White Blood. Red Blood.
I plowed through an online form, annoyed at repeating the same information a million times a week. Why couldn’t the world centralize this stuff once and for all? I plugged in name and address, checked Black, supplied phone number, copy-pasted my website url. Bla bla bla. After finishing, I went back through to catch typos. Above the race/ethnicity list, I noticed the instruction: Select all that apply.
What?
All?
All.
Do it.
I checked White.
Energy surged through my ribcage. It made me sit up straighter.
I checked American Indian.
My chest puffed out.
I felt bigger than myself, made whole by ghosts.
My great-grandmother on Mama’s side was white, an Irish immigrant who married a colored man. She eventually moved back to Ireland. There were no photos of her in the family album; she disappeared from our story. Her whiteness did not. My mama could have passed, if she’d been plucked away from the gaggle of nappy-headed kids trailing behind her calling her Mama. And all us nappy-headed kids were Mama’s color, Great-Grandmother’s color. I never claimed my Irish foremother. I failed to see her in any mirror, failed to recognize her when smoothing lotion into my ashy skin— shades lighter than straight-out-of-Africa. The Irish woman was a distant relative without a name or face. I didn’t feel her in me. Until I selected all that applied.
My double-great-grandfather on Dad’s side was American Indian — Blackfoot. Isaac Johnson was a Civil War veteran. A photo showed him wearing a 19th century suit that reminded me of Gunsmoke. The picture was blurry. I couldn’t tell what he was for sure. On the other hand, photos of his grown daughter, Granny Mum (great-grandmother, Dad’s side) made me disoriented. How could I be black when Granny Mum looked like she’d just been rounded up and shoved onto a reservation? How could I be black when Granny Mum’s features were so classic she looked fake? The cheekbones, The nose. The hair. I stopped looking at Granny Mum’s picture, and my black equilibrium returned. Close the family album, and I didn’t feel Isaac Johnson or Granny Mum in me. Until I selected all that applied.
While writing and promoting Blindsided: Essays from the Only Black Woman in the Room, the subject of race took me over. What kind of black woman was I? I talked about black. Thought about black. Ached about black. Searched for black people to be black with. Black, black, black. Squished and puny, I was unequal to the task of being me.
When I selected all that applied, the ancestors swooped in. Where you been girl? Sit up straight.
