ON BEING BLACK

By Mark Reed

Being Black.  How can a white man in the South, much less anywhere else, know what it is like – really like – to be black in America?  It may not even be possible.  Sure, we can say that we understand their pain, their frustrations, and their anger – but really understand?  I don’t think so.

I grew up in the 1940’s and 1950’s in an average middle class white family in Smyrna, Georgia.  The Deep South.  There were no black children in my neighborhood, much less in my schools.  In fact, it was 1964 when I was a freshman in College at the University of Georgia before I ever had a class with a black person, and even then they were few.  There were no blacks that lived in the City Limits of Smyrna – the Smyrna of my youth.  They mostly lived in Davenport Town, that small enclave just east and outside the City Limits.  My memory of Davenport Town of that time is limited to brief visits in my mother or father’s car to pick up or take home our black maid, Mary.  She was the only black person I knew when I was a young child.  To tell the truth, I never thought of her as black or as a different color from me until later in my childhood, probably from hearing things said by other children.  I loved Mary and she loved my family and me.  She was more than a maid.  She was a part of the family.  She named her son, Mark, after me, and some years later he tragically died at a young age.

The details are fuzzy in my mind, all these years later, but I remember coming home from school one day and finding Margie, another black woman, waiting for me in Mary’s place.  It seems that Mary couldn’t stay with us any longer for some reason, and she sent her cousin, Margie, to take her place and “look after her white folks.”  This was about the time that my mother experienced her first fight with a brain tumor (the one that didn’t kill her).  After mother’s operations, it was some time before she was able to participate in raising three young children, and even then it was limited.  Margie became our “black mommy,” or “Nanny” as they call it today.

I can remember from a very early age my father speaking to us about race relations between the blacks and whites.  He was an unusual man in a lot of ways, but most definitely on his views, as a white man growing up in the South, on how to treat the blacks.  Let’s say that his views did not mirror the general opinion of the majority of the population at the time, as far as race went.  He told me that when he was a child, growing up in Smyrna in the 20’s and 30’s, many of his playmates were the little black children from Davenport Town.  He and they were just kids.  No difference, really.  Children seem to be color blind up to a certain age until the views of their parents or peers creep into their consciousness.  I believe that those who we are around are the ones who shape our views of the world and the people in it.  Children have a certain innocence, at least until it is corrupted by others.

Dad always said that there were good black people and bad black people – just as there were good white people and bad white people.  He said to judge a person on who they were and how they acted and treated you – not on their color.  As I said, his views did not mirror those of the majority of people of the time.

One of the things I am most proud of about Dad had to do with his work.  In the early 50’s, he formed a partnership with “Hoot” Gibson, a past and future Mayor of Smyrna.  They acquired a large tract of land adjacent to Davenport Town and developed the first new “black” subdivision in Cobb County – Rose Garden Hills.  He and “Hoot” built nice single-family homes for black families.  I have the old 8mm film Dad took of the construction activities and homes being built.  There is no sound, only the flickering images.  There is this one scene, in particular, I really love, of this young black couple coming to look at the new homes and picking out the home they bought.  I wish I knew their name.  By developing this nice subdivision for the blacks, Dad and “Hoot” were arguably the most hated white men in the county in certain circles. They had the temerity to build houses as nice or nicer than many white families lived in.  But the thing about this particular endeavor that really rings a bell, for me, is the fact that in addition to building these nice homes for the blacks, they also were responsible for a first class elementary school being built for the black children of the community – Rose Garden Hills Elementary.  With the advent of desegregation some years later, Rose Garden Hills Elementary ceased to be used as an elementary school, but the building was taken over and used for various daycare and other functions for the benefit of the community.  I’m proud of this contribution my father made to the black community.  I doubt if many today, or any for that matter, are even aware of this little sidebar of Smyrna history, but my family is.

I remember with crystal clarity the time he told me, “You know, if I had been born black, I’d be dead today.  There is no way I would have been able to accept the way they are treated or spoken to.”  He also made it absolutely clear that the use of the “N” word in our home was forbidden.  If it were to have escaped my lips in his presence, or he heard that I, or any one of us children, had uttered it, we would not have been able to sit down for a week.  I must admit that in my life I have used that word a time or two, forgetting for a moment my father’s rule, but when it was said, I remember feeling a total disgust with myself for having done so.  Some things we do because of whom we are around, as I mentioned earlier.  Even so, there is no excuse.  To this day, when I encounter someone who uses it, and generally it is someone who is from my father’s generation, it never fails to shock me and make me feel a discomfort that is hard to describe.

I remember one time at home, before I was a teen, when I was chanting a little rhyme that a lot of children used, with varying words, “Ennie Meenie Minee Moe, Catch A N—– By The Toe.”  I don’t remember the context of why I was using that rhyme, but I remember clearly that when the word left my mouth, I looked up in horror to see Margie standing across the room looking at me with sad eyes.  I don’t believe that I had ever been as embarrassed before or since.  I was so ashamed.  I told her I was sorry and cried.  She gave me a hug and told me it was OK and that she loved me.  That made me cry all the harder.  Why is it that we hurt those we love and care about?  My father never knew about this or the other occasions I used the word.  I’m glad for that.  Not because of the punishment that would have come when I was a child, but for the disapproval and disappointment that he most surely would have felt.

Michelle and I tried to raise our children to be colorblind.  To treat all people the same way they themselves would want to be treated.  The “golden rule.”  I believe we have been successful in that regard.  In fact, one of Bill’s best friends in Middle School was a black boy.  The color made no difference to him.  The same holds true for Lew.  They have grown up to be men of character who judge their fellow men for the content of their heart, not the color of their skin.

We live in a tumultuous time today. Race relations, which had improved over the years, seem to have fallen back to a time of hatred and distrust on the part of many blacks and whites. The racist “race card” is played on people for innocent remarks, or as a way to attack someone. I am hopeful that this too shall pass. I have had black friends over the years, and have some today. My pastor for many years was a black man. My ministry has been to black people in Haiti. We all have to get past the color thing and concentrate on the human thing. We are all human.

I have had several recent interactions with people of color in the last week, with each being enjoyable and friendly. Let us focus on and build on such as these. There is hate being foisted upon us by those who want there to be division and conflict. Ignore it. Look to the heart. Yours and others.

HASTA LA VISTA, BABY

By Mark Reed

I just read a piece about people’s celebrity encounters. This is one of mine.

Back in the early 90’s I was in Washington, DC, Georgetown actually, visiting my sister Cynthia.

As many of you know, I like to take photographs. I have been to DC many times and taken lots of photos, including the expected Capitol and monument images. This also included lots of photos of the Georgetown area. But most all of my previous photos of Georgetown had been taken with lots of people around, usually in the frame. I decided to get up early on a Sunday morning and take snapshots of Georgetown sans people.

Cynthia’s townhouse was located on N Street, just around the corner from the Georgetown Inn on Wisconsin Avenue. It was a beautiful early morning with the sun just having risen and the light was beautiful for photographs. I walked out of her townhouse and walked the couple of hundred feet down to the corner next to the Georgetown Inn.

As I walked up the empty street beside the hotel taking photographs as I went, I stopped near the entrance to compose a shot. As I stood there facing the door, it swung open and a couple walked out.  Because I was trying to take photos without people in them, I did not take the shot. It was then that I realized that the couple was Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver.

 This famous couple had to contend with paparazzi almost nonstop whenever they went out in public. Here they were early on a Sunday morning, the streets empty, and they must have thought they would be free of the pesky and obnoxious paparazzi for some treasured time for a stroll together.

Our eyes locked. I could see that they were not particularly pleased to see a photographer standing in front of the hotel with a camera, ready to snap photos of them. I had to make an instantaneous decision. Do I take advantage of this unexpected opportunity to get up close and personal photos of them? Remember, this all was happening in the blink of an eye, or the click of a shutter, so to speak.

I made my decision. I smiled, pointing my camera down, and said, in my best Das Anald voice, “I’ll be back. Hasta la vista, baby.”

They both gave me great big smiles, waved, turned and walked up the street hand in hand. I hope I helped them enjoy a little respite from their normally hectic public life.

I would not have made a good paparazzi.

REMEMBERING JAY

By Mark Reed

Growing up in Smyrna in the 50’s and 60’s, one of my classmates was Susan Barnwell. She had a little brother named Jay. I didn’t really know him since he was a couple of years younger than us. During our time at Campbell High School, Susan and Jay’s family moved from Smyrna to Marietta where they attended Sprayberry High School.

Fast forward to the University of Georgia and the Sigma Pi house in 1966. Jay came through fraternity rush, and us Smyrna men remembered Susan. Jay was a sharp guy and was issued a unanimous bid to pledge. He accepted. At that time, we had a system in place that each pledge was to have a “Big Brother” who would shepherd him through his pledgeship and help ease his transition to brotherhood in the fraternity. Jay chose me. I had a number of “Little Brothers” over my years in Sigma Pi at UGA. They were all good men, but Jay and I developed a special bond, maybe partly because of our Smyrna connection and Susan, but I think it was more than that. We genuinely liked each other. He was a good man and a better friend. I still have the Pledge Paddle he made for me when he was initiated.

I had a gold ’65 GTO convertible in school. It had great looking wire wheel hubcaps that were greatly admired by hubcap thieves. They kept being stolen. Every time they went missing, Jay would invariably “find” me another set. Just about every fraternity man had a nickname. Jay’s was “Hubcap.”

I remember a story Jay told me about when he was a member of the Civil Air Patrol (CAP). He was on a flight with one of his flight leaders as pilot and Jay was sitting in the co-pilot seat. The pilot looked over at Jay and asked him if he would like to take the controls and fly it a bit. Of course he did. He took the controls and after a few moments of steady level flight, Jay pushed down on the yolk and did a rolling dive and then back up to level flight. Jay looked over at his instructor with a big grin. The man’s chin was still on his chest, his eyes frozen open and perhaps he made a little mess in his panties. What the pilot did not know was that Jay had taken flight lessons and was a proficient pilot. I don’t remember if Jay told me there were any repercussions for his aerial maneuver, but if he knew there would be some, I have no doubt he would have done exactly the same.

As fate would have it, I graduated, went in the Army and we lost touch. Over the years, his name would come up in discussions between us Sigma Pi brothers, but no one had heard from him, other than to say he was thought to be living in California. I tried to search him out a number of times, but to no avail. Then, ten years or so ago, out of the blue, Jay contacted me. It was old home week and we enjoyed catching up with each other about our missing years. We shared our Army memories and marveled that we were still here. This started a steady stream of e-mail, text, phone calls and Facebook communications.

Finally, in 2016, we met up for lunch when he flew in for his Sprayberry High School 50^th Reunion. It had been almost fifty years since we had seen each other. It was as if no time had passed at all. He was not well and told me that this would likely be his last trip here. We both realized we would never see each other again. We gave each other the fraternity handshake and a big hug and parted ways.

I found out he died after a month or so of sending him e-mails, texts, etc., with no response. I was afraid I knew the reason for no response. I was right.

This brings me to a recent event. When I was in the Army, I was issued the standard Field Jacket. I was not issued a button in liner for cold weather, since I was going someplace HOT. I was smoking cigars with some old buddies of mine recently, in fact some of those Smyrna guys who were Sigma Pi brothers with Jay. Somehow the subject of Field Jackets came up, as we had all been in the Army. One of them mentioned, upon learning I did not have a liner, that I should drop by Hodge Army Navy Store in Marietta near The Big Chicken next time I was in town, and see if they had one.

I went by Hodge and asked the manager if they had the old Field Jacket liner. He said they were rare, but if they had one, his old vet employee would know, and he asked him to take me to the back of the store to search. The “old” guy said that if they had one, it would be old and used, and I laughed, saying my Field Jacket was old and used, too. He asked when I served…’69-’71…same as him. The “old” guy was my age.

He said I looked familiar and asked my name. I told him and said that I was a native to the area and went to CHS. He then asked me if I knew Jay Barnwell. When I told him Jay was a friend and fraternity brother, he said he had met me before back in 2016. I had been in Hodge back then and he had helped me find something, and in our conversation we established the Jay connection. In fact, I had pulled out my cell phone and called Jay in California and the three of us had a great conversation. It all came back to me.

He was very excited to see me again. He said that he and Jay, along with seven other buddies from Marietta, had all enlisted together and gone through Basic Training as a group. They all survived their Army service and had a nine-man reunion every five years for the last fifty years. Their last reunion this year had three of the nine missing. Two had died and Jay was a no show. I sadly told him that Jay had died this past year. He was visibly shaken. He said he would let their fellow soldiers know.

I recently made a Facebook post about the Field Jacket and running into Jay’s old Army buddy, and his granddaughter saw it and contacted me and thanked me for keeping his memory alive. That prompted this Blog story.

I miss “Hubcap.”

FYI: Hodge is moving from their long time location on Hwy 41 in Marietta to East Lake Shopping Center behind Williamson Brothers BBQ on Roswell Road. My Field Jacket will become my hunting jacket in cold weather with the liner…and I will think of Jay whenever I put it on.

A REMEMBRANCE OF DOCTOR PAT

By Mark Reed

(This story was written just days after Doctor Pat died on April 15, 2001)

I picked up the paper today and read that William Connell Patterson Jr. passed away after a valiant fight with cancer.  He was Bill to many, but to some of us he was “Pat” – Doctor Pat to me.  Even though I had seen him a week or so ago, and knew that the end was near, reading about it in the paper was still like a fist in the gut.  The air went out of me.

The first time I met Doctor Pat was in September of 1964 when my dad delivered me to the University of Georgia as an incoming freshman.  When we got to the parking lot next to Reed Hall and Payne Hall (where I was to room), we ran into Pat and his son, Bobby, who turned out to be rooming next door to me in the dorm.  I had heard dad talk about “Doctor Pat” but this was my first time meeting him face to face.  As it turned out, Bobby and I became friends and I remember him talking in glowing terms about his father.  While Bobby didn’t say it outright, you could tell he hero-worshipped his dad.  I now know why.

When Michelle and I got married in 1973, our first home was across the street from Pat and his wife Iwee on Ridge Road in Smyrna. We visited with them frequently. You can’t think about Pat without thinking about Iwee.  What a class act she is!  A lovely little lady with a great big heart.  Pat one time joked to me that he didn’t deserve her.  I don’t know about that, but she is one special lady.

Pat was one of my dad’s best friends. Dr. Pat was also a renowned surgeon. He probably saved dad’s life in 1969 when he performed an emergency surgery on him to repair a perforated colon.  He was our family doctor for many years until his retirement.  But he was much more than that to me.  Since dad passed away twenty years ago, Pat had become more of a surrogate father for me than anything else.  He and dad were the same age, born a few weeks apart.  My periodic visits to see he and his wife Iwee were a joy.  With Pat I developed rapport, a friendship, a relationship I wish I had developed with my dad – a relationship that comes with age and maturity.  We would sit and talk of old times, swap stories, share feelings, discuss our losses, our triumphs and our pains and joys.  But no matter the topic, when I left our visits, I always had a “warm fuzzy” from being with someone I loved and who loved me in return.

It was a special day when Pat and I sat on his back patio, him enjoying his cigarette, me just enjoying being in his presence, when he shared with me that he felt toward me like a son.  I cried and told him he was like a father to me, and we two grown men felt all mushy together.  God it was great.

Of the many stories he shared with me, the one I cherish most was from his childhood.  We were talking about God, faith and prayer – specifically the answer to prayers.  As he relayed it to me, when he was just a boy living at home on the farm, his father had a special pocketknife.  As with many men, this knife was a prized possession he carried everywhere in his pocket.  He sharpened it, cleaned it and took care of it.  As sons do, Pat watched his father use the knife, and wanted to use it also.  One day, half expecting to be turned down, he asked his father if he could borrow the knife.  To his glee, his father reached into his pocket, pulled out the knife and handed it to him.  It was unsaid, but Pat knew that he must take special care of his father’s knife.  He knew a special trust had been bestowed upon him.

Pat spent the day whittling; cutting twigs from trees, putting his initials on the barn wall – all the things a young boy does with a knife.  He said it was a wonderful day.  As the afternoon came to a close and it was time for him to return to the house and give his father back his knife, he reached into his pocket to feel its hard shape.  A moment of panic ensued when he realized that the knife was no longer in the pocket of his overalls.  He was mortified that he had lost his father’s prized knife.  He frantically tried to retrace his steps during the day, all the while scanning the ground, the straw in the barn, the fields around the farm.  He realized the almost futile effort of finding this “needle in a haystack.”  It was then, there in the barn, that he decided that while he was not big on prayer, he didn’t know what else to do but go to God.  He said he didn’t remember the actual words of the prayer, but the gist of it was, “God, help me find my father’s knife.”  As he stood there in the barn, head bowed at the finish of his prayer, he opened his eyes and looking down at the straw covered barn floor, there was the knife at his feet.

Pat told me, with a twinkle in his eyes, that finding that knife at his feet after his prayer was “just about enough to convert me right there on the spot.”  And he and I laughed out loud.  I think he was converted right then.

Another story Pat relayed to me was about the time he was stationed at Okinawa after the war.  He was the USAF medical officer for the base on the island.  He had his family stationed with him and he said it was a great time as far as military service went.  He said that they had a diving platform anchored off the shore over a reef where he used to scuba dive.  He shared the events of his last dive with me.  He said he was down about twenty or thirty feet along the side of the reef where he had found a giant clam attached to the coral.  With visions of a valuable pearl inside (although it is oysters that make pearls, I believe), he struggled to pry the huge clam free.  As he was working on the clam, a dark shadow passed over him.  He looked up toward the surface to see a monstrous shark passing back and forth through his air bubbles from the scuba tank.  Obviously the shark was interested in these strange bubbles in his environment.  As the shark passed through the bubbles, it descended deeper and deeper towards Pat.  There is not much more terrifying for a man than to be out of his element in close proximity to a creature that is higher on the food chain (at least in this venue).

An intelligent man, and good under pressure, Pat realized that the bubbles were drawing the shark closer.  He took several deep breaths, and then turned off the airflow and hugged the side of the reef and stayed perfectly still.  The shark swam away and at the limit of holding his breath, Pat turned back on the airflow.  No sooner were the bubbles making their way to the surface, did the shark return.  Pat went through this procedure several times, and each time the shark returned, each time a little closer.  One last time he turned off the air and as the shark once more glided off into the darkness, Pat swam with all his might to the surface and to the safety of the diving platform not looking back to see if the shark had turned back toward him.  As he pulled himself from the ocean, he decided that he could do without that clam.  He left the reef to the shark from then on.

One story that was told on Pat by my father is one that Pat and I laughed about many times.  Pat and dad owned an airplane together.  A Piper Comanche – a sweet little single engine four-seat plane.  Dad, who was a combat pilot from WWII, was a pretty good pilot, but he said that Pat was one of the best he ever saw, particularly from a technical standpoint.  As he did with everything he did, flying was something he attacked with a quest for perfection.  As the story goes, Pat was coming in for a landing at McCollum Airport in Kennesaw, where he and dad kept the plane.  As usual, he was coming in for his normal perfect textbook landing.  This time was no exception, except for one little thing – he forgot to put the gear down.  Those who witnessed it, and from the investigation that followed, it was determined that it was the “best” belly landing ever.  The plane landed flat on its belly without either wingtip touching the ground. A perfect “one point” landing (as opposed to the more normally associated “three point” landing). Dad, who belly-landed two P-51 fighters during the war, said that his landing was no mean feat.  I believe Pat would forgive me for sharing this story.

In one of our last conversations, we were discussing the trials and tribulations of being a father, and how the relationship with one’s sons can be hard, especially when they are teenagers and young men.  Having two teenage sons, I am experiencing some of that, although I am blessed with two wonderful boys (as were Pat and Iwee).  Pat shared with me that it is almost inevitable that there be a splitting apart of the relationship, but that the good news was that with time it came back together, better than before.  He said that he and Bill had become closer than ever through his final illness.  He said that made the illness worth it.  Pat talked of his love for Iwee, Bill and Bobby.  I feel honored and truly blessed to have had him share some of his love with me.

During my last visit with Pat, his brother Gene was there.  I don’t know if it was Gene’s presence that did it, but Pat looked better, seemed to feel better and seemed to be in better spirits than usual (although Pat was never “down” about his condition).  He said he had received his “three score and ten” and more.  He said he had a wonderful life and was OK about leaving this world.  I wish I could say the same about him leaving.  I’m glad the way he was the last time I saw him will be my final vision of him.  But it sure will not be my final thoughts of him.

I remember a line from an old movie, “How Green My Valley.”  It was a statement from a son upon the death of his father, and it went like this:  “Men like my father never die.  He is with me still, real in memory as he was in life.  Beloving and beloved forever.”  That’s how I will remember Pat.