Troubled Waters

I sent the image to a friend. He’s working on some motivational speaking pieces and I thought it was a great topic. He told me I should blog about it and I chuckled and thought to myself that he was using some motivational, reverse psychology on me and I filed it away as a draft. I instead wrote Black Mothers Don’t Hug Their Daughters; but, then it started raining here and by day three, all I could think about was troubled waters.

I’m sure you’ve heard the hymn, ‘Wade in the Water, an old Negro spiritual that is attributed to Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. The lyrics tell runaway slaves to ‘wade in the water…God’s gonna trouble the water’. When we think about trouble, our minds are automatically taken to a bad place. But in this instance, going into the water allowed the slaves’ scent to be washed away so that hound dogs couldn’t trace them. The water was stirred up, or troubled, as a distraction for the dogs, so the slaves could continue on to freedom.

It makes perfect sense but there was something about the quote that nagged at me. Something about it spoke of something greater – supernatural even. I searched and found what I’d been looking for – John 5:4. This particular section of scripture describes a man being healed at a pool by Jesus. The specific verse says, ‘For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatever disease he had.’ Some translations substitute stirred for troubled and others only add that particular verse as a footnote (check out the YouVersion Bible app and look for it under ESV and NIV). I sat there dumbfounded. Not at the supernatural healing power of God; I personally know what He can do. But at the idea that in some places this particular verse is just a foot note.

You see, when I think, really think about this quote, I get goosebumps. Sometimes, in order to be cleansed or freed from whatever bondage we’re in, we have to be stirred up. We have to be fired from a job, lose all of our money, end a relationship, or simply be moved out of our comfort zone. This stirring, or troubling, while it can be extremely scary, is actually what our souls need. These moments require us to stop and take stock of what’s been weighing us down and dirtying us up. As we come through the water those dirty parts are cleansed and healed – like the man at the pool.

Listen, I am not a theologian, nor do I consider myself a Bible scholar. But what I do know is that through my personal relationship through Jesus Christ, I have been through many troubled waters. At times, I certainly felt like I was drowning and hopeless. But when I look back on how I came out on the other side – what I let go of in that water – I am grateful for those experiences.

Until next time…

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Black Mothers Don’t Hug Their Daughters

I saw those words as I scrolled through my Facebook newsfeed the other night and immediately thought I’d misread it. Surely it said, ‘Black mothers, hug your daughters more’. I scrolled back up, only to find that I had indeed read it correctly the first time. I tucked it away in the recesses of my mind, wondering what black mothers these were.

The next day, as I waited to pick my daughter up, thinking of what term of endearment I was going to whip out for her, those words crept back into my thoughts. Which black mothers had she been talking about? Not my black mother – who to this very day, as I mother my own children, hugs me every time she sees me. Not me – who hugs my daughter, while I tell her how smart, and talented, and brave she is. What black mothers was she talking about?! I got home and started reading the comments and felt validated in my confusion by all those who said that it was a horrible stereotype but also saddened by the numerous women who said that their mothers didn’t hug them. Ever? Just on special occasions?

As I sat contemplating the hows and the whys, I was reminded of a discussion I’d recently had with a girlfriend. I don’t remember exactly what started the conversation but we got into the idea of the ‘Strong Black Woman’. You know, Miss Independent, I Can Do Bad All By Myself, No scrubs, to the left, black woman? The one Mary sang about while Angela set his car on fire and the one Viola played that many of swore we could never be? I concluded that because we had to be strong for so long (watching our husbands getting sold on auction blocks, losing our husbands, fathers, uncles, cousins to crack, and memorializing our sons being killed while walking home) we didn’t know how to be vulnerable. I explained a story I heard on NPR about how the sheer fact that we are black ages us biologically in a process called weathering. While black don’t crack on the outside, the constant stress of racial and gender discrimination, ages black women on the inside, far faster than it does our white counterparts. All those thoughts made me wonder – was that why some of us don’t hug our daughters?

I told my husband a couple nights later that I had been working this piece out in my head for a few days. He gave me this strange look when I told him the title and we ultimately got around to whether or not I believed it was true. Absolutely not I said. But in that discussion he reminded me of something I’d read in “The Mother of Black Hollywood’ by Jenifer Lewis (which is a PHENOMENAL book) and her relationship with her mother. As she got older and went through therapy, she realized that it wasn’t that her mother didn’t love her and didn’t want to show her affection; she had more pressing issues on her mind. She was raising several children, alone, and was quite poor. Jacob and I agreed that when putting food on the table and keeping the lights on is always on your mind, you don’t always think about hugging your kids a lot. Giving them what they need and even what they need actually means, takes on a different meaning when you have to constantly worry about keeping a roof over their heads.

Here’s where I’m going with this. Yes, some black mothers don’t hug their daughters. But that lack of affection isn’t limited to race. I can’t say that it’s even limited to socioeconomic status. What I’ve found is that as a mother, I love the way in which I was loved, as do most other mothers. That’s not good or bad; it just is. Clearly that’s not always the case and it’s not to say that there isn’t room for improvement, but I truly believe that most mothers do the best that they know how.

As I was waiting at the car wash Wednesday evening, I could over hear a young woman telling her mother about an accomplishment at work. Her tone quickly changed and I could hear her pleading with her mother to just be proud of her, in that moment, and not to bring up her faults, in that moment. I wanted to tap her on the arm and tell her that although she couldn’t see it then, her mother most likely didn’t know any other way to do things. I decided against it (folks will go off on you these days). But as Jo and I walked to the car, I replayed that conversation I’d heard, and vowed to do better – as her mother.

Until next time…