticket agent, I told her what I had been going through and she didn’t charge me to check the second bag. I was not happy about it though.

I have asthma and cigarette smoke really bothers me. I hated having to walk through the cloud of smoke to get in and out of the bus station and having people get back on the bus with their clothes and hair reeking of smoke was making me really sick.

One man got on the bus and asked if he could sit next to me and without thinking I said no. He smelled like the bottom of an ashtray. No way I could have tolerated that! It was bad enough that he sat behind me. But I managed to have the seat all to myself most of the way home, thank God.

When I got to Dallas the next day, my suitcase was not there. Apparently the agent in Tucson had forgotten to put it on the bus. And the customer service agent there in Dallas told me that I could not leave until the next evening. I was going to have to spend the night in Dallas. 

Things were getting worse.

The station was full of people and I was concerned about my missing bag. She suggested I go to a shelter but we both knew that wasn’t a good idea. There were a lot of people stranded there at the station and some of them were either trying to get away from Houston or trying to get there. Many of them were headed for the shelter and it was already nearly full. 

I went outside and looked around and saw several hotels but most looked out of my league. This trip was going to cost me a lot of money.

I went to McDonalds and tried to get on to Priceline and get a bargain on a hotel there and for some reason that didn’t work so I realized the one hotel was the cheapest one so I trudged the 2 blocks and got a room there.

I was exhausted. I hadn’t slept much the night before and I fell into bed and slept a few hours after I let my family and friends know where I was. I had set up a group text with my brothers and nephew and friend and I contacted Harmon and assured them all I was all right.

I got up, went to get something to eat and drink and because I had nothing to sleep in, I bought a few tee shirts and came back and took a shower and passed out again. I looked up a few places intending to go get some Texas barbecue the next day. My hotel room was quiet and comfortable and I got some good rest before I got up, cleaned up and checked out.

Two doors down I saw a little fried chicken place. Nothing fancy - just fried chicken. It had to be good because there was a long line inside so I went in and ordered a couple of pieces and sat down and enjoyed it before I walked over to the bus station.

It was still packed but I got there around 1:30 and my bus wasn’t leaving till 7:30 but I had nowhere else to sit and wait so I did. Thankfully, the Seat Nazi didn’t hassle me and I didn’t have any problems while waiting.  

I asked one of the customer service agents a few times about my bag and one finally took me over to the baggage area and lo and behold, there was my suitcase, tagged and stacked and ready to go on the bus I was going to take. I felt a lot better.

I shouldn’t have. I should have taken my suitcase with me. But no, I was trusting them to get my bag home with me and I left it there. This was Friday afternoon.

I met this wonderful lady who was 75 years old and was still working as a nurse. We sat and talked for hours. She really made the time go by a lot faster. I wished that we had been going in the same direction, but we weren’t.

I had been rerouted through Shreveport, Birmingham and Atlanta. I would change buses there and take another bus that would go south through Georgia and then over to Tallahassee. There, I could wait 8 hours for the bus to Panama City. I said no, I could call my family and they would come get me in Tallahassee. 

I sent Harmon a text and told him that I would not be home until 10 p.m. on Sunday. He spoke to our friend and told her and she said she would be sure to be there to get me.

We got to Shreveport late. We were even later getting to Jackson, Mississippi. We had to wait there and the bus station was locked when we got there. Someone opened the door and the restaurant was closed and there were barely enough seats for us all to sit in. There was nothing for us to do but just stand around and wait. It was awful. The bathroom was disgusting.

We got to Birmingham late as well. We stopped at one place that did have food so we got a good breakfast and of course, we got to Atlanta late. I missed the bus I was supposed to take and guess what? My suitcase was not on the bus.

Now when I got to Dallas, they had issued me a different ticket. I had my luggage tag at that point. I was assured my bag would make the trip so I wasn’t too worried. It did have a luggage tag on it with my name and destination. Actually, I had gotten a different ticket in Tucson, Dallas, Atlanta and Mobile. Somewhere along the line, my luggage tag went MIA.

However, our bus was late arriving in Atlanta and I missed my connection by about half an hour. When I spoke to the ticket agent, she issued a different ticket for me and I was glad because it got me back to the original route and I would get home at 9 a.m. the next day instead of 10 p.m. as I had originally been told.

I checked in with Customer Service again, and I was seated in Priority Boarding. It was at this point that I think I wasn’t given my luggage tag. She again assured me that my bag would go on to Panama City and that I shouldn’t worry. I had checked a second bag but did not trust “special handling” so I kept it close to me.

Two years ago, I took a trip from Chicago to Savannah, GA with my brother and we were seated in Priority Boarding in Atlanta to wait for our transfer to the bus to Savannah.  The way it is supposed to work is that an agent is supposed to let the bus driver know that he has Priority riders and that he is supposed to walk us out to the bus and board us before the rest of the travelers are boarded. 

So we sat there, trusting the agent to get us on the bus.

However, the agent forgot that we were there and did not board us and we ended up having to wait 5 hours for the next bus. We were given a voucher for future travel but we didn’t use it.

So I was leery about being seated there and I spoke to several of the people working in Customer Service so that I would not be forgotten again. They all assured me I would not be forgotten and that they would see to it that I was seated. One even gave me a voucher for a meal which was nice.

The bus was supposed to leave at 11:35 that evening but it was late. We weren’t informed that our bus was late until after midnight and we were told it would be another hour before it arrived. 

I was afraid I would not get home when scheduled and I had already contacted my family to let them know when to expect me. Since my arrival time had been changed so many times, I was worried, but they assured me they would be there whenever I got there.

I went to ask the ticket agent about when another bus would leave in Mobile because I was going to miss the connecting bus. She gave me some kind of silly reply that did not really address my question. I noticed the customer service agent who assured me he would take me to my bus walking off with his meal and when I got back to the Priority Seating area, they were seating people for my bus! No announcement, no one had come to get me, if I hadn’t returned when I did, I would have missed my bus!

I rushed out and told the driver I was to get Priority Boarding and he said no one had told him I was there and he told me to go ahead and get on the bus.

We were very late arriving in Mobile, so once again, I had to sit 6 hours till the next bus. This was Sunday morning and I had been traveling since Wednesday afternoon. 

And no, my bag was not on the bus when I got to Mobile.

I got to Panama City Sunday afternoon about 4:30. Yes, we were late. And what amazed me was that the driver stopped at a convenience store not 5 minutes from the bus station. 

When we got there, I went to get my carryon bag. When we left Mobile, he was the one who insisted I put that bag under the bus and had asked to see the luggage tag on the bag. I showed it to him and he had the bag put on the bus.

But when I got to Panama City, I didn’t see my bag. I asked about my bag because it hadn’t been taken off the bus. 

The driver said it must not have been on the bus and I insisted that it was. It was on the other side of the bus and the driver demanded a luggage tag. I reminded him that he had seen my bag in Mobile and that it was tagged with my destination and name and he allowed me to claim it with my ID.

I asked the ticket agent in Panama City if he had a bag there that had not been claimed. As I said, the bus station there closes for a while in the afternoon and he was ready to leave and didn’t want to take the time to look for my bag.

By then I was tired and frustrated and I just wanted to get my bag and go home. You see, Blountstown is about 40 miles from Panama City and I don’t have a car so I didn’t want to have to ask someone to make a second trip for me to get my second bag.

He was not willing to even listen to me, but said if I didn’t have a luggage tag, he couldn’t look for it. I kept telling him he needed to stop and listen and he did but it was clear he was angry and didn’t want to entertain me. 

He made a half-hearted attempt to look for it but I told him that I had been re-ticketed so many times that I didn’t have a luggage tag anymore. He couldn’t find my name in the system and I realized he wasn’t really going to look for me. I left my name and number and what the bag looked like and asked him to call me.

I have called a few times in the 10 days since I got home. The agent said that things were slowly coming in from that direction and he hoped my bag would still arrive. But in order to fill out a lost suitcase claim, I have to go to Panama City so I will have to make a second trip anyway. So far, my suitcase, marked “Special Handling” is still missing.

To put it briefly, this was a nightmare of a trip. I really do understand about rerouting me because of the hurricane. I know the roads were flooded and that my route would have taken me right through areas that were hit hard with floods and wind. But I still think things could have been handled a lot better.

There were a few bus drivers who just didn’t seem to care that we were late and that we were going to miss connections because of it. That really made me angry. I have been with drivers who hate being late and really do their best to get us there as close to the original time as they can. Not these drivers. They just moseyed along and took longer times at the rest stops and caused a lot of us to miss our next bus.

I wrote a letter to Greyhound after I got home. I don’t expect to hear much from them.

I am not sure if I will take Greyhound again. I think this was the final straw for me.

All I want now is my suitcase.