A Smile to Remember, RIP Big Daddy

Posted on by serenitisparkles

Too often we never get the chance to say goodbye.

It all happened so fast. Like a lightning bolt that strikes down a beautiful palm. My best friend called me crying. Kenya got shot. Chills ran through my body and I remember feeling so helpless. I could hear her deep pain. And I understood why. Kenya aka Big Daddy was larger than life. He had a smile that made your heart melt. Kenya was like a teddy bear. He was there to help and never to harm. All I could remember thinking was WHO could be so evil.

My best friend told me he was on life support at a hospital about 20 mins away. She told me that the whole family was there. I dropped everything and went to be with them.

What would come next would stay with me forever.

When I got to the hospital I saw the family crowded by his bed side as my best friend walked out to tell me, he’s gone.

That day ended in pain and tragedy, but what it would bring was a sign of unity never seen before.

In order to tell this story properly, let me give you some background on my experience with my best friend, Kenya and the family that you won’t know if you are just reading this.

About 5 years before this tragic day, I moved to the south from New England. My white skin and love for Hip Hop music would make me an awkward fit at the time for this heavily separated town. When I first entered the high school lunch room it was obvious that most groups were separated by color or ethnicity rather than interests or life experiences.

I felt alone at the time because I related more to the black kids in the school because of Hip Hop culture, but I wasn’t necessarily accepted by them at first. Until I met my best friend, Kenya, and the family. They just truly saw ME. Me and my best friend became inseparable and Kenya’s smile became a reassurance that I was always good where ever I was in town. I was so blessed to have each and everyone of them in my life, especially Kenya. They were the definition of what family stood for. Always together, and I was always welcome.

I had come from a broken home and family that was separated by 1000 miles. My mother, whom I was living with at the time, was suffering from breast cancer, and I just remember feeling the embrace that I needed from all of them. It came right on time.

As the years passed on I saw Kenya grow up from a boy into a man. July 4th was the last day I got to spend with him. I remember there was a cookout at one of the family members houses and Kenya was the reason that July 4th was a hit for all of us. He brought hundreds of dollars worth of fireworks and began the show. We were outside for hours that day, basking in the beauty of the fireworks show that Kenya was putting on as he poured his energy into it. He was a bright light for all of us, and that day, he did his thing. Less than a month later, he was gone.

Hopelessness and sadness filled the family circle, but like always they stuck together. As the years would pass, his brother, sister and cousins would start an event for his birthday in his name. RIP Big Daddy. In the beginning, maybe a couple hundred would show up and celebrate and the police would always try to shut it down. Every year, more and more began to come. Like a fire igniting, it would continue to burn. Whether we realized it or not, Kenya’s energy lived far beyond his death.

This year, thousands would gather in the name of Big Daddy and Ending Gun Violence. The police that used to try and shut it down, would be forced to get behind the cause.

I don’t believe that our energy ever really leaves this earth and I believe that Kenya aka Big Daddy is proof of that.

I will always miss you, but your smile lives in my memory bank to remind me that life is worth smiling about. RIP Big Daddy.

Living on the “White” side of things

Posted on by serenitisparkles

No, I did not say living on the “right” side or that white had any other influence in my soul than the color of skin I was given.   Colors mean something because we have allowed them to separate us.   Groups, placed by the few powerful, to separate all of us from our greatest strength, ALL OF US.

My daughter inspired me to write this because she has been affected by this “group” she is associated with.  She is a half white, half Colombian little person just beginning to understand the barriers society has placed on us.

She came to me the other day and said, “Mommy, the worst thing anyone ever said to me was, white girl white girl white girl.”  She said it wasn’t because of what they said but how they said it.  The girls taunting her were young black girls in our neighborhood.

We lived in a neighborhood where she was the only white girl.  She and I believe in rich culture.  Money didn’t define us,  our relationships did.  We were poor, but making it through.  Like everyone else in the neighborhood.  We understood what it felt like to go with bread and eggs in our refrigerator because her father was not providing financial support.  We understood what it felt like to have to do laundry and walk a mile to get to the laundry mat just to save money on washing clothes.  But in the eyes of our peers, we were White.   My daughter looked up to those girls.  They were a part of her home.

I grew up, up north, in Rhode Island where everyone was blended and the beauty of mixing cultures was ever so prevalent.  My best friends were triplets mixed with Native American, Black, and White.  I moved to the south at 16 years old to live with my mother as my father had gone to federal prison.  I moved to a southern town, dated in its appearance to the time before the south had lost.  Every culture was there, yet separate.  Every cafeteria table was a different “group”.  I wasn’t raised to see the differences.  I was taught to embrace the similarities.

At that time, 16 years old, I was also poor and my mother was sick.  I didn’t want to live there, I didn’t want to go to that school.  I didn’t want to be “grouped” with others because of what they believed I represent.  I let music decide what I would do next.

I was very much into Hip Hop as I was a beat away from NYC where it was flourishing.  When I got to the south, I began to hear the sound of Trap Music and Caribbean vibes and fell in love.

From that moment on, I would stand in the culture and break the stereotype.  I would teach my daughter to learn people from the inside out.  Celebrate the beautiful differences and though many will only see you as the color of your skin, remember that we are more alike.  Not understanding each other is one thing, leading with blind prejudice is another.  Whether you are black, white, asian, or any other race, we shouldn’t judge each other by the one thing in life that we didn’t choose; the color of our skin.