A Black Woman Born in 1943

We don’t check history at the gate, history is a messy carry-on.

First things first, my mom didn’t pass away. She’s alive and well. I was visiting her this past weekend and our last conversation before I returned home was about her life story, which I recorded as part of a personal historical archiving project I’ve, over the years, roped my parents into participating.

The following is what I wrote on the plane as I reflected on the conversation with my mom about her life; specifically how it began and what her world looked like at the same age my kids are now.

My mother was born at home in Columbus, GA in a three room house with no running water. 

I’m reflecting on this fact as I’m driving a $50,000 electric vehicle (rental) to the airport where I’ll board a plane that will make a 550 mile journey in under 90 minutes.

My mother’s grandmother was born to parents who were enslaved.

My kids love visiting their BiBi’s apartment, where they can watch TV with literally hundreds of programming options in a dozen languages besides their native English.

My parental grandfather was murdered when my dad was 6 years old by a racist white co-worker while my Pop Pop rode his bike home from work. The murderer was never arrested or charged with a crime.

I have anxiety that either of my children will be victims of similar racist violence, as my parents worried about me and their parents before them worried about the same.

So so much has changed in a span of a few generations, and so much hasn’t.

What I find remarkable is that the histories of times gone by are so close that we can reach out and touch them, talk to the people who lived those times, and listen to them reflect on how different things used to be and how certain things haven’t really changed.

I have absolutely no concept of living in a home without running water. I remember a time without the internet, but only just. As I listen to my mom tell me about her early years, I keep thinking:

“How in the hell did you raise me without constantly scolding me whenever I complained about anything?!”

When people say, “I want my kids to have a better life than I did” I cringe. I think I always have because rather than that common saying igniting motivation to work hard and persevere, all I can think about is the oppression that is put on people such that they need to wish for such hard work and perseverance.

My mom’s living conditions at birth were beneath the dignity of any human being. She and her siblings weren’t born into poverty because her parents didn’t work hard enough or weren’t smart enough or were “less fortunate”. My mom was born into a state of poverty because of racial capitalism and white supremacy. Period.

My father, his mother, and his siblings were forced to navigate a world where their father/husband could be taken from them without consequence because of racism and patriarchy. Period.

Everyone who transcends systemic injustice should be commended, but in USian society we make heroes out of a few who’s stories make us feel fortunate in our privilege, while doing next to nothing to eliminate the circumstances that place so many unnamed people in lives full of suffering most never escape from.

I’m so very proud of what my parents and their generation have accomplished given where they started from. Without their hard work and luck I would not have had the horizons to reach for in my life.

But I’ll be damned if I don’t hate with a passion the architects and enablers of a system that made my parents’ accomplishments in life the exception and not the rule.

The founding fathers, the architects of racial capitalism, the entire United States of America can fuck all the way off for what they did/are still doing to these lands and the beings here.

I’m not proud to be a USian. I’m not proud of what this country stands for. The US is an illegitimate nation built by psychopaths whose primary goal is to extract resources to concentrate wealth among an extremely small minority of white men. The rest of us are forced to get in where we fit in, and there are strict rules to that process still.

The US shouldn’t exist and the good things that come from the people here are in spite of the suffering this nation perpetuates for profit.

This nation has come a long way from my great great grandparents being enslaved, but the true nature of a nation built on genocide, ecocide, subjugation, and exploitation can only change so much before it becomes unrecognizable.

I want this nation to be unrecognizable by the time my children are telling their stories about me to their grand children.

What might that look like? I imagine it would resemble the reaction my grandfather would have if he walked into a biology classroom and saw me teaching a room full of white kids in college.

I thought about saving this post for the upcoming July 4th holiday, but, well, here we are.

I realize I’m being hypocritical when I call out US culture and history. I’m going to enjoy the bbq, fireworks, and (some) festivities come early July (Y’all can keep those corny-ass American flag swim trunks and bikinis though). But you won’t catch me chanting “U-S-A”, waving a flag, or capping for even the most progressive US policy for the same reasons that I wouldn’t applaud or celebrate a serial killer that helped an elderly person across a busy street.

Part of why this stance is so visceral for me is because of what my parent’s can tell me about their experiences as Black people. For example, one of their classmates in college had to take a semester off because he made the mistake of falling asleep in a bus station in the “whites only” section of the terminal. He was nearly beaten to death and had his college career disrupted for sleeping on seats a white person might want to sit on hours later.

Harriet Tubman’s life overlaps with the lives of Thomas Jefferson and Ronald Regan. Think about how much US history is contained within those 91 years and the fact that one person can bridge so much of a nation’s history.

My children can literally reach out and touch the civil rights era. And most of you reading this can too. How much of that time do we understand from first hand accounts? How many times do we ask them about those years and what they remember? Where were your relatives when MLK was murdered?

My generation is fond of saying that they will never forget where they were and how they felt on September 9, 2001. How many of us have shared that knowledge and insight with folks born after that day? I will never forget how I felt when I heard about Brianna Taylor, Sandra Bland, George Floyd, Travon Martin, John Crawford, and so many other modern day lynch victims. Do the young people in our lives know how we feel about those events?

We may never forget those moments, but those moments lose their power to make change if we don’t share our reflections and experiences with others. My mother’s story of her life, as can only be told by her, dies when she dies. Except the parts she shares with me and that I share with others.

I think a lot about these things as I’ve crested middle age and my parents have become octogenarians. Humans are hard wired to define their reality through stories, and as I’ve gotten older, I care less and less about forms of currency that don’t directly lead to interesting stories.

I wish I had started recording my mom, dad, and older relatives earlier. There’s so much I won’t ever know about them and their lives, which is so sad because of the lessons and wisdom we’ll miss out on.

This week’s news letter might have landed better in two months, but who knows if any of us will still be here. Please share your stories with as many people you can trust and love. We need the wisdom, insight, and creativity of every single person to make this world better.

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New Video Content

I’m working through the footage of the second part of Butchering a Whole Deer, and I’m reminded of how much I have yet to learn and practice as an Adult-Onset Hunter and home cook. Videos like this help remind me to not take myself or this process too seriously. Enjoy!

Squirrel season just ended and I was only able to harvest this one. The video for this is coming soon and as I think about this coming summer and fall seasons I’m going to include more time to hunt these delicious rodents. Local, sustainable, free range, acorn fed yumminess.

Wild Food Update

Venison Reuben

Let me tell y’all something. This sandwich was f*cking scrumptious! One great motivation for harvesting wild food is cooking wild food and wishing you had more. We don’t have that much venison left in the freezer and I corned the last two leg roast cuts to make the meat for this sandwich.

For next year I’m thinking I’ll corn two whole venison thighs so that I can have Reubens and corned venison hash all winter and spring. Here’s the recipe, another great one from Hank Shaw.

Recommendation

Food storage.

The more restaurant quality foods you can get in your kitchen, the more efficient and, I think, enjoyable the process of preparing wild foods gets. For my bulk flours and grains, I go with Cambro storage containers

I also use these contains to store liquids like stock and to brine meat. The 4QT size fits nicely in the fridge and has plenty of capacity for most jobs a household might need.

Business Update

I made money this month!

Thanks to those who’s signed up as patrons on MY PATREON. It means a lot to have a steady income and I can put the money to good use. Every little bit helps and there are lots of things I’d love to start doing as my business grows.

I also made some money from the product recommendations I’ve made, which is just wild to me. This whole process has been easier and harder than I thought and I’m incredibly thankful for the folks who design and maintain the incredible software that allows so many of us to connect, share, and support ourselves.

Cheers to them, cheers to y’all, and cheers to the community of folks we’re building and maintaining!d

Thanks for reading this week’s newsletter!

-Jonathan