Reflections in the Dark Room

The Obama Effect…Have you noticed that whites are now so willing to engage us in conversation?  All their lives, they have known very little about us, because they were only exposed to the Martin Luther Kings, or the Rodney Kings.  But now, thanks to the floodgate of curiosity brought on by The Obama Effect…

Presidential Inaugural Ball 2009… Seated ay a nearby table, Frederick Douglas has a captive audience in W.E.B. DuBose and Fannie Lou Hamer, and Medgar Evers has just joined them.  Marian Anderson was asked to sing tonight, but she agreed to do it only if Bessie Smith and Mahalia Jackson shared the stage, and they were accompanied by Marvin Gaye, John Lennon, and Jimi Hendrix.  Look, there’s Harriet Tubman.  No one knows how she arrived, but there she is.  And my guess is that, when the time comes, no one will see her leave…

Urban: The New Definition… Don’t look now, but the word “Urban” is now in vogue.  Not long ago, Urban was closely followed by words “decay” and “blight.”  But now there is a flow of positivity flooding the streets of used-to-be-ghetto real estate like Grant Park in Atlanta.  Of course, the big draw in Grant Park has always been the Atlanta Zoo and its animals.  So at some point the question must have arisen, “how do we keep the animals and get rid of the black people?”…