Chapter 02
Friends and Family Get the Good Dishes
My students ask me what it was like to be raised in the sixties.
Honestly, I couldn’t tell you much.
I was eight.
It was the summer of 1970.
I do remember our local YMCA.
I was taken there to swim.
I had questioned my mom.
“Mom, why do all the black kids have to wait outside the fence?”
“It’s not their turn to swim, Lee Ann.”
“Why aren’t they swimming with us?”
“There are some people who believe that it has to do with cleanliness levels.”
“But if they get in the water, they shower like we do, then everyone is the same clean.”
“There are things like head lice and body bugs and ticks. Those things don’t disappear with just water.”
“Those bugs don’t bite white people?”
“Some people think that way.”
“How do we think?”
Mom sighed.
“Do you remember Jessy? When we first met him? What was Mrs. Finch doing?”
“She tried to feed him out of a dog bowl for the work he did.”
“And, what happened?
“He turned it down.”
“Then?”
“You brought him home and let him mow the lawn. Then he stayed for dinner.”
“Where did he eat?”
“At the table with us. He used our plates.”
“That’s what we think.”
“He told you that people will talk.
He said that he shouldn’t be inside with you being a single lady.
He said if you’d wrap it up, he’d take it out back and eat and bring you back the plate.”
“You heard all that, huh?”
Mom looked sad.
“Yes, ma’am. I also heard what you said to the Mrs. Finch before we left. You said Daddy words!”
“Forget that part.”
“So, now you have an example, how do you think we think about the kids at the fence.”
“They should be here with us. Even if people talk.”
“Times change slowly. It’ll happen.”
“I understand.”
“I believe you do.
Take care of yourself, first.
That way you can take care of family.
Eventually, friends become family and you take care of them too.
Don’t let skin color change the way you treat people.”
“Can I wait out there with them?”
“You have your beginning swim test today! You can’t miss that.”
“Do I have to? I’ve failed it five times already!”
“This is the last chance this summer for you to pass.
You’re staying on this side of that fence.”
“My arms aren’t strong enough!
They won’t let me swim under water.”
“Knowing how to swim may save your life one day. All my kids will learn how.”
“Jimmy even passed the first time and he’s three years younger than me!”
“You’re smart. No one is good at everything.
It never feels good to fail.
It feels a lot better knowing what you do and don’t know than it does to assume you can’t… yet.”
I would love to end this story by telling you that I passed the test that day.
I did not.
The next year, they made me take the beginning swimming class again with kids as young as five.
I failed the test four more times.
On the fifth time, I passed. I have no proof, but I think they gave me two extra forgiveness points.
Then, I got to take my underwater test, and I passed the first time.
I had strong legs. Thanks to bike pedaling!
That and I got to push off the wall.
I left the underwater test with the certainty of knowing; I never needed to be trying to swim anywhere unless there was a wall to push off from.
My next experience with water came during my teenage years.
I’m choosing not to tell this story with remembered dialogue.
What happened hurt my feelings.
My father is no longer alive.
Recalling dialogue will bring up memories that I would rather remember as a chorus of voices instead of exactly who said what.
My dad took us water skiing. My sisters and brother were great.
The mandatory life jacket gave me confidence.
Dad tried to get me up three times.
Nope. It didn’t happen.
I figured my siblings had fifteen minutes to ski.
He would give me fifteen minutes to try to learn.
I was wrong.
Now as an adult, I figure, in his mind, I was worn out and would only get worse.
In my mind, he lost confidence in me.
I never tried again.
When they went out in the boat, I would sit on the pier.
I knew the pier was my place.
I wasn’t mad about it.
I pretty much made a deal with the universe.
If water left me alone, I would leave it alone.
Daniel's Den 