“I don’t see you running to visit your father. Maybe it’s just as hard for you as it is for Thirjane.”
“I go with my mother every year,” I said.
“Child, it’s not like visiting a grave. He isn’t dead. Just gone from his mind. And that’s why he shouldn’t be alone. Maybe if you went more, he’d find his way back,” she said. “Maybe that’s why Jamison goes over there to see him.”
“Oh, don’t defend him now. That’s just more of his bull.”
“Is it? Or is it just him being the man you married? Trying to protect you and the people you love?”
I looked down at the slippers I was wearing and kicked at the floor.
“He had no right,” I said. “That’s my father. If he wanted to see him, he could’ve asked me.”
“You don’t think I want Thirjane to go see him? Eldridge was my friend too,” she said. “But if both she and you are acting like he’s dead and standing on it, what can we do but accept it and let you live? I don’t want to hurt your mother’s heart no more than it’s already been hurting. She’s my baby sister and I just want to protect her. Maybe Jamison was just doing the same for you.”
The Color of My Parachute
“You need to have an appointment for that. Take a number and have a seat.”
Those were the two sentences the woman sitting at the front desk at the Department of Social Services seemed to say to everyone who approached. She never changed her indifferent tone, no matter what they said, and always responded with one of those two rehearsed lines I’d imagined she’d been saying for years. When it was my turn, I was determined to break the pattern, but also afraid to appear uncooperative. She wasn’t exactly a peaceful-looking woman.
After Aunt Luchie and I spoke about my father, I told her about the effect seeing McKenzie had on me and how I’d thought about opening a facility to help women like her. She thought it was a fantastic idea and immediately went through her mental Rolodex of all of the people who could help me get it started. I took her suggestions but I kept imagining McKenzie in my mind, standing there with those shopping carts, and something in me said I needed to do this on my own. No connections, no tea and crumpets, making this another rich-people-doing-something-for-poor-people thing. I wanted to do more. To really get involved. I was pumped up and ready to act. Together, we decided that it might be a good idea for me to go over to Social Services to see if there was even a need for the outreach program I was talking about. Aunt Luchie volunteered to watch Tyrian and I set out to find answers.
Standing in line, listening to the lack of commitment the front desk woman was exuding, I was sure it wouldn’t be that easy.
“I’m here to get information about the—” I started, but she cut me off. I just knew she was about to tell me to make an appointment or take a piece of paper and sit my behind down for five hours.
“Internship?” she said, looking me up and down as if I wasn’t even supposed to be there.
“Internship?” I asked.
“Here’s the application,” she handed me an old clipboard with a piece of paper on it. “Fill it out and bring it back. Mr. Duncan, the director, will call you in to meet with him.”
Afraid to say another word, I took the clipboard and went to find a seat in the packed waiting area.
I sat down and looked over the application. Trying to concentrate above the growing pitch of screaming children seemingly running only around my seat, I learned that the department was looking for interns to volunteer to assist them during the new year. The internship was for students and professionals interested in a career in social services. It wouldn’t pay, but it would give participants the opportunity to see what social services was all about and actually assist in certain cases. It was a part-time commitment that would last five months. It seemed like the perfect opportunity had fallen and was sitting right in my lap on top of a clipboard that someone had apparently chewed on. It was just what I was looking for—well, not exactly, but it seemed like a great first step to get where I needed to be. It would be a good thing to actually have some experience in the field before I put any money behind my project. In the meantime, I could see what other special services were offered and decide how mine would be different. I was so excited, I wanted to jump up and hug one of the screaming children passing by. It was the very first time in a long time that I felt like I had the potential to be a part of something that was of my own making. I filled out the application and anxiously handed it back to the woman. Even she looked more friendly with my new attitude.
“Have a seat,” she said. “Mr. Duncan is seeing someone right now. So, he’ll probably call you in a minute.”
The minute turned to forty, and like most of the other women in the waiting area, I was sitting there looking weary and worn out. The noise was too loud, the air was too stifling, and the seat was so hard I thought it was becoming a part of my own behind. In a minute I would have to create a social service project to get myself out of this seat. I was trying
my best to keep my mind on my goal and not lose my excitement, but I was sinking fast. I was about to break my diet and get a bag of potato chips out of the snack machine when someone called my name.
Mr. Duncan was an old, bald Irish man whose years tackling issues facing the poor seemed to leave him a bit battered but wiser for his journey. Instead of asking me a bunch of questions about my intentions for working in social services (which was a good thing, because I hadn’t intended on anything before I’d gotten the application an hour ago), he told me what I might face being employed there and informed me that this was no job for someone simply interested in pushing papers and even wishing to save the world. “It’s hard work,” he said. “And you have to know when to pull back or it’ll go home with you. Many of us do take it home, thinking we can save everyone, but then we only lose ourselves and burn out. We have good people here, but we all have to learn where to draw the line.” He then looked over my application, saying he’d had many Spelman graduates come through the office and knew I’d be a quality intern because of this. “Now you’re a bit older than the other applicants. Any reason why you’ve decided to come here right now? I see your last position was in administration,” he said eyeing me.
“Well,” I started, “I just had a baby and . . .” I was nervous and had to stop to catch my breath. All I could hear in my head was Jamison asking why I hadn’t gone back to med school, visualize in my mind the stack of envelopes, the rejections, the look of disappointment on my mother’s face. I was frozen. I couldn’t fail again. I couldn’t lose another thing I cared about.
“Take your time,” I heard Mr. Duncan say and I knew I must’ve looked like I was about to cry but I couldn’t. I took a deep breath and imagined in my mind Tyrian’s face. The little smile he’d recently learned to flash whenever I kissed his nose or whenever Jamison walked into the room. I looked back at Mr. Duncan and tried to start again. “He’s almost two months now and I can’t lie, I’ve had a very easy time with him. I haven’t had to worry about anything. He’s taken care of and all of his needs are met—just like that.” I snapped my finger. “Now he’s beautiful and deserves everything the world has to offer, but the more I look at him, I realize that other children deserve the same. Other families deserve to know where their next meal is coming from. Mothers need to know how they can provide it. And if I could just be a part of that, it would be great.”
Mr. Duncan looked like he was about to cry too. He sat back in his seat and held up my application.
“I guess this is one we’ll have to keep,” he said, smiling. “So, we’ll have a way to call you to let you know when your first day is.”
“I got it?” I asked.
“You got it,” he said, putting the sheet down on his desk. “We’ll see you in the new year.”
It was December and freezing outside, but I was floating on air. The screaming children turned to singing angels as I headed out of the office. I felt like a new woman. A woman of purpose. Not Kerry Jackson, the black Barbie doll, but Kerry Jackson who was about to do some hard work and make some hard changes in the world. It sounded crazy, but in that moment, with each step I took, I felt like the old me was dying. And I didn’t know what it was that I was stepping away from or why I needed to go. But there was a spring in my step that I felt from the inside. Walking down the street with other women who were working hard and facing probably the same things I was facing, I felt a rush of life I had never felt. I knew it was a little premature, but I was a person on a mission.