Weddings And Racists Always Make Me Cry

Granny was perfect. At least, that is how I, her granddaughter, felt as a child. Her hair was always “done,” and her nails were never bare or showed signs of chipped polish. She dressed up for errands and wore makeup while cleaning the house. While my mother was equally attractive, wearing makeup while cleaning after a twelve-hour nursing shift was not a priority. For Granny, who had six children and worked outside the home, no amount of exhaustion was an excuse for not being “presentable.” Granny was my first introduction to glamor, a statuesque figure who wore “earbobs” and sapphires. I was in awe of her beauty, grace, and fierceness. Granny was my goddess.    

Most of my extended family preferred the company of my much quieter grandfather. He was gentle. He was tolerant. His bright blue eyes twinkled as he shared his gentle smile with you. Pappy was in stark contrast to the acid tongue and opinionated Granny. When you approached him, you relaxed and exhaled. As you sat and casually talked with Pappy about sports, politics, or religion, he accepted whatever you offered without dispute or criticism. If he happened to disagree, instead of arguing, he offered a slight nod, a shrug, and a smile. You could exhale and forget your problems. There was a weightless feeling that surrounded him. With Pappy, you were playing golf on the moon. You floated and giggled as you turned somersaults in the air. If Pappy was the lack of gravity, Granny was the sun. She was the source of all gravity.

With Granny, you stood at attention and knew her almost black eyes were reading your thoughts, your auras, and your objectives. At family gatherings, everyone but me gravitated toward Pappy. My attention stayed fixed on my grandmother as she sat back, listening and dissecting people’s intentions. She was the guard dog to Pappy’s bottomless kindness. When she caught someone in a half-truth or exaggeration, she wasted no time in calling out the guilty party. Her almond-shaped eyes narrowed ever so slightly, and her ruby lips pursed together as a lady-like grunt vibrated in her throat. This was her war cry that caused grown men to recoiled at the impending humiliation. This ability captivated me.

Her slow Virginia accent camouflaged her power to eviscerate you before her cigarette ever reached her lips. She lifted the Virginia Slim and inhaled without rush. Slightly tilting her chin up, Granny exhaled white smoke as if sending a burnt offering to herself. Pappy shrugged his forgiveness to the perpetrator. Granny had no time for it. With a flick of ash, she dismissed you.

Pappy’s position as the kind one balanced Granny’s dirty work of being the admonishing party. She told people bitter truths they did not want to hear. Granny held you accountable. Unlike other women in my young life, my grandmother wasn’t the idealized, demure Southern woman. Those Southern belles who deferred their thoughts and actions to whatever male was in their orbit. As others stood at attention, I paid attention. My upbringing taught me to be a nice girl, a good girl. I tried because I’d been told that’s what “Jesus wanted.” The more I tried, the bigger a target I became to the bullies in my life. Watching Granny was an education in mental karate for self-preservation.

Her beauty matched her fierceness. Her looks disarmed men and intimidated women. In public, people slowed and watched her glide by. I loved it. It was one of the few times in my young life I felt seen, even if only because of my proximity to her. They watched her, and I watched them.

  “Stand up straight and stop shuffling your feet. Pick them up when you walk.” She spoke while still looking forward. I always complied, unlike my normal state of trying to make myself smaller and invisible. If the cost of admission to be with Granny was standing up straight and picking up my feet, I paid willingly.

High heels and pencil skirts that fell just below the knee were Granny’s fashion signature. She wore both to show off her shapely legs. She tried to pass on some of her fashion identity to me each summer by buying my school clothes. Clothes meant to last me the entire school year. If I had an unfortunate growth spurt mid-year, I was out of luck. Our annual shopping pilgrimage involved Granny scouting the stores and choosing items. She would then wave me over and ask which outfit I liked. This continued until she loaded my arms down and then pointed to the nearest dressing room. 

The last step was Granny taking two fingers and running them along my waistband to make certain the clothes were just a few inches larger than they needed to be. My fashion benefactor ensured the new clothes had enough extra room for me to grow. With a final “hmmm,” she asked, “So what do you think?” She always gave me the final say about what I was going to wear. I loved her even more for that.

It was on one such trip, when I was eleven or twelve, that she bought me my first pair of high heels. Calling the shoes high heels was a stretch.

“But Mama won’t let me wear shoes with any kind of heel on them,” I told her.

“What do you mean, no heel?” she replied, still holding the open-toe dress shoes by the ankle straps. They were rust-colored with circular cutouts in the leather. The small brown heel was barely an inch. That wouldn’t matter to my mother. I couldn’t even wear the ever-popular clogs because of the slight lift.

“Really, why is that?” Her eyes narrowed. My answer was a shrug. She stared at the shoes before glancing back at me.

“Do you like these?” She wiggled the two fingers the shoe straps were hanging from. I didn’t. I couldn’t, however, pass up the prospect of having any type of heel. This opportunity was too huge. I quickly nodded my head.

“Grab the box,” she said over her shoulder as she proceeded towards the counter. I was sure my mother wouldn’t let me wear them, but just having a pair was enough for me. When my mother saw them, she glared at me like I had tricked Granny. As if that were even possible. I shook my head vigorously and looked at my grandmother.

“I picked them,” Granny interjected as she reached for her cigarettes.

“Mother, she is too young for any type of heel. She knows that,” Mom said, shifting the blame back to me.

“Really?” Granny’s lips made a slight popping sound as they released from the cigarette she had just lit. “Well, if you haven’t noticed, her feet are the same size as yours. It looks like they have had a growth spurt before the rest of her.” With her cigarette between her fingers, she used it to point at my feet. “I would love for you to find me a pair of Mary Jane Sunday School shoes in size six and a half. Are you expecting her to wear tennis shoes to church? Flip-flops, maybe?”

I stood perfectly still. My mother, like all others, relented. With one condition: I could wear the shoes to church, nowhere else. My grandmother leaned back in her chair to tap

the ashes into the thick green glass ashtray next to her. One side of her mouth lifted slightly, forming a smile only I could perceive.

If only she could have stayed perfect. All gods and goddesses have their own singular flaw. A flaw that needs to be overcome before it destroys them and the surrounding mortals. Because they refuse to change, these flaws cause suffering to those who worship them. With too much long-suffering, people stop hoping, believing. Hopelessness and non-belief thus cause a goddess to no longer exist.

  What flaw eroded Granny’s perfection? One small word with the power to hold anger, hate, and vileness in each syllable: the N-word. Growing up in the South, I heard this word uttered as casually as “y’all” or “Aren’t you sweet.” However, Granny’s utterance of this word was visceral. To my knowledge, she never had a black friend, neighbor, or really any substantial interaction with any black person. Her feelings towards non-white people was a mystery. She never explained why she felt the way she did. 

Whenever she said THAT word, her anger and hatred chipped away at her divinity, leaving me glossy-eyed with the taste of bile in my mouth. She would propel that word out like she was coughing phlegm from her lungs. As if her soul were trying to rid itself of this word tumor. Granny speaking that word caused me to turn my head or look down at my feet. I didn’t want her to see the tears pooling in my eyes. That word and the hatred that it carried caused my goddess to morph into a mere woman, a flawed woman. There were enough flawed people in my young life; I needed a goddess. 

With each year, my devotion to Granny eroded chip by chip. Granny knew her power but was blind to her defects. Therefore, there was nothing to change. The hate-filled word sounded vile, felt vile, and left me recoiling from her. Her continual and casual use of it undermined everything she said and everything she tried to teach me.

         When I became a teenager, my visits grew less frequent until they stopped altogether. I believe I would have continued visiting her if not for her racist feelings. I was angry with her but never asked why she felt that way. As I grew up, I realized it was more than just a word. It was a philosophy that seeped into everyday conversations. Age allowed me to see her hatred was more than a single word. I was angry at her for not living up to the illusion I had created around her. I could not love someone who was so damaged. It was all or nothing in my developing brain.

During my first semester in college, Pappy died. His death after almost 60 years of marriage left my grandmother untethered. The two had joked that Granny would wear red to his funeral, which is exactly what she did. It was her last “fully” Granny thing. Afterwards, her internal fire seemed to cool. The need to protect Pappy from those who might take advantage of his kind nature no longer existed. She became calmer. Perhaps being alone allowed her to confront the voices in her head with nothing around to drown them out.  

While she confronted a new life alone, I was off to college. There, I encountered people from different countries, different faiths, different languages, and different skin colors. For the first time in my life, I had Black friends, gay friends, non-Christian friends, and we were all facing the same problems. We struggled with academics, money, and the pressures of becoming adults. My worldview had expanded.

I never entertained the thought of returning home. Life had other plans for me. I returned from four years of college with no degree, no job, and a biracial baby. I had to contract back to my starting point, my childhood home, because of a lack of money and options. My circumstances convinced me that all contact with Granny would end.

  My feelings of not belonging existed before I left home. Upon my return, it was more than feelings. I was literally told I did not belong. This didn’t come from my family, but from my former community. A “friend” from my childhood church said I should not attend services anymore. The good Christian ladies of the Lottie Moon Fund held it was inappropriate that I, being unmarried, would bring my “mixed-breed” daughter to church.

  “They just said it’s not appropriate for you to come to services with, now this is them saying it, a ‘mixed-breed.’” My friend never batted an eye as her thick Eastern North Carolina accent delivered the message. She gave no consideration of the pain her words caused me. I stared blankly at her for a moment. Her tightly permed 80s-style hair; even by 80s standards, was high. As this was now the 90s, her hair seemed even larger. The oppressive August humidity caused her chemical drenched locks to expand upward five inches, adding to her already six-foot-tall frame. Squirming in my father’s Lazy Boy chair, this “friend” casually scanned the trailer’s living room where I grew up.

“But don’t worry, I’m still going to be friends with you. Mama says I’m a good person for doing that.” She made eye contact with me to make sure I understood the depth of her altruism. At twenty-five, she was older than I yet had never ventured beyond the county line. Her soul seemed to feast on my returning home because of my apparent failure in life. Her mother was already telling everyone who sat in her beautician’s chair about how “charitable” her daughter was for maintaining a friendship with me.         

I closed my eyes and listened to her drone on with county gossip, knowing as soon as she left, I would be her next topic of conversation. The heat and sadness in my life weighed me down. How did I end up back at my starting point? The person who sat across from me had been my only friend growing up. My “friend” had been openly insulting to me throughout our entire relationship, which I endured out of loneliness.

My return home meant survival for my daughter and me. I decided silence and loneliness were healthier than subjecting my child to the insults and judgments of “good people.”

Being Granny’s granddaughter, I informed my friend that the next Sunday I planned on not only going to church but marching down the center aisle to the front pew where I would call out the hypocrites. “Tell ’em to be ready, ’cause I know enough of their sins to lay bare in front of every last one of ’em.” Her eyes, no longer darting around the room, were wide and fixed on me. I almost felt sorry for my former friend as she turned pale and begged me not to.

I sounded like Granny, but lacked the courage to follow through. The following Sunday, I wrapped anger around my pain to protect it. My only consolation sprang from the confidence that every time the church doors opened, the front three rows of old women jumped because they had received my message. There was no front pew in my daughter’s or my future.  

I didn’t set foot in a church for years after that conversation. I decided at the time God and I were on a break. Exhausted from working three jobs, I didn’t have the bandwidth for scripture. I mean, “Love thy neighbor.” My neighbors didn’t love me or my daughter.

While I became harder towards the Christianity of my youth, Granny’s beliefs seemed to soften. She took pictures of my daughter to her many social clubs, passing around whatever the latest photo my mother had shared. Reluctantly, I began the occasional visits. Each time Granny scolded me, but not for racial or religious reasons. No, it was just as my mother had forbidden me to wear heels; I would not let her great-grandchild wear jewelry. Not to mention, her dresses weren’t up to Granny’s standards. 

As I sat in my grandmother’s living room and watched her dote on my daughter, I found it hard to understand this change. She already had great-grandchildren, white great-grandchildren. How could someone obliterate a lifetime of vitriol? And what, I wondered, caused her to hate at that level?

I later learned that her grandfather had fought for the South in the Civil War. I wonder what stories and “truths” she heard as a child. What war horrors did they blame on the blameless? They passed down intolerance and bigotry the same way they passed down her brown eyes and black hair. I do not excuse her racist remarks and feelings. Perhaps racism provided a protective cocoon wrapping around her fear of those who did not look like her. 

I did not and do not excuse Granny’s racism. She did not get a pass or a rationale for her behavior. I discovered, however, that I loved the flawed woman, not the idolized goddess my childhood had created. My absence in her life was justified because, even though I loved her, I could not subject my daughter to Granny’s hate. Whatever those fears and hatreds once were, they now yielded to the small brown child that snuggled in the old woman’s arms. 

This new Granny was on full display at my cousin’s wedding. My mother, daughter, and I took the hours-long drive across state lines to attend. We were late. We planned to sneak in and sit in the back row. As we pulled up, there stood Granny at the top of the church steps, hands on hips and her red lips tightly pursed. Seeing us, she looked back at the open doors and held up her finger, letting whoever was on the other side know they could start soon. She turned her attention back towards us, Mother now slumped down, trying to hide behind the steering wheel. 

Mother whispered, “You go first.” Why she whispered, I’m still not sure.

My response was “Coward” as I opened the door and released my child from her car seat. I leaned closer to my daughter and, in an excited voice, said, “Okay, go see Granny!” before pushing her ahead of me. Mother mouthed “Coward” back to me.

  “You’re late,” was Granny’s hello. “Hurry up, everyone is waiting to begin.” She then turned her attention to the toddler standing obediently next to her. Granny leaned over and ran her hands over the child’s wrinkled dress. She took her fingers and alternated between patting and fluffing the girl’s curly textured hair. Granny, always unsure what to do with my daughter’s hair, decided if it “was going to be poofy, it should be big poofy.”

The old woman grabbed the child’s hand and walked inside, leaving Mother and me behind. “Oh, good Lord, please tell me she did not hold up this wedding for us?” Mother spoke through clenched teeth and a frozen smile.

“Us?” I responded while pointing at my baby walking away. No, my cousin was not patiently waiting in the wings for her aunt and cousin to arrive. The bride, the groom, family, guests, pastor, and God waited for Granny to release her hold on time so her great-granddaughter could arrive.

Standing at the back, I watched the two saunter down the center aisle. The small brown fingers fit snugly in the aged white hand that led her to the front. My daughter smiled up at Granny. I recognized that look — the magic of walking with a goddess. But Granny, being Granny, stopped and faced the congregation before sitting down. She stood with her lips tightened into a small circle and scanned the pews with a slight curve of her eyebrow. This slight gesture sent out a wordless message to everyone: “Behave and not one word about my great-grandbaby.” In that moment, Granny once again stood like the statuesque figure of my childhood. My body relaxed as I absorbed what had just taken place.

Standing there, I whispered to God I was no longer angry and was allowing the divine back into my life. God being unaware of our break let me know the divine had never left. That day, I stopped blaming Jesus for others misquoting him and claiming authority over his words and actions. I left my exhaustion and anger in the car, enabling me to see that a goddess can change. That day, a goddess pushed away her fatal flaw and pulled us closer to fill its place. She loved us more than all the hate she ever mustered. I stopped thinking about those who rejected us and refused our entry and thus opened space in my life. I replaced the pain they caused me with a frail, white-haired goddess who taught me about redemption. That day, my grandmother did something I had been unable to do. Granny walked my daughter down to the front pew.

Mother and I were still standing at the back of the church when she leaned over and mumbled, “I guess it doesn’t matter where we sit.” I laughed and nodded. She then noticed a tear rolling down my cheek. 

“You crying already?” Mother asked.

“Yeah,” I whispered, “weddings always make me cry.”