I wasn’t sure about posting this week. I have a lot going on. But my little Abigail Hadiya insisted. Wants you to know about our next great adventure. She was excited about being the star of our next show until she caught wind of the subject matter.
“Ya’ll help me! He’s mean. I’m scared.”
Calm down Dee. It’ll be all right.
“Like it was with Daddy? I don’t think so. Did he tell you he’s gettin ready to write a book on teen suicide. He keeps calling me the star of the show. I don’t think so.”
I told you it will be all right.
“I bet.”
Don’t be so belligerent."
“Ya’ll pray for me. Mommy and Grandma Leah will stop him. I hope.”
Don’t bet on it. Anyway gentle reader here we go.
Two things pushed me down the path to a belief the entire discussion on race in this country since the Civil Rights Movement is wrong. My years under the tutelage of the Street Corner Aristotle convinced me crime is part and parcel of the assimilation process in America. And a rising tide of suicide consideration in communities on America’s assimilating margins taught me there are lagging and leading indicators of assimilation. Or at least that’s what economists say. They get some things right. The old blind hog finding the acorn thing I suspect.
I hesitate to repeat ideas previously discussed, but my youngest son convinced me a couple of weeks ago readers need to revisit some conversations. It helps them to understand you. I’ll take his word. I believe in listening to young people.
What made me listen on the subject of suicide is a conversation with a young Hispanic man a few weeks ago. I’ll call him H. We met at the drive through at Chik Fi La. He was working and I was ravaging another drive though. I had never seen him before.
Yet he struck up a conversation. He told me he was suffering from depression. Had been contemplating how to end his suffering. My wife says I remind her of Lady Liberty. I should have stamped on my forehead give me your poor, your tired, your huddled masses… Anyway I told him being young is overrated. You think you should be happy. Nothing is further from the truth if you live in mainstream America.
I told him everything you go through good and bad is exaggerated because you don’t know what comes next. As you get older you realize you get through the good and bad and often you look at back at the bad and see where it led to good days in your life. That suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary condition.
H took what I said to heart. He said he was going to work on feeling better. When I see him we talk. He appears to be in a better frame, but I watch him. I know about hiding your deepest pain. You need to let it see the light of day. The light can help you overcome the darkness blanketing your mind. And that darkness is cold and afflicting. The light is so much better.
The darkness is a middle class affliction. And assimilation is defined by life in the middle class. The more middle class your community the more mainstream you become. Unfortunately, the more likely you are to kill yourself.
Life is too focused on the struggle against oppression when you live on the assimilating margins of our society to want to kill yourself. My struggle to overcome the darkness forced me to consider why I held on to life with such a light grip when everyone around me clung to it so tightly. Although I knew two other Black kids who tried to kill themselves back in the day. Both were from solid middle class backgrounds. One went to high school with me. Neither had I want to kill myself stamped on their foreheads. Both gave it a good try.
I spoke to one about a year ago and she talked about how life gets better. She suffers from MS. Her life remains a struggle, but you seek the light if you’ve survived the darkness. I want kids to know that.
My dad is blind and paralyzed on his left side, but he holds life in a vise grip. I’m happy to see that. I spoke with someone Friday night who suffers from several chronic illnesses. We laughed about how precious life is. The older I get the tighter my grip on it. The more I see suicide consideration is a lagging indicator of assimilation.
A temporary solution to a permanent condition.
I want kids to know this. I gave my being young is hard to two of my students abut a week ago. I could see no one had ever told them this. I hope what I said sticks. One is from Uganda, the other from Vietnam. They live on the same assimilating margins I knew as a young man and I want them to know though life is a struggle, we must soldier on.
“Don’t listen to him! He says these fancy words. Has he told you he is going to walk me out a sixth story window. What are you trying to do Mr. Hawkins, send me to see my Daddy!”
Calm down Dee.
“You’re mean.”
And I love you too much to kill you. We’ll see where this goes.
“Love huh, I’m glad you don’t hate me.”
Let me talk to her folks. I’ll be back in a couple of weeks.
“You’ll be back. What about me? Ya’ll pray for me.”
What is worse Not having or knowing what you don’t have?