Month: January 2017

I have not written any new entries here for a while….I guess I just put to much of myself into the last election …and more than politically burned out from the results…The last time I posted this picture , an old friend complemented me on taking such a nice picture when I was a young man. But to most of you I don’t have to tell you, this is Dr. Martin Luther King born Micheal King Jr .he is at Morehouse College in 1948. I always stop and honor Dr. King on this day. But most of the time I don’t go out and do any special activities on the Holiday that is his birthday. I have tried to make everyday that I am able to serve as Martin Luther King Day. I won’t say I was a friend of Dr. Kings. He certainly knew who I was. He was a very early hero to me long before the march on Washington. But I was much too young to have been in his circle. And as a youngster I tried very hard to spend as much time with the people I considered the “movers and shakers” in the civil rights movement. I must have washed Martins car about 10 times. and helped cut the grass at his house a few times. But for me as I grew further into my teens. It was Julian Bond, and John Lewis, Diane Nash, Lonnie King, C.T. Vivian and a lot of other people you never heard of from SNCC and the Atlanta student movement that called to me and formed my idea of the type of activist I wanted to be. Even though Atlanta Georgia was the only true Metropolis soaked in the culture of “Jim Crow” It probably was the biggest threat to the old segregated culture..Because as anyone who knows the area can tell you, the city is full of historically Black educational institutions and even today it’s the Black educational capital of the world..many movements from the civil rights era may have started in other towns …with student and clergy from other places. But they all seemed to gather in our city when the movement matured. I got to see it all happen. The meetings . planning sessions. And all the talk about what tactics to use. heard many of the arguments between different factions. And I was just a kid. But that was rarefied air to be in if you were growing up then and there. I still remember the talks among my “elders”..meaning 22-30 year olds ..making plans to risk their lives on campaigns to change the way we lived “down south” as well as the way Black people all over America saw themselves and how we were perceived by the rest of the country as well as the rest of the world. These same people lead me to be able to go to several other countries and see and participate in movements for freedom and justice for oppressed people , Angola , Palestine, North Viet Nam and other countries. There is a reason why I am so disgusted by “coonery” , deadbeat dads, monkeyfied rappers, and hip-hop hoochie mamas. Back then ALL the images we saw of ourselves were clowns, maids , janitors, criminals, shoe shine boys, “bucks” and Mammies. And these people in the movement were the best and the brightest of us. Risking not just any future success in employment but their lives in order that the coming generation could walk unthreatened. with dignity and pride…..seems like a simple thing today….but it was not. Today’s activist need to understand that it was a deadly business. Most of us didn’t expect to live past 30……..and many did not. Martin Luther King was NOT Santa Claus , and God bless him our Dear John Lewis who Trump insulted this week is not. Regardless of whether you always agree with Lewis today….I consider him one of the the bravest Americans who ever lived. I was on that bridge in Selma when we were both along with dozens of other people beaten and trampled by horses and gassed. I know we did not “fix” America back then …..but there are a hell of a lot of things black, brown and poor people can do today that they couldn’t do before the movement….and it goes on ..and it should everyday..NO Martin was not Santa..the movement was not “cute and fluffy”…and one day of service won’t change sh*t. Honor Martin in what you do everyday…….thanks…..just an “old head” talking