I have a love/hate relationship with Black History Month.
When I was much younger I approached the month the same as everyone else...until one faithful day. I remember it vividly.
Another girl in my 1st grade class started going through the black history month photo cards. There were little cards that had photos of significant black history moments on the front, and a brief paragraph about the moment on the back. As she flipped through the cards at our lunch table (I should note: she was my friend and 2 grades ahead of me...I've always been an old soul) I noticed a card that looked slightly familiar. I knew I had seen the picture before, and one of the people in it seemed vaguely recognizable.
Then she flipped the card over and the back said something about The Little Rock Nine. None of that piqued my interest, but as she read me the card one name stuck out, Ernest Green.
Well for those of you that know me, and for those that don't, you probably know my dad is Ernest Green of The Little Rock Nine.
I won't go in to the history, because honestly I learned the history side of the story the same way most people did...in school. SO if you really want to know, you can Google it, or open a book and get all the clinical historical pieces. I'm here to give you the personal side of the story.
I had an inkling that my father was "somebody." When I got to spend the summer in Arkansas while Disney made a movie about my dad starring Morris Chestnut. It wasn't really the fact that Disney was making a movie about my dad that I cared about, rather I was excited about getting dressed up and having people fuss over my hair. I also spent a lot of time with Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis, because I thought they really were my grandmother and grandfather Green...who passed away long before I was born (in my defense, I didn't know any better...I was 3 when they filmed the movie).
...to must seem like a dream come true. I have grown up calling different celebrities and notable figures my uncles and aunties, meeting Presidents who tell me how much they admire my father, and even hearing his voice sampled on a Public Enemy song. That's all fine and dandy, but he's my dad.
I know someone knows him as his "persona," if they call him Ernie. To me he is not the man in the history books or documentaries. He's a wonderful father, husband and brother. The best testament to that is the fact that I never grasped the scope of his celebrity growing up. I just knew February was the month where more fan mail than usual came to the house, and for some reason people wanted to talk to my dad. He never raised me to see him as "Ernest Green," he raised me as my father.
So why am I saying all this? Honestly, I don't know. I remember this summer watching The Butler and having my breathe taken away when the entire portion of the film on Eisenhower, talked about the Crisis in Little Rock. I felt like I was sitting next to a superhero, in his Clark Kent disguise, but only my mom and I knew his cape was hidden underneath.
Another impetus for this rant...I'm embarking on my own journey as a hopeful history maker. I hope to leave my indelible mark on the world like my father. Some may think I'm crazy for trying to compete with a standard like that. But there aren't many black women running major financial institutions, or serving as Secretary of Treasury...so I think there's some space for me to make it happen. I always grin a little when someone wants to bring me down a peg or says, "my aunt's best friend's grandmother was the first black person to integrate her middle school, so I guess your dad is a big deal"...and I can shake a stick at the number of people I've met that swear they sat down before Rosa Parks.
My hope with this post is to show some of you that heroes walk among you, that ordinary people can do extraordinary things. And that what may seem like the most average of acts, like going to school can change the world. But above all that for some of us, Black History isn't a month, it's a lifetime affair.
XOXO,
MacKenzie
