The Times In Which We Live...

Yesterday I saw a young Black girl in the store with an older white woman. She was about 11 or 12 years old. Something about her or maybe my heightened awareness of recent incidents of harm being done to unsuspecting Black folks, made me want to ask lil' Sis, if she was okay. I hope my eyes conveyed my concern such that she knew I was a safe harbor if she needed it. 

I'm not paranoid, or even racist, as some will deflect, but these are the times in which we are living. Two white folks were recently convicted for brutally abusing several Black children they adopted. Lynchings are on the rise. We are to believe that a young Black wrestler killed himself by rolling himself in a wrestling mat. Let us not forget Tamla Horsford, the 40-year-old Black mother of five athletic sons living in an all white community, found dead in the backyard after a sleepover with white soccer moms. 

The stories of abuse or death of unsuspecting Black boys by their white "friends" is off the chain. Even white folks on social media are warning Black folks to be more careful and not so trusting in white spaces. I hear them...

I have said it for a long time now, and I will continue to say it, if white people knew the true depth of barbarity in their history, instead of spreading a narrative that they should clutch their pearls and fear Black folks, they would wonder why we're not afraid of them. 👀 

Be careful folks. We must be careful about the situations in which we put ourselves, certainly our children. How many of you hold inside or come home from work or some other integrated situation complaining about some negative experience you had with a white person, overtly or passively? What makes you then think that somehow our children can navigate that? Without the proper tools, they cannot... 

We are not protecting them when we don't talk to them about racism and discrimination, past or present. We do them no favor when we don't teach them to recognize the red flags, instead, we harm them. We harm, not protect them, by not passing down stories, not telling them their history (the good to fortify them, the bad to prepare them), not sharing our personal experiences, not instilling in them the skill of discernment to be on alert at all times. 

There's a way to do that without exchanging their innocence of youth for a constant state of fear or paranoia or making them feel tense or on guard at all times but rather, alert and aware of the signs to notice when things are out of sorts. They will know to err on the side of caution and not second guess their intuition telling themselves that something's wrong with them when it is not. Teach them to assess their surroundings to know good and bad people in their proximity. Teach them to identify good folks, both Black and white, who can be trusted to help in these situations. 

Have you all seen the social media posts where non-Black parents are teaching their children that if they're in a situation that doesn't feel safe, to find a Black woman to protect them. 👀 Sidebar: Black folks are feeling some kinda' way about this for a bunch of valid reasons. Again, however, it's not paranoia, it's survival. 

Is this fair? Are these pleasant conversations to have with our Black children? No, but they are necessary conversations that can be a matter of life or death. More importantly, it is responsible parenting...

We are hearing too many stories from far too many Black families left with no resolve, no justice, therefore, no peace, after an inexplicable and sudden death or missing of a loved one. May each family so affected, find justice and peace... 

~ Miss Higgi Prays 🙏🏿

Meet Joan Trumpauer, A White Woman Who Traded Her Privilege to Stand in Her Truth

We've all at least pondered what we would have done had we lived when America was "great". Well, here we are.

We are reliving a continuation of the worst of America's history. These are the times one promotes in chants to "Make America Great Again". This is the "great" they want to return to?

Meet Joan Trumpauer. She was a real one. She is a white woman who traded her privilege to stand in her truth. She put her life on the line for what she believed. Are you a Joan?

We need more Joans at this time. History does not allow that you just look the other way, pretending it's not that bad or that it's not really happening. History does not allow you to be ignorant or silent...

So, what are you going to do? I challenge us all to channel our innermost Joan and get to work. White folks, especially you "liberals", white women in particular, I need you to be the ally you say you are. 👀 Roll up your sleeves...

Pass on Joan's story to educate and inspire others.  Story Source: Informatify Facebook page 

She was a white Southern girl descended from slave owners — raised by a mother who believed in segregation. At nineteen, she threw all of that away, and it landed her on death row. And that was only the beginning of what she was willing to lose...

Her name was Joan Trumpauer, and she grew up in Arlington, Virginia, on the comfortable side of every line the segregated South had drawn.

Her family had once owned slaves in Georgia. Her mother was a staunch segregationist. Everything about Joan's world was arranged to reward her for looking away — to keep her safe, protected, and silent inside a system built for people who looked like her. The path in front of her was the easy one: finish school, marry well, live quietly, never make trouble.

But Joan couldn't stop seeing what that comfort was built on. Raised in the church, she kept colliding with the unbearable contradiction between what she'd been taught about justice and the injustice she watched every day. And at some point she made a decision that would cost her nearly everything: she would no longer stand on the comfortable side of it.

In 1961, at nineteen, she joined the Freedom Riders.

Their idea sounded almost mundane. Black and white Americans would ride interstate buses together and use the same waiting rooms and counters, regardless of race. No weapons, no threats — just a refusal to obey laws built on inequality.

In 1961, that refusal could get you killed. Freedom Riders were beaten in broad daylight, buses firebombed, mobs waiting at stations with chains and clubs.

Joan knew all of it. She boarded the bus anyway.

When she reached Jackson, Mississippi, she was arrested almost immediately. And then she was offered the easy way out that would follow her for years: pay the fine, leave Mississippi, go home, forget the whole thing.

She refused.

So they sent her to Parchman Farm — the Mississippi State Penitentiary, a place designed not merely to punish people but to break them. And here is a detail that tells you everything about what she endured: because Parchman had no women's wing, nineteen-year-old Joan was held in a cell on death row, crammed in with seventeen other women.

She spent about two months there. The heat was suffocating. The guards leaned on psychological cruelty as much as physical confinement, subjecting the women to invasive, degrading "examinations" designed purely to show they could do anything they wanted. They were making clear, Joan said, that they had total power — and probably would use it.

And through all of it, the guards reminded her of the one thing they thought she'd forgotten: she was white. Unlike the Black prisoners beside her, she could leave anytime — she only had to say she was sorry.

She never did.

Most people, after Parchman, would have gone home. Joan went deeper.

She dropped out of Duke and enrolled at Tougaloo College in Jackson — the first white student at the historically Black school. Her reasoning was pure, defiant logic: if whites would riot over Black students integrating white colleges, what would they do about a white student integrating a Black one? At Tougaloo she worked alongside Medgar Evers, met Martin Luther King Jr., roomed with the writer Anne Moody, and became the first white member of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.

Her family couldn't understand it. Threatening letters arrived. And to the segregationists of Mississippi, her real crime was never simply breaking their laws — it was choosing empathy over the privilege she'd been handed at birth.

Then came May 28, 1963 — and the moment that would put her face in history books.

Joan was one of roughly fourteen activists who staged a sit-in at the whites-only lunch counter of the Woolworth's in downtown Jackson. Anne Moody was there. So was professor John Salter, and chaplain Ed King. They sat down. They ordered food. That was all.

What followed became one of the most violent sit-ins of the entire Civil Rights Movement. A mob surrounded them and, for nearly three hours, unleashed everything it had. A Black student, Memphis Norman, was dragged to the floor and beaten by a former policeman. Salter was burned with cigarettes and hit with brass knuckles. The crowd screamed "communist" and worse, and a man pointed straight at Joan and called her a "race traitor." They poured ketchup, mustard, sugar, and spray paint over the activists' heads, spat on them, and punched them.

The police stood nearby and watched. No one stepped in.

And a photographer named Fred Blackwell captured it — three people at a lunch counter, dripping with condiments, ringed by faces contorted with hate, refusing to move. The picture went around the world. It became one of the defining images of the movement, because it showed something no argument could: that sometimes the bravest thing a person can do is simply refuse to get up.

The danger only escalated. Three weeks after Woolworth's, Medgar Evers was murdered in his own driveway. The next year, Joan briefed a young activist named Michael Schwerner on how to survive as a white organizer in Mississippi — one day before Schwerner was kidnapped and murdered alongside Andrew Goodman and James Chaney.

And one night in 1964, on a dark road near Canton, the Ku Klux Klan surrounded the car Joan was riding in and beat the driver. They escaped. She later learned the Klan had meant to kill her that night — and when they failed, they murdered three other activists instead.

She kept going anyway. She helped organize the March on Washington. She was arrested again and again — taking part, over the years, in dozens of sit-ins and demonstrations. She never stopped showing up.

Eventually Joan Trumpauer Mulholland became a teacher, spending decades in the classroom before founding a foundation to teach young people about the movement. Now in her eighties, she still speaks to students across America. And when they ask where she found the courage, her answer is disarmingly plain: she never thought of herself as especially brave. She simply knew what was right — and once you truly know a thing is right, she says, pretending you don't becomes impossible.

She summed up her whole life in a single sentence, back in 1963: "I'm trying to help America become what it says it is."

She wasn't forced into any of it. She was never denied a single right she risked her life to win for others. She could have lived a comfortable, quiet life and lost nothing.

Instead, at nineteen, she crossed the line she'd been warned her whole life never to cross. And she never crossed back.

Her story leaves a question for the rest of us. When we see injustice in our own time — and it costs something to say so — which side of the line are we standing on? Had you ever heard of Joan Trumpauer Mulholland before today? Tell us below, and share her name forward. The quiet ones who refuse to look away deserve to be remembered too.

Source: Informatify (Facebook)

                          She earned it!

The Dearly Departed

America woke this morning to news that senator lindsey graham died. Speculation is rampant that mitch mcConnell is at least brain dead, but no confirmation has been made. Good Sunday Morning...

A friend said, mostly because of her job, that she refrains from making jubilant posts on social media following incidents of death or harm to others. I understand, and given normal circumstances, I would agree.

I must say, however, that we are not living in normal times. We are living in a time and place of absolute chaos and incivility. Our usual defenders are not fighting for us, not our legal system, our media outlets, our legislators. No one! The American people have been left to our own devices. 

Enter, social media where We The People gather to vent...

This nation is being led by the worst of the worst. Cancer left untreated festers, grows, and metastasizes over time. Untreated cancer left to consume America has adversely affected us all.

Taking the high road, being kind and gracious and civil in the face of such incivility has not served us well. Do we need to stoop to the lows where others dwell? No, not necessarily. If ever, however, there was a time to respond in kind, it is now.

If, in fact, some of the comments seem venomous or mean spirited, it is because the deceased earned such responses.

One is due in death the same level of decorum, respect, civility, and compassion by which they lived and afforded others during their lifetime. The inevitable incident of death does not make a horrible person a better person. They are simply a dead person who was horrible and who most folks, including their family, will remember accordingly. There will be no fake tears or other usual acts of mourning.

If you live a horrible life, that's how people will remember you. What is new, however, is that moreso now, people are prone to express how they truly feel about the 'dearly departed' in the immediate. We have been conditioned to not speak ill of the dead.

These departed others, however, are not friends or family members who, although we didn't particularly care for, we still might owe some degree of respect. These are politicians and other public figures, people who were in positions of power who brought us harm. People who probably wielded their power irresponsibly and deliberately in ways to negatively affect our lives. They will be gone but the impact of the pain and suffering they caused will long endure. So, if public response to their demise is less than civil, they earned it. They are not our neighbor, friend, or loved one.

Justice scalia was the first public figure I recall being brutally scorned post death seemingly even before his eyes were closed. He was a horrible person, as was lindsey, as was mitch, as was rush, as is elon, as is trump (the celebration will be massive and global - we will experience world peace for as long as the celebration lasts, earning him posthumously, his shamelessly desired Nobel Prize 🤷🏾).

The list of potential candidates for the list of public figures of ill repute, is infinite. It encompasses more names than I could ever cite. The difference is that previously we waited for history to judge these people. In these times, however, there is no need to wait for history. History is being written about them in real time, even during their life.

They were/are horrible, horrible people. May they have an eternal reunion in hell...

FN: If these people were your loved or special ones and you ignored, excused, condoned, or remained silent as they committed their damning deeds, you were complicit in your silence. You were quiet and unbothered then, please be quiet and unbothered now. Refrain from lashing at others not sensitive to your time of sorrow. Speak not, as you spoke not when your 'dearly departed' was still here unapologetically causing grief and wreaking havoc upon the others of us...

~ Miss Higgi Says

America 250

 

Merriam-Webster defines independence as, “the state of being free from the control, influence, or support of others. It is the ability to make your own decisions, govern yourself, and take care of your own needs”. It encompasses personal independence, political independence, and independence of mind.

Independence Day, also known as the 4^th of July, is an American holiday commemorating America gaining independence from Great Britain in 1776. Today marks 250 years of that independence. Tones of freedom ring loudly in the celebration of the holiday.

Freedom is the foundation of The Declaration of Independence, the historic document commemorating the day asserting that all people have natural rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Thomas Jefferson writes this celebrated document as he enslaves Black people, impregnating a minor Sally Hemings. The hypocrisy…

Enter Frederick Douglass...  

On July 5, 1852, Mr. Douglass, a self-emancipated Black man through escape from slavery, is invited by the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society, to offer an address in honor of America’s Independence Day. Per usual, he rose to the occasion in grand style and delivered one of his most memorable and powerful speeches, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”, wherein he challenged the hypocrisy of a nation espousing liberty and freedom as core values while enslaving Black people.

Although not aware of Mr. Douglass’ speech for most of my life, as it was not taught in American schools, the hypocrisy he so eloquently described has always been rooted in my soul. Always, I have felt conflicted about this holiday of “independence” that America goes all out for. It has simply always been paid time off to spend with family and friends. I, too, questioned what exactly we were celebrating? Freedom? Independence? Whose freedom? Whose independence? Aren’t we still having the same conversations in 2026 that Mr. Douglass raised for debate in the 1800s, the humanity and citizenship of Black Americans? So, tell me again, what are we celebrating?

Celebrating Independence Day has always been a challenge for me and, I think, many Black Americans. Cause for celebration of the holiday this year, however, is heightened in that it marks 250 years of America’s freedom, the self-proclaimed global example and blueprint of democracy to be revered and modeled by all. I remember questioning all the hoopla even as a teen in 1976, the exaggerated celebration felt hypocritical.

This milestone celebration of 250 years, however, is different.

 In 1976 all the stops were pulled out for the bicentennial. The nation excitedly prepared for this celebration, months, if not years, in advance of the actual day. There were military parades, profound speeches were prepared and delivered, a commemorative coin was coined, extraordinary fireworks and grand community celebrations were had. We were inundated with everything red, white, and blue.

This year, the mood is very different. I am even further removed from there being a holiday such that, when I walked into my gym last week, I asked, what’s up with the red, white, and blue? Seriously, I am totally checked out. The lack of national excitement or enthusiasm for celebration of the 250^th year of America’s independence allows one to be checked out.

Collectively, We The People are a functionally depressed nation, going through the motions, tolerating or managing what feels like the worst of times, certainly not a time of celebration. Each day we awake to another day of WTF did he do while we slept.  Many are fleeing the country or considering it. It’s exhausting…

Didn’t we resolve this in 2020? How did we get here again? America MUST examine herself and seriously ponder the consideration of answers to that question. I digress...

The nation is under siege from within. Instead of being internationally celebrated for 250 years of model democracy, freedom, and independence, the US is being ridiculed and shunned for slipping into a place of darkness in pursuit of recreating the ugliest and gravest of her original sins. She wants her property back. You too, white women…

The white house, turned cheap, gawdy gold, has been turned into a circus and junk yard combined as one. The reflecting pool is now a cesspool filled with algae. Foreign leaders are being kidnapped and brought to the US to be tried for crimes against their nation, as crimes and corruption is being actively and openly practiced by “leaders”, themselves convicted, at the very helm of this nation. The hypocrisy…

Innocent fisherman and children in school are being bombed just because…   

Americans are losing basic freedoms we have come to take for granted. While we were preoccupied and distracted with interpretation and adherence to the 2^nd Amendment right to bear arms, our 1^st Amendment rights to free speech, free press, right to assemble, right to privacy, and such, were being dismantled. Education, healthcare, and welfare systems are being demolished. People who failed to vote or who voted in the interest of harm to others but not to themselves, are 'finding out' as harm knocks on their door…

We The People, are truly unrepresented. So, tell me again, what are we celebrating?   

A friend summed it up this morning with his Facebook post, “It feels weird to celebrate our independence, when it’s pretty clear we’re losing it”.  Some of us have never truly had it…      

Merriam-Webster defines subjugation as the act of bringing people, a territory, or a group under    complete control and forced submission. It involves one dominant party taking away the freedoms, sovereignty, or rights of another, often through conquest, oppressive rule, or systemic power imbalances.

We are at a crossroad folks. Which way will we turn?

 

Miss Higgi Says, Happy Subjugation Day? 🤷🏾

A Serious Question

A serious question y'all, why the disparity in how we honor Black fathers as opposed to Black mothers? 🤷🏾

On Sunday I hosted a gathering to celebrate Black Fathers. It was the smallest crowd that I've ever had on any of my calls, less than 20 people showed up. ZERO Black men showed up. One did text a regret as he'd gotten a last minute birthday dinner invitation. Happy Birthday Friend!!! Otherwise, no men... 

It left me with so many questions.

Did people not show up because they don't feel Black fathers are worthy of celebration? Do bad daddy stories overshadow good daddy stories? 🤷🏾

Black men complain all the time that Black mothers are held in higher regard. Still, even they didn't show up to be celebrated or to celebrate themselves.

I would like to think that people were not available because they were spending quality time with dear old dad. Not so sure... 

In speaking with a friend yesterday morning, she shared that her pastor expressed from the pulpit his disappointment in the disparity of how we celebrate Mothers and Fathers on their special day. He noted that when he called XYZ restaurant expecting not to be able to get a reservation on Father's Day, given such short notice, he was told to come on down. He didn't need a reservation. There was plenty of room. On Mother's Day at XYZ restaurant, one had to have made the reservation at least a month in advance. He pondered why not the same for Father's Day.

Interesting, right? 

So why didn't Black folks show up on Sunday to celebrate Black fathers with When Black Women Gather? As on Mother's Day, I wasn't expecting a large turnout. But almost no turnout? I wasn't expecting that...

Thank you to those ladies who did show up. Your stories were inspiring. Keep telling them...

It's a serious question y'all. Something has gone awry in our community.  We see it, we know it all too well. More importantly,  however, we know that we MUST address it.

Concerned that some people might have felt conflicted about "celebrating Black Fathers" because they didn't have a positive story to tell, I expanded the celebration beyond fathers to include brothers, sons, mentors, even historic or public Black male figures they admire, any Black male who has inspired or encouraged them. Still, they didn't show up... 🤷🏾

Let me be clear that when I host gatherings in celebration of Black mothers, invariably there are daughters who tell me they did not have a positive experience with their mother. So, the hurt and disappointment goes both ways. Overwhelmingly, however, bad Mom or not, the celebration of Black mothers far exceeds that of Black fathers.

This year, almost without exception, I made a special effort to acknowledge all the men in my phone for Father's Day with a text message of the image below, even some with whom I no longer communicate. My wanting Black men in my life especially, to know they are seen, loved, and cared about, superseded personal differences. Most responded thanking me for thinking of them. Sadly, one friend responded that mine was the only greeting he received. He has children. 👀 Again, the hurt goes both ways...

I had gathered positive statistics to share during our gathering to celebrate Black fathers. Black fathers are much more involved and present in their children's lives than is acknowledged, even more than other men, but that's not the story we hear. Instead, we are overwhelmed with the negative. Gatherings such as mine, are essential for our collective soul. Itbis imperative that we tell our own stories. Black children must witness, hear, live, and experience our stories. Our children are our future and were welcome at this event...

I wanted to open with a poem, short story, or short video created by a Black contributor paying positive tribute to Black fathers. I must say finding such accolades was, sadly, quite the challenge. That's a problem y'all...

Years ago, in honor and respect of Black men who are holding it down, I stopped wishing Black women Happy Father's Day. I recognize that women, although sometimes forced to play both roles, cannot replace fathers in our lives. So, let us value and encourage them.

Please share, if you're open to it, what you think might have been the issue on Sunday. Maybe the sun was shining all around the United States, although my email list includes international participants, and people just had better things to do. I accept that too. I'm just curious...

Share too, if you don't mind, another topic you'd like to explore in gatherings of Black men and women. What do we want to know about one another and/or our experience of or relationships with the other?  

My Black male cousin shared the link below for a positive Black Father movie currently playing on Netflix, Color Book. I haven't seen the movie yet, but the trailer looks inspiring. Check it out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPEmz5sBjwM

Thank you for indulging my question. Why the disparity and how do we overcome it? I love me some us and will always do my part to encourage that we heal, love, encourage, and honor one another.

FYI, I will not host a Gathering for the next two weeks as I will be away on a special journey of my own. I'll see you again on July 12th.

Take care of one another. We are all we've got and WE ARE MORE THAN ENOUGH! 

 In the Forever Spirit of Unity in Our Community, 

~ Miss Higgi 

Happy Father's Day!!!

 

Breaking Chains on Juneteenth

Happy Juneteenth everyone! 

I think it so appropriate that the Obamas had their celebration yesterday, a day ahead of Juneteenth, and a few weeks before the hypocrisy we're supposed to celebrate in July marking America's 250th anniversary. No thank you, very much. Tell me again, what exactly are we celebrating?

Yesterday reminded me of the value of Black folks to this country. There is no America without Black people. We built this nation physically and otherwise, we are the moral compass of this nation, we are the fiber and the talent and the rhythm of this nation, we are the magnet bringing folks together. There is no America of worth without us. The Obama's reminded us of that yesterday in their own subtle way. 

Despite being preyed upon, dehumanized, and the object of monumental traumatizing challenges that most others could never have endured, we survived....

I am so proud of Black people. There is no other person that I would want to be in this whole wide world. Not ever. I want all Black people to share my pride, to feel that way. Break whatever chains that remain on your mind telling you that you're not good enough. We are more than good enough! Oh, yes we are!

What is it that they say, free your mind and your body will follow? Your body is free, allow your mind to follow. 

Anyway, have a great Juneteenth everyone! Do something special in honor of Black folks everywhere. If nothing more, be still and have an intentional talk with the Ancestors just to be reminded...

~ Miss Higgi Says, Break the Chains

Celebrate Back Women ~ Loretta June Ross

She was eleven years old when a stranger attacked her on her way home from a Girl Scout meeting.


She did not talk about it. There was no framework for talking about it — no language, no resources, no adult in her world who had been taught how to receive that kind of disclosure from a Black girl in Texas in the early 1960s. She buried it and kept moving, the way children taught to be strong learn to bury things, and for three years she carried it alone while the world she lived in continued to expect her to excel.

She excelled anyway.


Loretta June Ross was born on August 16, 1953, in Temple, Texas, the sixth of eight children in a blended family. Her father, Alexander, had immigrated from Jamaica as a boy and become an Army weapons specialist and drill sergeant — a man shaped by discipline and expectation. 

Her mother Lorene was a Texas native who managed a household that moved frequently, following military assignments, until the family settled in Texas permanently. Loretta grew up understanding that education was not a suggestion. It was the only reliable ladder out, and she intended to climb it.


She skipped grades. She joined the honors track. She was the kind of student who made counselors sit up and pay attention — and one counselor did more than pay attention. He identified a scholarship to the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University and pursued it on her behalf. The scholarship was won. The future was mapped. Loretta Ross, a Black girl from Temple, Texas, was going to Harvard.


Then, at fourteen, a distant relative assaulted her.


The pregnancy it produced was not something Loretta could hide or defer or manage quietly. Abortion was illegal in Texas in 1969. She moved into a Salvation Army home for unwed mothers and gave birth to a son in April 1969. She named him Howard Michael Ross, borrowing the middle names of her two favorite brothers in a hurry, because she had never truly planned to keep him.


She kept him.


The scholarship evaporated the moment she chose her son over the conditions attached to it. The high school she had attended — the same school whose counselor had fought for her Harvard future — refused to readmit her. She was a mother now. Mothers did not belong in high school. She was fifteen years old and the system that had celebrated her intelligence had decided, in a single administrative ruling, that her circumstances had made her someone else's problem.


She was not someone else's problem.
She rebuilt. She found her way to Howard University in Washington, D.C. in 1970 — a historically Black institution that admitted her when Radcliffe, upon learning about Howard's existence, quietly withdrew its welcome. At Howard, she declared majors in chemistry and physics and immediately found herself pulled toward something larger than the laboratory. She became the tenant association president in her building. She joined a Marxist-Leninist study group. She connected with the anti-apartheid movement, with Black nationalist politics, with the particular electricity of a campus full of young Black people who understood, in their bones, that the personal and the political were not separate categories.


She was tear-gassed at a demonstration at sixteen. She considered it an education.
At twenty-three, Howard University's health clinic gave her a Dalkon Shield — an intrauterine contraceptive device that had been marketed to doctors despite internal company knowledge that it was defective. The device caused a severe infection that went misdiagnosed. By the time it was correctly identified and treated, the damage was permanent. Loretta Ross was sterilized at twenty-three by a medical device that should never have been on the market.


She sued the manufacturer, A.H. Robins. She won. When a class-action lawsuit followed and her case drew wider attention, she recognized something that would shape the rest of her working life: that what had happened to her was not an isolated medical tragedy. It was a pattern. Black women, low-income women, women of color were having their reproductive choices made for them — by assault, by illegal abortion access, by defective medical devices, by laws that controlled their bodies without consulting their lives.


The framework she had been living inside all along finally had a name she was beginning to reach toward.


In 1979, she became director of the DC Rape Crisis Center — the only rape crisis center in the country run primarily by and for women of color. She was the first Black woman to hold that role. She ran it for years, building it into an institution, and in 1980 organized the first National Conference on Third World Women and Violence — the first time Black, Latina, Asian, and Native American women working in rape crisis centers across the country had ever convened in one room, collectively, to name what they were dealing with and demand that the movement start dealing with it too.


The mainstream women's movement of the 1980s was, by and large, a movement run by and for white women of relative economic means. Its central preoccupation was abortion rights — specifically, the right to not have a child. The framework was narrow in ways that Loretta and her colleagues could not ignore: it said nothing about the right to have a child, which was being systematically denied to poor women and women of color through forced sterilization and coercive medical practice. It said nothing about the right to parent children in safe conditions — in housing that wasn't condemned, in neighborhoods that weren't poisoned, in a country that provided health care and education.

The pro-choice framework protected one choice. The women Loretta worked with needed all of them.


In July 1994, Loretta Ross sat in a hotel room in Chicago with eleven other Black women during a break from a conference on welfare reform. They had been watching a debate about abortion rights that felt, to all of them, like a conversation happening in another language — a language that acknowledged women's bodies but not women's lives. They pulled out a legal pad. They began writing.


The phrase they arrived at was two words: reproductive justice.


It was not a slogan. It was a framework — a complete reconception of what reproductive rights meant when you centered the women the mainstream movement had left out. The right to have a child. The right to not have a child. The right to parent children in safe and healthy environments. These three principles, together, constituted the framework — rooted in human rights language rather than the narrower legal vocabulary of choice, and explicitly connected to the economic, racial, and environmental conditions that determined whether those rights were real or theoretical for any particular woman.


The framework spread. It became foundational to an entire movement. It shaped legislation, academic programs, legal arguments, and the work of organizations across the country that had been waiting, without knowing it, for exactly this language.


In 1997, Loretta co-founded SisterSong — the Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective — a national network connecting Native American, Latina, African American, and Asian American women's organizations around the shared framework she had helped build. She served as its national coordinator from 2005 to 2012.


On April 25, 2004, she co-directed the March for Women's Lives in Washington, D.C. — 1.15 million people in the streets of the capital, the largest protest march in American history at that time. She had organized delegations from across the country, built coalitions across racial and ideological lines, and turned out more bodies than any march before it.


She kept teaching, kept writing, kept showing up. Three books on reproductive justice. A course on white supremacy and human rights. A practice she developed and named "calling in" — the idea that lasting change required bringing people into conversation rather than simply shutting them out, that accountability and compassion were not opposites.


In 2022, the MacArthur Foundation awarded her a "Genius" Fellowship — one of the most prestigious recognitions in American intellectual and creative life. She was sixty-nine years old. She had been doing this work for fifty years.

The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade that same summer.

Her phone started buzzing the moment the decision came down. Friends, colleagues, journalists, people who needed to know how she was holding up — how a woman who had built her life around this fight was receiving its apparent defeat.


She picked up the phone. She kept talking.
She had been eleven years old on a sidewalk in Texas when the world first demonstrated what it intended to do with her body. She had been fifteen when a system designed to reward her excellence decided her circumstances disqualified her instead. She had been twenty-three when a defective medical device made the choice for her that no one should ever have made without her consent.


She had spent fifty years making sure no woman faced those moments alone — and making sure that the movement fighting back was big enough, honest enough, and complete enough to actually win.


She is still making sure.


Source: Armed Stories, Facebook (Story & Photo)

80 Years Wasted...

 

What a Waste...

Today marks 80 years of breathing for the guy occupying the White House. What a wasted 80 years of good breath and life better deserved by someone else.

What a waste...

He symbolizes all that is bad. He is evil, vile, criminal, corrupt, void of humanity, morally bankrupt, filled with hate, anger, insecurities, and rage and sadly, more breaths to take.

He lives to harm others. He thrives on the pain and suffering he creates. He is fueled by the disdain and ill regard held for him. It empowers him.

What a waste.... 

He represents nothing good. He has never known love, given love, nor received love. His "L" word is loyalty and that is one-sided. He demands much and gives nothing in return. 

What a waste...

I look at him and I think of all the good people who have gone before him whose loved ones would do anything to have them back. For whatever reason he has known longevity. His life has been spared. He still walks amongst us and seems to think his mission in life, especially as POTUS, is to inflict pain and do harm to others. 

What a waste...

There is not one good thing to say about his 80 years of breathing. Not one. Do tell if I am mistaken.

Miss Higgi Says, What a waste...

FN: Dear God, please hear us. Let not our prayers be wasted today. All heads bowed. Repeat after me. May there be tumultuous lightening and torrential rain contained to a certain address in DC just in time for a circus event scheduled to cheapen the nation and further humiliate its citizens today.

Please Lord, answer this and our many other prayers. In God's name we pray. Inshallah. 🙏🏿

Our Ice Is Cold Enough

I asked Chat GPT who were the attorneys for young Karmelo Anthony. Then I asked who was white and who was Black. What do you think Chat said? 👀

Yes, this prominent Black family, reportedly of means, replaced Black attorneys with white attorneys, resulting in their young Black son being convicted and sentenced to 35 years in a matter of hours. Sounds like a classic case of the ice is colder syndrome. SMH...

When those white attorneys look at that dead white boy they see themselves, as does the judge, the prosecutor, and the all-white jury from which three potential Black jurors were stricken. 

When Black civil rights attorneys who know their history look at an innocent, well-to-do, well behaved, Black boy with a bright future, they see themselves and a shit-load of previous clients railroaded by an unjust legal system based on race. They are motivated to fight for the client who, but for the grace of God, there go they or their loved ones.

Black jurors are routinely rejected in favor of white jurors which says a lot about integrity. If the belief is that white jurors will rule in favor of the prosecution, no matter the evidence, the inference is that Black jurors will fairly weigh the evidence no matter the parties. Fair minded and thinking jurors do not guarantee the prosecution a victory starting on third base. They have to run the bases and prove their case to win. 

Black folks on juries increase the probability that fewer innocent people are incarcerated for something they didn't do or wasn't proven. Fewer field hands, Black bodies, are supplied to prison yards for free labor on the new plantation. 

Black folks please stop running from jury duty. They want to strike you from service. Don't help them. We have no control over who gets arrested, what they get charged with, if they get bail, and other pre-trial procedures, but we can have a role in determination of guilt or innocence. 

As a juror, we do have the ability to make the prosecution fight for a victory. It takes but one voice in that jury room to bring balance and truth to a system claiming to pursue liberty of justice for all. Be the voice. Consider jury duty your civic duty.

When you can afford to do so, hire your legal representation accordingly. You want to hire the person who has a track record and who is going to fight most zealously to prove your innocence. Hindsight is 20/20 but in this redneck, good ole' boys situation, this outcome, absent a zealous fight, seemed predictable.

My heart bleeds for young Karmelo. He just lost his life for defending himself against white bullies who, unlike him, did not have a promising future. But they were white, that's all that mattered. 

The more things changed the more they stay the same. 

Miss Higgi Asks, when will Black folks learn that our ice is cold enough? Our minds are warped such that we are conditioned to bet against one another, which is tragic, just tragic...

Prayers for Karmelo convicted for defending himself. May there be grounds for an appeal. 🙏🏿

 

Chat GPT said:

Dallas criminal defense attorney Mike Howard served as the lead defense counsel for Karmelo Anthony in his Collin County murder trial. He was assisted on the defense team by attorney Toby Shook.

Prior to retaining Mike Howard, Anthony was initially represented by attorneys Billy Clark and Kim T. Cole.

Billy Clark: The official State Bar of Texas profile for The Clark Law Firm, PLLC explicitly registers the practice as a Black-owned, veteran-owned, and disabled-owned business. He is also a member of ⁠Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., the first intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established for African American men.

Kim T. Cole: She is a prominent Black female civil rights and criminal defense attorney in the Dallas-Fort Worth area who frequently handles high-profile discrimination, civil rights, and ⁠wrongful death cases impacting the Black community.

Mike Howard: He is a white criminal defense lawyer who operates the ⁠Law Office of Mike Howard, PLLC in Dallas. He began his legal career as a public defender before transitioning into private practice.

Toby Shook: He is a prominent white veteran trial attorney based in Dallas. He spent more than two decades as a high-profile prosecutor with the Dallas County District Attorney's Office before entering private practice, where he has defended several high-profile clients in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Our Sweet, Sweet Babies...

So, what is it they say about history repeating itself? How many of our babies must we lose? 

Yesterday an Asian shopkeeper in SC was found not guilty of murdering a Black boy. The same thing happened in Los Angeles in 1991 with a Korean shopkeeper. Same scenario. Same verdict, Not Guilty...

In Columbia, SC, Cyrus Carmack-Belton, a 15-year-old Black boy, was chased down and murdered in cold blood by an Asian merchant who claimed he thought the baby was stealing a bottle of water. His murderer walks...

Latasha Harlins, a 14-year-old Black girl, was murdered in cold blood in 1991 by a female Korean shopkeeper in Los Angeles who claimed she thought the little girl was stealing an orange juice. The baby had the money for the orange juice in her hand when she was murdered. The courts allowed her murderer to walk too...

The Asian community, which was used as plaintiffs in a legal matter dismantling hard won civil rights gains of the Black community affording equal access for everyone, including Asians, to institutions of higher education, got a bill of protection written in their interest based on a narrative of  fear of Black violence against them... 👀 Where's the body count?

Anti-Black racism is rampant, violence against the Black community is on the rise, to include missing persons and a renewed fascination with lynchings, one of America's favorite pastimes, and yet another Black child is murdered in cold blood with blessings from the court. Instead of a bill of protection or public outrage, the Black community loses another of our hard won civil rights, voter representation. There is rarely a peep and the beat goes on...

It's exhausting y'all. Just exhausting...

Condolences to the families of our slain children;

Cyrus Carmack-Belton🙏🏿

Latasha Harlins 🙏🏿

Miss Higgi Says, violence against children is never acceptable. May ALL of our dear sweet babies, too many to count, rest in eternal peace. 🙏🏿

 

Click here for the article.

June Is Gemini Month

 

First of all I can't believe it's June. Already, half the year is gone. I know I keep asking the same question, but where does the time go? Father Time please slow down the clock just a little bit. Please...

It's June y'all and June is Gemini Month!

I had a conversation with a friend yesterday about how when we were young the zodiac was everything. We had stereotypes for each sign, Gemini's were smart, Scorpios were sex freaks, Leo's were conceited, Taurus was stubborn. All these things we believed. We were influenced about who we dated or who we were compatible with based on zodiac signs. LOL!!!

I don't think we knew much about astrology or the zodiac but we certainly projected our lives by it. Do you remember looking at the newspaper everyday to see what your horoscope was for the day? So, we were all having the same day just because we shared the same zodiac sign? Yeah, OK...

Some folks took it real serious and got their charts done, read the stars, followed the moon, and all that stuff. The rest of us I think it was just in fun. It faded over time. It was something to do. It was a conversation piece, an ice breaker, if you will. "What sign are you?", she asked, as she batted her big, flirtatious eyes and flashed a smiled at him. He smiled back, and they were dating! LOL!

Anyway, Happy Birthday to my fellow Gemini Twins. You are smart, you are friendly, you bore easily, and commitment? 👀, well that's a thing... (smile).

I will be 66 next week and I can't believe that either...

Happy Monday y'all!

Did You Know?

You know the orange braggard occupying what's left of the White House that he hasn't yet defaced or demolished, the guy who loves to talk about himself and how brilliant and superior he is in comparison to all "low IQ" others, people therefore inferior to him... Well, did you know that in 1968 he graduated from Wharton, one of the top business schools in the country? Yet, he doesn't talk about it and either do they... 👀

Tell me when has a school who produced an alumni of such prominence, stature, and leadership, not talked about it... When has that ever happened before? LOL!

Has anybody been on University of Pennsylvania campus lately? Is there even a picture of him in the bathroom, much less in the foyer, at the Wharton School of Business? That's what the other schools do.

If you visit Yale or Harvard, you're going to see portraits of presidents, supreme court justices, and other distinguished alumni hanging on the walls telling the story of that school. They are bragging! They are proud! So tell me, is there a picture of the orange guy anywhere at Penn, even on a crumpled flyer? LOL!

Not even the self-proclaimed braggadocious genius occupying the White House reminds us of his Ivy League brilliance.

Miss Higgi Says, Hmmmm, I wonder why... 🤔

So, What Are We Celebrating 250? 👀

 

Is anybody else struggling with this 250 celebration thing? Not only are the celebrities dropping out, they were never checking in, as are, I'm assuming, many of the rest of us. 

Celebrating the 4th of July has always been a struggle ideologically for many in the Black community, something to do with hypocrisy 👀...

I remember during the summer before my first year of law school, going through a program at a major law firm in Washington, DC. It was just before the holiday when a partner came in to address a group of mostly non-white students. He shared with us copies of the Declaration of Independence. With absolute glee and unmistakable pride, he explained that in his household, faithfully, every year on the 4th of July, they gather as a family to read that great document. Talk about not reading the room or knowing your audience. 🤦🏾 It was painful...

I'm sorry, I digress. That memory of July 4 is forever embedded in my recall...

I imagine that this year, 2026, many others in the nation are feeling conflicted about celebrating what should be a commemorative and historic event. Given the nation's current state of affairs, the notion of celebrating Independence and Freedom likely presents a hell of a struggle for many "good Americans" across the nation...

Tell me again, what are we celebrating? 

A celebration of what? For what? Of whom? 🤷🏾

We are in the midst of witnessing whatever was created in those 250 years, good, bad, ugly, and indifferent, being intentionally destroyed by an anti-American regime, posturing as government, hellbent on an obvious mission to destroy the country as we sit by doing mostly nothing to stop it, but are somehow expected to show up and join in celebration. Again, celebration of what? 

In the spirit of the great Frederick Douglas who posed the question, What to the Slave, which has expanded to include the rest of y'all, is the 4th of July? The holiday, especially in 2026, has no meaning...

Miss Higgi Says, Happy Juneteenth! Stay Home on The 4th of July and celebrate real heroes and martyrs, visit www.martyrsday.us to see how. 

Boycott 250!

A Necessary Inconvenience

I remember when flying was something to look forward to. You could get on the airplane, have a nice meal, eat, read, or fall asleep in a comfortable seat and get to your destination full of excitement and anticipation, free of hassle or inconvenience. Those days are gone. Flying has become a necessary inconvenience...

There were no crazy fees, no long lines, no taking off your shoes and throwing away your water bottles and expensive toiletries that exceeded some nebulous 4 ounce quantity. None of that! We could get on the plane and just go! People used to actually go to the airport without a flight to just sit and watch the planes take off. Remember that? It was all rather simple...

And then 9/11 happened. The airlines had sympathy galore from the public and they took full advantage of it. They reduced staff, raised fares, and implemented fees for everything that you can imagine starting with ridiculous baggage fees that have since brought them billions upon billions of dollars. 

Bag fees began with just domestic flights because somehow you only needed a change of clothes if you were flying international. 👀 Initially, international flights did not have bag fees. Now all flights have fees, first bag, second bag even more, a third bag will cost you your children. 

Remember the standby flight? It was a convenience offered for free because it was a win-win for both parties, the airline and the customer. It is still a convenience for the airline but one for which the customer must pay. Need to change your flight? It's going to cost you - Dearly!

From there it went to seats for sale! Want leg room or a seat wide enough to not share with a neighbor you've never met or that comfortably fits even modest hips for your five hour flight? Its gonna' cost you... 

Wanna' sit in that emergency aisle and promise to help in the event of an unscheduled landing between runways? To be of that service, to help save fellow passenger lives, will cost you too. 

Love that window seat? I love the aisle. Wanna' choose your seat of preference at time of purchase to avoid the airline assigning you to the dreadful middle seat as punishment for not taking the bribe up front? Pay up!!! 

Remember when if you had a seat at the back of the plane once everybody was on board if there were vacancies in the front of the plane, notwithstanding first class of course, you could move to that empty seat for free? Not anymore. You want to move? That's gonna cost you too...

Hungry? So sad, to bad... Meals are no longer included. First they removed the hot meals and all steel cutlery from the flights and served instead some prefab sandwich that tasted prefab, now with plastic utensils only. Unless of course, you were in first class, then you still got a hot with your temporary airline cot. 

Eventually they started charging for that not so good sandwich. Ultimately, the sandwich was reduced to a snack of cookies or chips and a drink. The major airlines used to laugh at Southwest and other no frill airlines for exactly the service they now provide.

Note that all of this is happening in the face of ever escalating ticket fares. Fewer services, higher prices. Capitalism at its best!

Recently, Delta announced that it will no longer serve snacks. In the spirit of follow the leader, the other airlines will surely follow suit. 

Post 9-11, we got something called TSA checkpoints, which entail physical groping of our bodies, searches of our hair, stripping of shoes, belts, and all things metal. Our luggage is being exrayed or physically searched, as we are forced to walk through expensive body scan equipment that fails even its own tests. Don't want to go through all of that? You don't have to! Pay a modest price for prepaid TSA clearance, and voila!, you can avoid the inconvenience of having your dignity violated... 

I have said nothing about how many steps you're going to get in walking from the check in ticket counter to your gate of departure. At least one mile in many airports. Whose bright idea was it to include inclines in that mile? Thank God for bags with wheels. My heart bleeds, however, for the mostly frail people pushing all those soon to be very able big bodies in those handicap assist chairs. The immediate cures at curbside is nothing short of miraculous! 

So here we are now in the midst of another crisis, this one created by the trump administration resulting in ridiculously high oil prices. Once again, the airline is not going to miss an opportunity to gouge the public. Have you bought an airplane ticket recently? Sticker shock is an understatement. As we know, once the fees go up and services are further reduced, fares will never come down and services will never be restored.

Highway robbery has nothing on skyway robbery. 

Flying is not only a necessary inconvenience, it is now a very costly, tiring, and mostly unpleasant necessary inconvenience. Safe travels...

Miss Higgi Says, friendly are the skies no more...

Happy Decoration Day!

Here's the history of how Decoration Day, a commemoration created by formerly enslaved Africans, became Memorial Day, now a national holiday. 

The transition of Decoration Day into what we now know as Memorial Day is a profound piece of American history, deeply rooted in the aftermath of the Civil War. While several towns claim to be the birthplace of the holiday, historians have uncovered that the earliest, largest recorded precursor was organized by newly freed African Americans.  

sdarj.org

Here is a brief history of how Decoration Day originated and evolved:

1. The True Roots: Charleston, SC (May 1, 1865)

In the final months of the Civil War, the Confederate military turned the Washington Race Course and Jockey Club in Charleston into an outdoor prison camp. More than 250 Union soldiers died there from disease and exposure and were buried in a chaotic mass grave behind the grandstands.  

chicagocrusader.com

When the city fell and white residents fled, a group of about 28 formerly enslaved Black workmen went to the site, exhumed the bodies, and gave them proper, individual burials. They built a tall fence around the new cemetery and erected an archway at the entrance inscribed with the words: "Martyrs of the Race Course."  

chsasalh.com

On May 1, 1865, a crowd of nearly 10,000 people—mostly freed slaves, alongside Black Union regiments and white missionaries—gathered to dedicate the cemetery.  

science.nasa.gov

The Parade: The procession was led by 3,000 Black schoolchildren carrying armloads of fresh flowers and singing "John Brown’s Body."  www.zinnedproject.org

The Honor: They were followed by Black women with baskets of wreaths, Black men marching in cadence, and Union infantry units (including the famous 54th Massachusetts Colored Regiment).

The Meaning: The crowd decorated the graves with flowers, listened to scripture, and held picnics. As historian David Blight notes, this was the very first informal "Decoration Day"—an act by newly freed people to declare exactly what the war had been fought for.  

www.zinnedproject.org

2. The Official Declaration (May 1868)

As informal springtime "decoration days" continued to pop up in both Northern and Southern communities to honor the staggering 700,000 Civil War dead, a formal movement took shape.  

science.nasa.gov

In May 1868, Major General John A. Logan, the commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic (an organization of Northern Union veterans), issued General Order No. 11. This order officially designated May 30, 1868, as "Decoration Day"—a national day specifically set aside for "strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country." May 30th was chosen carefully because it was a time when flowers would be in full bloom across the entire nation.  

www.cem.va.gov

3. Keeping the Tradition Alive

Throughout the Reconstruction era and into the early 20th century, African Americans and Black veteran posts remained the primary caretakers and celebrants of Decoration Day in the South, keeping the memory of the Union sacrifice alive even as white Southern communities heavily policed or ignored it. Concurrently, Southern white communities practiced their own distinct "Confederate Memorial Days" on separate spring dates.  

www.nps.gov

4. Evolution into Memorial Day

chicagocrusader.com

Over the decades, the name "Memorial Day" gradually became more common than "Decoration Day".  

www.cem.va.gov

Post-World War I: The scope of the holiday expanded. It was no longer just about the Civil War; it was broadened to honor all American soldiers who had died in any military conflict.  

www.cem.va.gov

The Uniform Monday Holiday Act (1968/1971): To create a convenient three-day weekend for federal employees, Congress passed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act in 1968. When it officially took effect in 1971, it legally changed the name to Memorial Day and moved its observation from the traditional May 30th to the last Monday in May.  

science.nasa.gov

What started as a localized, deeply emotional tribute by newly freed citizens to honor the soldiers who died for their emancipation ultimately transformed into the national day of remembrance observed today.  

science.nasa.gov

Source: Gemini AI

Miss Higgi Says, Happy Decoration Day!

Celebrate Black History 365!!!

Counting My Blessings...

Twenty years ago today on May 19th 2006, I graduated law school. I was a few days shy of 46 years old and ready to take on a new world. It had been a tumultuous 3 years of my life and this was a very proud moment for me. I had at least one hundred guests in the audience that day. I can still see their happy faces screaming as I spoke from the podium. And we had a nice party afterwards also. 

During my first year of law school I had the pleasure of meeting Congressman and Freedom Fighter, John Lewis. While I graduated from Rutgers University in New Jersey, I did my first year of law school at University of District of Columbia (UDC). During that year, I had the honor of meeting some really fabulous civil rights folks among them was John Lewis and Dorothy Height.

Congressman John Lewis was there giving a speech and promoting his book. I was just mesmerized by him. I approached and said, I have to have lunch with you. And, as most polite people would, he said, fine, call my office. Of course when I called the office I expected them to blow me off. Not at all... Instead, they asked when did I want to come. I couldn't believe it! It was just that simple y'all. Never be afraid of "no", just ask for what you want no matter how outlandish it may seem. That's been my motto in life. Sometimes I forget. On a day like today I am reminded to ask for what I want.

Fast forward, just a few weeks later I'm on the hill having lunch and spending a good part of the afternoon with our renowned civil rights hero. We talked in his office, we walked through the tunnel to the Congressional dining hall where we had lunch. I met his staff and many of his colleagues. It is a day that I will never forget. He was the nicest and most gracious person, acknowledging everyone from fellow politicians to janitors. He greeted everyone along our way in his beloved community. He was the real deal... 

Fast forward again, three years later I am a part of the student government team looking at potential commencement speakers. I'm more than 20 years older than my fellow graduates. They'd never heard of Congressman John Lewis, sadly, not even the Black ones. Trust me, it was a hard sell but I got them to understand why we should have him as our commencement speaker. 

One of the assistant deans in the law school was married to a congressman at that time. So it was decided that we would allow him to invite Congressman Lewis to be our speaker. After several weeks of him dragging his feet and that not happening, I approached the dean and said do you want me to call. At this point, it's in the interest of time. The dean said sure. Once again, I simply asked and again, "Mr. Good Trouble" said yes. I was thrilled. 

It was agreed amongst us students, class president included, that I would introduce the congressman on commencement day. Of course I would. It was me who got him, who thought of him, it was my idea. Well, one of my colleagues, the class president, worked for that congressman who never made the call to get him. And while she and the others on the committee had agreed that I would do the intro, now all of a sudden she was to introduce Congressman Lewis at graduation. I was being asked to step aside. I could not believe this was happening. This was to be a joyous moment...

The dean actually wanted me, the Black student who thought to bring a noted Black Civil Rights leader to campus, to step aside so Becky from Montana (not her real name, I don't even remember her name), yes Montana, could have the honor. This was race, politics, and the all too familiar paper cut micro aggression of "good liberals", all wrapped up in one punch to the gut. 

Of course, however, I was not settling for this. I gathered several of my female peers of all races and nationalities and along with one of the few Black professors we had on campus at the time, as mediator, we confronted the dean. We were very clear that it was our graduation and we got to decide who we wanted to speak. I was proud they stood up for me.

After agreeing to be our commencement speaker, I had another ask of Congressman Lewis. I asked that my peers and I could come and spend a day on the Hill with him as I did two years before. Again y'all, he said yes. These were the same students that went before the dean with me. 

Over the years I had several opportunities to mix with the Congressman. He knew me by name and face as a result of that one random request during my first year of law school. I remember being at the Democratic National Convention, I didn't have a ticket to get in the main event for Obama's acceptance speech. The good Congressman directed me to his office to get a ticket. Ask for what you want...

A compromise was made for our graduation ceremony that I didn't quite appreciate until the Black female professor explained the power of having the last word. So, Ms. Montana got to briefly welcome to the Congressman before he spoke. I got to publicly pay tribute to him after he spoke, in a way that my colleagues and those in the audience would always know his name and all the good trouble he had started in the interest of the good of this nation. What would he say now? Shame on the US Supreme Court for turning the clock back to erase the work of valiant Civil Rights workers like the Congressman and so many others.

May 19th, 2006, was certainly a day of honor for me, one I will never forget for a lot of reasons. Incredibly, I was damn near 50 graduating law school which you couldn't have told me I was going to be doing at 45. My Mom died at 45... She would have been quite proud!

 

Moreover, I cannot believe that it's been 20 years. Where did the time go? What have I done between the dashes? This is certainly a time for reflection, a time to remind myself of my tenacity, and the positive impact and influence I have had on so many others over the years, knowinly and unknowingly. People often remind and thank me. I am humbly grateful... 

While I did not start out to tell the story I just shared, the moral of the story is to never be afraid of "no". Never underestimate what you can do, Yes, you can! Always, always, ask for what you want for s/he who does not ask, certainly will not receive. 

Congratulations to me 20 years later! 

~ Miss Higgi Says, thank you for taking this stroll down Nostalgia Lane with me. 

Enjoy your day! Do something or ask for something you think out of reach! Go for it! 

Happy Birthday Malcolm X! Celebrate him and Congressman John Lewis today! They both left us a blueprint.