Anthony Brinkley - Residual Effects

 

I grew up in Tulsa, Oklahoma, embraced in a loving environment that, fortunately for me, was all Black. See, back then, we still had the mindset that created what became known as the Black Wall Street before it was destroyed by an angry white mob. In the schools, the local stores, and movie theaters all were run and patronized by Black people. My neighborhood then was like an extended family unit, because if you did something wrong around the corner, Mrs. Johnson would make sure the news reached home before you did. [audience laughter] If the homes down the street told you to do something, you just said, "Yes, sir," and did it. 

 

Now, my parents divorced when I was young. I rarely saw my father afterwards. But I was fortunate to have my grandfather, Robert Ross. A tall, lean, muscled man with a strong sense of right and wrong and a strict yet gentle guiding hand. My granddaddy liked to drop little nuggets of wisdom that didn't really hit home till I got older. Like, "You can pick your friends, but your family is just stuck with them." [audience laughter] 

 

Though whippings weren't off the table for him, he tended more to lecture when you did something wrong. He'd set me down in front of him, and push that old ball cap he liked to wear back and then begin in that slow, sonorous tone, killing me softly, [audience laughter] “Son, why you want to do your mother like this when you know you're wrong," eventually bringing tears to my eyes. I never thought of myself as disadvantaged, though I was well aware of Black and white differences, because our teachers would constantly exhort us that we had to be twice as good as a white guy to get the job and that education was the key to opening doors. 

 

When I was about 12 years old, my grandfather and I were coming from the white side of town where he worked as a night janitor. We'd made it to our side of town when the cops pulled us over. I became anxious when they made him get out of the truck, because he wasn't speeding or anything. Now, I couldn't hear what was said at first. But when things got loud, I opened the door and got out to hear them screaming at my grandfather, that he better answer them with sir. When he didn't, and I guess because of the defiance in his stance, they started hitting him with their sticks and didn't stop when he went down. 

 

I can still hear the sound of those clubs striking his flesh, his muffled [grunts] as he refused to cry out. I stood there watching helplessly as they kept hitting him and hitting him and hitting him with tears in my eyes, praying, "Please God, please make them stop." They finally did, leaving him bloody, battered but alive. I prayed as I ran to him, "Please God, don't let them kill my granddaddy." I touched his still body, relieved to hear him moan, then watched angrily as the cops sauntered back to their cars like it was no big deal. One of them, before getting in, turned and blew me a kiss. I will never forget that smirk on his face.

 

It was the mid-1960s. And that day, my ambivalence toward white people morphed into a near hatred. And later, when I began reading Malcolm X, he became my compass. And my motto was, "I ain't going to start nothing, but I will end it if you put your hands on me." 

 

After high school, I joined the Air Force to see the world, and also because the GI Bill would help pay for my education. My first assignment after training was working on fighter aircraft at Osan Air Force Base in South Korea. Man, I loved being in Korea, absorbing bits of a completely foreign way of life, how the people in the countryside were so warm and welcoming to what was probably for them the first Black guy they'd ever seen in real life. But I was culture shocked on the base where for the first time ever, I was surrounded by white people. 

 

The only other Black guy in electronics worked way at the other end of the building. I didn't know how to approach this situation, because my interactions with whites had never been comforting. And here I was plopped into this fishbowl where everywhere I went, everything I said or did, I stood out. I was the Black guy. It didn't help that I had to deal with Staff Sergeant Jablonski. Stocky, stern, blue eyes icy with disdain as he regarded me with folded arms and a stare, leaving no doubt that my race was a no-go for him.

 

When we had a disagreement about a way to solve a problem with our systems and mine turned out to be the correct one, it did not improve his attitude toward me. Our shop commander, Tech Sergeant Denny, seemed well aware of Jablonski's biases, for he made sure that he was never paired with me for on-the-job training. Tech Sergeant Denny, he was an older white guy who loved to laugh and crack jokes, but was also a stickler for the rules. And his first one was, "Do your job." I had no problem doing the job. It was just on the job that I felt so other. They had never heard of Curtis Mayfield, and I didn't know who the hell Uriah Heep was. [audience laughter] 

 

But the thing is, we tried. I was able to start relaxing and even developed a bit of camaraderie with some of them, especially Grimaldi, with whom I shared a kindred spirit. We both loved to debate without being stubborn about our positions. Plus, dude was one of the nicest guys I've ever met. 

 

One day, a group of us decided to take a hike into the countryside to spend the night. We sat on a hilltop smoking weed. Let me tell you, back then, for $5, you could get a whole gallon bag of killer. [audience laughter] We sat on a hilltop smoking weed, shooting the breeze, discussing the meaning of life, when suddenly this hauntingly lyrical sound that we'd never heard before drifted up to us. We all froze as we saw this procession of candlelights revealing men dressed like monks with shaved heads and long robes winding towards us, then passing us. It was like this beautiful, surreal movie unfolding before us as a sound played on, an instrument we couldn't see repeatedly washed over us. Then the last light disappeared and we all breathed out, "Wow." 

 

I reflected on the experience the next day. I mean, there were two Black guys and four white guys on a hilltop in Korea, experiencing a moment akin to Malcolm's revelation when he traveled to Mecca and found himself spiritually joined with Black and white and brown people on a religious high. Now, granted, we were experiencing a high of a different sort, [audience laughter] but still, that moment reinforced that we were all Black and white Americans sharing the same gift.

 

] Later, almost a year into my tour in Korea, it was my turn to be on standby on the base, just in case there was a problem with our systems. It wasn't really my turn, but the guy in front of me was sick, so the task fell to me. The problem was I'd already planned a date for that night. So, after pacing and fretting for a bit, the young and dumb in me decided leaving and going downtown would be no big deal, because nothing ever happens at night, right? 

 

Early the next morning, I was confronted with the error of my ways. Ray Pride, the other Black guy in electronics, banged on the door while I was staying downtown and told me that a base alert had been sounded while I was supposed to be on standby. That was my flirting with danger then falling over the cliff moment, and I knew that common military expression applied. I was in deep dodo. Ray shook his head as he drove me to the base, "Man, I don't know what you can tell them, but you better find something." 

 

I can't remember what I was going to say to my shop commander. But when I got there and saw Jablonski of all people standing there deliberately planting on my path to the office, gloating with that smirk, the same smirk I'd seen on that police officer's face that night, all thoughts of humble power burned away. And F these white people was the only thought in my head as I marched into Sergeant Denny's office not giving a damn and stood at angry attention.

 

Sergeant Denny sat behind his desk with his back to me facing the wall, then slowly turned, giving me with a wave of his hand an at-ease signal. But when he saw the anger radiating from me, I could see the perplexity on his face. It seemed like a transition occurred within him. I like to think that the spirit of my grandfather entered the room, for instead of reaming me out for desertion, he sat back, then began speaking in a familiar tone. "Brinkley, why are you standing in my office giving me an attitude when you know you're wrong?" His words triggered memories that superimposed my grandfather's voice and big hands on the head, and made me think of how the one man I knew loved me would be so disappointed in my actions.

 

Sergeant Denny said a lot of other things, but it was his grandfather-like demeanor that completely disarmed me and brought tears to my eyes as he spoke on and on and my shoulders slumped in guilt. He ended up giving me a punishment far below that which my desertion warranted, which when word got out, really pissed Jablonski off. [audience laughter] You could have probably fried an egg on his bald ass head. [audience laughter] But I was so shocked that an older white guy would give me that kind of break that I didn't even react to Jablonski. 

 

That moment with Sergeant Denny added glue to my budding resolve to just let people's actions show me who they are and to try not to make ready judgments based on race. I left Korea far different from the guy about whom my sister would always say, "My brother won't even wear white T-shirts." [audience laughter] I have since experienced racial slights in liberal bastions like Massachusetts and California. 

 

I've known openness and acceptance in the double-syllable "hi" from a Southern belle in Greenville, South Carolina, and a big warm bear hug from a gruff-looking red-headed biker in Texas who fixed my car and just said, "This one's on me, buddy," [audience laughter] which reminds me of another of my granddaddy's golden nuggets that shone only after I'd added mileage to my lifeline, when he said, "Son, some books look a whole lot different when you open them up and turn the pages. Read before you judge." Thank you.