Tina McElroy Ansa - Juicy Lessons From 'The Place'

 

I was born in Macon, Georgia, which is at the very center of the state of Georgia. They called it the heart of Georgia. And the whole time that I was growing up, my daddy owned juke joints and liquor stores. He owned juke joints all over Macon, Georgia. There was a Bonton Cafe and the Bluebird Beer Parlor and the Broadway Beer Parlor and Grill, at different times, different ones in different locations, but they were all called the place at our house, as in, “Oh, God, I got to go down to the place and open up or don't forget to bring Coca Cola's back from the place”. And they were all situated in the same African-American business district. I don't know if you know, but before desegregation, every little town, every large town, especially in the south, had a thriving African-American business district. 

 

And in Macon, Georgia, ours was Broadway and Mulberry. People just talked about “I'm going to go down to Broadway and give me a drink.” “Oh, yeah, I'm going to go down to Mulberry and pick up some fish for dinner.” Or, the one that I loved was, that woman got a butt big enough to walk Broadway. [audience laughter]

 

I loved Broadway and Mulberry. I saw my whole life through the prism of Broadway and Mulberry and my father's juke joints because there was always music playing. You could tell what era it was and what year it was by the music that was playing. There was either Bobby Blue Bland or BB King or Elmo James or Ruth Brown or the Wilson Pickett or my homeboys, Otis Redding or Little Richard or James Brown and the Famous Flames. We claimed him sometimes, too.

 

And I loved the music. Music was going on all the time. Bumpy, bumpy bump, on the jukebox. That's why they call it, a juke joint. My mother worked at my father's juke joints. My father called it helping out. My mother worked at these juke joints and she brought me downtown in a fluffy yellow baby blanket all wrapped up. And she came in and one of her boys, as she called one of the roustabouts or winos, put this cardboard box up on the counter, this liquor store box, probably Old Forester box. And she put me inside this box in my little fluffy yellow blanket up on the counter for people to come by and see the new baby, the last one McElroy child, the baby of the family, the youngest of five.

 

And, everybody came by and did what they always do. When you see a new baby. “Oh, ain't she pretty? You got a pretty little baby girl, Miss Nellie”. Or, “Oh, yo, look, she looks like a daddy. That's supposed to be good luck. She is going to be a lucky little girl.” They said the things that all admirers say, but these admirers were different. These admirers had look on their breath. And most likely half of them had a Pabst Blue Ribbon can in their hand, because these were the regular folks at the place. They were there all the time. They were part-time barmaids and part-time prostitutes, part-time maids, boosters and pickpockets and folks who rolled on the back of the garbage truck or the numbers man or the numbers woman. I love these people.

 

These were my babysitters, these were my compatriots, these were my friends, these were my confidants. Because I spent all my time that I could down at my father's place. I would come there after school and do my homework at the bar. I'd come on Saturdays just because I loved going down there. And I love these people. These people had such marvelous stories, such amazing stories. They told stories all the time about what happened last night, how the fight around the corner got started and who threw the plate last window. Stories about the first time they came town from the country. But the stories that I really loved were the stories about love. Oh, God, everybody had a love story about something was going on in their lives. And it was so appropriate because one of the Creole words for having sex is juke.

 

And so like a juke house is a brothel. And so, these people would be at the juke joints and they would just share their stories all the time, stories of unrequited love and stories of love gone wrong or, stories of how that man made you feel that you just smiled all day long even if you didn't see him, stories that make people just rock on the bar stools, and clasp their chest and just raise their hands in the air and go, mm, mm. [audience laughter] Rich, juicy, wonderful love stories. Unbelievable love stories, because these people had really lived and that they had stories to tell even when I didn't understand them. They were wonderful love stories. Stories of how it feels when the one you love don't love you back. 

 

I remember sitting at the end of the bar one afternoon, and one of the regulars was transvestite. And she was sitting there, a burly kind of guy, and she was sitting there [audience chuckle] with full stage makeup, the false eyelashes, the earrings, the makeup, everything, glittery blouse. And she was sitting at the bar with a glass and half pint, and she was drinking. She'd look out on the dance floor, she'd take another drink, and she'd look out on the dance floor. And so, I just sort of leaned over from my homework what is she looking at, and it was a couple out on the floor, a tall man, a little skinny woman. They were all, hooked up on the dance floor, just dancing.

 

And my girl here looked at them again and looked over at me and looked at them and took another drink, and she leaned over to me and she said, “Baby, I have fattened my last frog for the snake.” And I remember thinking, “Oh, my God, that's so good.” [audience laughter] That's so good. Oh, wonder what that means. I wonder what that means. Oh, God, I wish I had lived more. I wish I had sex. I. I wish I knew what that meant, because I knew it was something really wonderful. But, y' all like to keep the babies of the family all ignorant, innocent for so long. I didn't know anything about life, but I had enough sense to know that was something rich and wonderful. And it was like all the stories that were in the place. 

 

And I realized then that's what I wanted. I wanted a story like that. It was all juicy and rich, it makes somebody go, mm, mm. [audience chuckle] And so, I decided right then that I was going to live a life that had stories like that. Well, I started noticing in school, the boys interested in you, you're interested in the boys. And I started noticing the girls, especially the older girls, had stories, because all we talked about and all they talked about was boys and doing it. Doing it, you know? “Is she a virgin? No, she's not a virgin. Yes, she is a virgin. Oh, no, she's not. You think she's done it? Yeah, she's done.” I mean, that's all they talked about, doing it. [audience chuckle]

 

And I would listen to their stories, and they would come in and tell them about the first time they did it., And I would listen closely because I was expecting a story, and they would say, “Yeah, well, it was in the back seat of Richard's car. He keeps all that junk in the back of the car. And it was so uncomfortable, and it was cold, and we had to keep our clothes on, and he didn't know what to put-- he got his feet got in the way and he didn't know what he was doing, I don't think, because it wasn't good. And he promised me it was going to get good later on, but it wasn't good right then. [audience laughter] And then in the middle of it, he hollered out, ‘Oh, I love you.’ And now I guess Richard loves me.” [audience laughter]

 

And I would look at them and say, “So this is your story, right? This is really? Really, backseat of the car. This is going to be--". I said right then and there “Well, this is not going to be my story”. I want my first time to be really wonderful, I didn't think my virginity was anything precious or anything, but it was mine, and I figured I should have the kind of story around it that I wanted. Okay, skip ahead to the year that I'm 21. I'm going to be turning 22 in the fall. I have my first job. I am working at the Atlanta Constitution, the morning newspaper in Atlanta, Georgia. In fact, I am the first black woman to work at the Constitution, if you can believe that. I was only the second woman in the newsroom. [applause] Well, that's unexpected [chuckles]. Listen to this. I was only the second woman to work in the newsroom. There were only two women working in the newsroom at the time. And I was probably the only woman in the 1970s who had graduated from college still a virgin. [audience laughter] We'll take headcounts later on.

 

I had dated guys in college and they were nice guys. They were good guys, interesting and all of that, and we'd made out and all that, but they just weren't it, they just weren't it. They didn't come up to this list that I had, and I didn't even know I had a list, but obviously I did. I wanted him to be well read and I wanted him to be well traveled and I wanted him to have a passion for things, not just his work and his job, which could have been fine, but a passion for life in some way. I wanted him to be good looking, but not pretty boy good looking. I didn't want a pretty boy. [audience chuckle] I wanted him to be good looking in a sexy, dark, dangerous, mysterious kind of way [audience laughter] and for some reason, I wanted him to wear a trench coat. [audience laughter] I have no idea. I wanted this. I wanted him to wear a trench coat. Maybe it was Richard Roundtree in Shaft [audience laughter] or Rick in Casablanca? I don't know what it was, but I wanted this man to wear a trench coat.

 

But the biggest thing is I wanted this man to be a man. You hear me? I wanted him to know what he was doing. I didn't want any fumbling and stumbling and not knowing [audience chuckle] where to put stuff. I wanted him to really know his way around a woman's body. This is what I wanted. And I was going to be 22 in the fall, and I realized, “Oh, okay, girl. It's time to do this thing. Okay?” [audience laughter] I had gotten on the pill early in the year, and I started, as you can imagine, looking around at everybody in a very different way. [laughter] All the men became very interesting to me all of a sudden, they were likely candidates.

 

And so, there was this guy at work, and he was a nice guy. We hung out together, and we liked some of the same things. He liked me and respected me. He thought I was a good journalist. I thought he was a good journalist. And, we both loved movies. We used to go to films all the time and talk about them. And he would give me rides home from work sometimes. And, I'd invite him in to come in and have some coffee, and we'd drink gallons of coffee and just stay up talking about films and the world and travel and all kinds of things. He was an interesting guy, but that's all it was.

 

And then one day, I'm sitting at the copy desk, I worked on the copy desk, and I looked up, and he was coming in, and he was obviously on deadline because he was rushing, and he had a notebook in his hand, and he was headed for his desk to bang out a story. And he had on a trench coat. [audience laughter] Oh, my God. It's a light bulb didn't go on click, lights came on. [audience laughter] It was amazing. I couldn't believe I had missed this all along. This man had on a trench coat. This was the one, he was it. He was it. And I knew his business because we were friends. And I knew even better he was going to be leaving in a few weeks. He had a job in another city.

 

Oh, it got better and better. [audience laughter] I thought, this is great. There's no opportunity for things to get messy and complicated and serious. We were going to do it, and he was going to be out of here. Oh, this was just great. So, I started my seduction plan. [audience laughter] When we went out to dinner, we were just hanging out. I would sit a little closer to him on the sofa. Nothing anybody would notice. And then if we told a joke and it was funny, I just hit him, I'd touch him on the shoulder. I started touching him a whole lot more. Okay? [audience laughter] I would get lint off of his shoulder. I would straighten his collar. One time, I straightened his trench coat collar. Oh, God, what a rush. [audience laughter] Okay?

 

Then I stepped it up. One night when he brought me home, he didn't get out of the car. He was just dropping me off, and I just reached over real casually and said, “Oh, thanks for the ride.” I kissed him on the cheek. He didn't even notice. It was no big deal. We were friends. I did that a couple of more nights. “Good night. Thanks.” And maybe the third night, I leaned over and gave him a kiss.  No big thing. No tongue, none of that but just a kiss. Nice, soft kiss. And he was like, “Whoa, what was that?” And we kind of both laughed. And I don't know what that was. And we laughed it off. [audience laughter] I don't know. Where'd that come from? Gosh.

 

And so I went on in, and that was it. And then that went real well. So, I started stepping things up. I looked at the calendar, and I looked at my cycle, and I picked the perfect week [audience laughter] and then I looked at the work schedule, and I picked a day that I knew that we both would be working late at night. And that way we wouldn't go in until the next afternoon, and we'd have the whole morning the next day to take our time. [audience chuckle] And I did. And I started thinking, “Okay, this is going good.” I mean, we are rolling along here. And I went downtown to Richard's Department Store, and I bought myself this long, sexy, flowing nightgown that had an empire waist and a real deep V to show off my cleavage. I had nice cleavage, and so I wanted to show that off. It was in green. And green really doesn't look good on me, but green is my lucky color. [audience chuckle] So, I thought I'd better go with that.

 

But to tell you the truth, I really didn't even think I needed luck. I mean, it was going along so well. In fact, it was going along too well. I started thinking, “Oh, my God, something's going to go wrong.” You know how that is. The Catholic schoolgirl showed up and going, “Oh, Tina, this is going to blow up in your face, girl. This is going along too well, you know it's going to be the biggest mess in history. It's just going to-- ". And I said, “Yo, shut up. Shut up. I just brushed off. Shut up. Shut up.” And I talked to myself and I said, “Stick to the plan, girl. Stick to the plan. [audience laughter] Don't get cocky. Don't get cocky. Stick to the plan.”

 

And then it was the day, and he drove me home the way he always did. I invited him in the way I often did. And he came in, and I made some coffee like I always did. And we sat on the sofa, and I, of course, sat close to him. And we're sitting there talking about movies or the news or something, and I just leaned in and just gave it to him. I mean, a real wet, juicy kiss. Just all into it. He was shocked. He didn't even see it coming. He was shocked, but I didn't give him time to recoup. I just jumped him. [audience laughter] I swear, I just jumped him, you know? And he was really shocked now, but he was on board, okay? [cheers and applause]

 

And so I led him to the bedroom, and at the appropriate moment, I slipped out into the bathroom and I put on my long, sexy gown and I put my hair up and I looked in the mirror. I looked myself dead in the eye, and I said, “Girl, Tina, you're really going to do this, huh? You are really going to do this.” And I did. [audience laughter] And it was good. In fact, it was great. It was wonderful. You know, this man knew his way around a woman's body, and I let him do it a few times. It was just really, really fantastic. [cheers and applause] Thank you. It was. It was really wonderful. 

 

And so, it was interesting because I just took one with myself because there wasn't any awkwardness, and there wasn't any uncomfortable kind of thing. He didn't scream some insincere “I love you” at some inappropriate time because we really didn't love each other like that. We felt warm for each other. We respected each other. We liked each other, and that's where we were. It wasn't about that kind of love. It was about really caring for each other, me choosing him. And so, we got up the next morning, did it some more, [audience chuckle] and then we got dressed, and we didn't have to go to work until the afternoon.

 

And so, I was going to go shopping downtown, and he said he’d dropped me off, and so I got out of the car and just a little kiss, and he kind of chuckled and laughed. He was kind of thrilled with himself, too and he kind of laughed and he drove off. And I watched him drive off and I thought, “Well, that's perfect. He's driving off into his life” and I turn to walk up the street, and I was feeling good. And I'm walking up the street, and I look in the store glass, and I saw this woman. And she's walking along, and, I mean, she is strutting. You hear me? Her shoulders are back, and she is just--. And I looked at her and I said, “Girl, you going on. Look at--". Oh, my God, it was me. I was strutting up the street I was a grown woman strutting up the street. I was having sex. I was in charge of it on my own turf, in my own way. I was like the women who rock Broadway with big butts. That's how I felt. And then it came to me. Not only was I a grown woman having sex in my own way, my own choice, but like the people down at the place, I had a story, and it was a juicy one, too.