What's on the Mind of the Easterbaby?

If you want to irritate, alienate, frustrate, and aggravate me INSTANTLY, all you have to do is bring up the fact that other races had slaves or that Africans sold other Africans into slavery. 😡 And if I wasn't a woman who was trying to get into heaven, I would probably respond with "WTF does that have to do with MY ANCESTORS and chattel slavery, beatings, rape, brutality, murders, injustice, separation on families that occurred once enslaved Africans were brought to this country???" So please don't say that to me, ok? Ok! I'm heaven-bound. I don't know why this part of history pricks at my soul so much. I definitely get why many African Americans say they get tired of slave movies and movies that capitalize on Black trauma. But this is the part of the story that has been skipped. In school, it went from Emancipation to Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement. For years, I heard my mom talk about Jim Crow and I thought it was a person not a set ...

Lots of talk now about the Constitution and will it survive this current administration. Those joining the US Military, as well as Federal Employees take an oath to uphold the Constitution. It's been a while since I've read the whole thing (yes I've read it b/c I'm a READER and I needed to know what I was upholding). At that time, I had not watch the Documentary directed by Ava DuVernay entitled, 13th. If you haven't watched it, I suggest you do. This documentary gives a whole history behind the 13th Amendment to the Constitution and the impact to African Americans long after it abolished slavery... Or DID IT? 😐 Slavery did not end with the Emancipation Proclamation, issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863. The Emancipation Proclamation freed only slaves held in the eleven Confederate states that had seceded, and only in the portion of those states not already under Union control. The abolition of slavery was achieved when the Thirteenth Amendment w...

Somewhere in this picture is my maternal relative, Benjamin Walker. He served in the 135th Regiment of the US Colored Troops for the Union Army. His company was formed out of Goldsboro, NC. The regiment included nearly 1,200 men, whose occupations included, among others, farmer, laborer and shoemaker. Benjamin Walker was a farmer. Accustomed to hard work, they helped build roads out of wooden timbers through swamps and built bridges over rivers and creeks. The journey of the 135th took them to Washington, D.C., where they were the only colored troops to march in the famous Grand Review. The regiment continued its service and mustered out in Louisville, Ky. They were among nearly a quarter of a million black men who served in the Union army. MY ANCESTOR - MY HISTORY - I WILL NOT LET IT BE ERASED!  Black soldiers fought in the Revolutionary War and—unofficially—in the War of 1812, but state militias had excluded African Americans since 1792. The U.S. Ar...

Anyone who knows me, even a little bit, knows I love birthdays! I especially love MY BIRTHDAY. I mean this blog is named in commemoration of my birth date which was an Easter Sunday Morning in the great state of NC! I actually consider my birthday a Holiday which means I do not work on that day. If My Holiday falls on a Saturday, I take off that Friday. If it falls on a Sunday, I take off that Monday. Am I being over the top... maybe, maybe not, who's to say? I see it as one more year God has granted me to fulfil His purpose for my life. Also born in NC and on this day in 1933, was Ms. Nina Simone who lived a life fulfilling her purpose - to use music to speak to and empower her generation (a civil rights generation) by reminding them, they were Young, Gifted, & Black! HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the late NINA SIMONE!  Eunice Kathleen Waymon (1933 – 2003), known professionally as Nina Simone, was an American singer, songwriter, pianist, arranger, and activist in the civil rights movement...

Age 15 is kind of a weird age. You're definitely a teenager but you can't drive yet outside of a permit and can't work. A lot of parents say, you can't date until you're 16.  You're in high school but not quite old enough to feel fully high school-ish b/c you still need your folks to take you where you need to go. LOL! Probably why nothing I did at 15 really sticks out in my memory except a few things. One core memory is from when I was 15, me and my cousin, Danielle (aka BG) were home from school and like most youngsters, we were HUNGRY. So we decided of all things, to boil some eggs... IN THE MICROWAVE! Now there are a lot of things you can do in life, but please don't ever in your life... DO THAT. Egg Everywhere! Egg Funk Smell Everywhere! Sad this is a core memory for me. I wish I had a more noble memory at age 15 such as being a 15 year old civil rights activist, like Claudette Colvin. ✊ Claudette Colvin is a civil rights activist who, nine months befor...

  Imagine being six years old and so oblivious to the hate around you that you thought the folks gathered to hurl insults at you was a Madi Gras parade. Or better yet, imagine being the adult standing there threatening a little girl to the point that she needed federal escorts just because her parents wanted her to receive an equal education. I can't imagine that. But I can testify that I've been a little girl who's neighbors wouldn't let their daughter play with her because I was black. Not play with me??? As cute and sweet as I was (I might still be cute and sweet...maybe... who knows 😁) But can you imagine that? I can because it happened.  Ruby Nell Bridges Hall (1954 - ) is an American activist known for being the first black child to desegregate the all-white William Frantz Elementary School in Louisiana during the New Orleans school desegregation crisis in 1960. Born in Tylertown, MS, to Abon and Lucille Bridges, Ruby was born the same year that the Supreme Cour...

I was about 27 years old when I flew in an airplane for the first time on my way to a job interview. When I approached the gate to board, I burst into tears! LOL! The gate agent comforted me and said it's going to be ok. I made it through that but I promised myself I didn't want any job where I had to travel. Lo and behold, I didn't get that job but I did take a job that was 50% travel. Never say never! During that time, there was no GPS, only MapQuest. I remember traveling to various cites, navigating unknown streets in my rental car & flipping through pages of my MapQuest printouts! I am pretty sure doing that is the equivalent of texting and driving in terms of distracted driving.  The good ol' days... NOT! Today, there are no MapQuest printouts, thanks to Dr. Gladys West & the Global Positioning System (GPS). If you weren't aware, GPS was around long before MapQuest, it just wasn't available for public consumption yet. But aren't you glad it is n...

Representation matters! As a little black girl in the 70s, most of my dolls were white. My favorite doll was the Drowsy Doll. You pull her string and she said, "I'm Sleepy". She probably said some other things but that's all I remember. One thing I definitely remember is that I tried to color her little white plastic skin. Drowsy looked a mess before all was said and done. Now you're probably thinking, I tried to color her black or brown. Those colors were there but Drowsy ended up with a lot of colors on her face. I guess I embraced DIVERSITY before I knew I should. As I got older, I began to appreciate having black dolls, seeing black people in entertainment, and learning about Shirley Chisholm! A Black Woman ran for the office of President...OH BOY! That was pretty cool! Well we know how the story goes, Shirley was the first but she wasn't the last. On Presidents Day, thank you Shirley for bringing that folding chair to the table!  In 1968, Shirley Chisholm...

I have always had a low tolerance for pain which is probably why I changed my mind about getting a tattoo. Years ago when I was in my early 20s, I thought about it until I went with a friend to get his. I saw blood I was like, No Thanks! I would never purposely do anything to cause myself pain or discomfort, not then and not now. I don't even eat hot wings b/c why would I want to purposely set my mouth on fire? 😬🔥 As I have gotten older, pain, chronic pain, is part of my every day life. I live with it but I don't like it. So as I learned about how the physicians believed that the slaves, especially women, didn't feel pain, I knew that was nothing but a lie from the pits of hell! Warning: This is one of those hard to read posts, but I believe it will give us all an appreciation for why black women continue fighting so hard to get equity in health care.  During the 18th through early 20th centuries, white physicians studied black slaves and their descendants in an attempt t...

Presidents' Day is Monday, Feb 17 and for me, it means a day off. If it weren't for having a day off, I really wouldn't know when Presidents' Day was if it weren't for the advertised Presidents' Day Sales. LOL! It began as a celebration of two of the most famous Presidents in this Nation's History, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. As a result of being the 1st and most famous, our Nation's Capital is named Washington, DC, home of the White House, the Capital Building, the Smithsonians, and Mount Vernon which was the home of George. Now who do you think built these historic landmarks? It wasn't George, you can believe that. No, these landmarks were built by slaves. Knowing this, how can anyone even consider discounting or erasing how slavery impacted this nation. Our very Capital has the handprints of the enslaved people and in the grand scheme of things, that's only a small part. Our blood, sweat, and tears are FOUNDATIONAL to everything thi...

Not sure where it started by it is implied that Harriot Tubman would've shot slaves that didn't want to be free or tried to sabotage her mission. I searched and haven't seen a quote of her saying this, so it could be true or an urban legend. The fearless, gun toter that she was, she probably did say it or at least thought it. Harriot was driven and determined to be free or die trying. One of her documented quotes was, "I had reasoned this out in my mind, there was one of two things I had a right to, liberty or death; if I could not have one, I would have the other." Ol' Kilmonger had the same sentiment at the end of Black Panther. Of Harriet's quotes, I actually like this one, "If you hear the dogs, keep going. If you see the torches in the woods, keep going. If there's shouting after you, keep going. Don't ever stop. Keep going. If you want a taste of freedom, keep going". Keep Going Y'all, Keep Going!  The Underground Railroad was f...

Remember the movie, Django Unchained, staring Jamie Foxx. Everyone loved it especially b/c Jamie's character was able to get revenge on his captors and save his wife. While I'll admit it was good to see the bad guy get what was coming to him, I (and this is just me) felt like the movie is some ways was being presented as satirical & comical in standard Quentin Tarantino fashion. One scene that bugged me, was showing the slaves on the plantation swinging in swings looking blissfully happy like life was all good. Anyhoo, many folks loved the movie so I guess I was the only one bothered. So what was life like for enslaved people? From what I have learned over the years, it was like a movie alright... A HORROR MOVIE!  The plantation system developed in the American South as the British colonists arrived in Virginia and divided the land into large areas suitable for farming. Because the economy of the South depended on the cultivation of crops, the need for agricultural labor le...

Welcome to any first time visitors to my blog! Welcome back to those who've been here before! What we learned about slavery... ok maybe just me... was that slaves were made to pick cotton and then Abraham Lincoln freed us after the Civil War. But what we... ok maybe me.... didn't learn was what was life like for a slave . The movie Roots gave us glimpse but no way Alex Haley could tell the whole story. We're gonna learn what we can though... we're gonna learn.  Slave code, in U.S. history, any of the set of rules based on the concept that enslaved persons were property, not persons. Inherent in the institution of slavery were certain social controls, which enslavers amplified with laws to protect not only the property but also the property owner from the danger of slave violence. The slave codes were forerunners of the Black codes of the mid-19th century. Slaves did not accept their fate without protest. Many instances of rebellion were known to Americans, even in co...

Happy Black History Month! For those who followed me here from FB, I appreciate you. So if my historical posts aren't going to show up over there... I am going to make sure they are seen and read by whoever wants to see and read them. Yesterday on Day 10, we learned about The Middle Passage, the journey of the enslaved Africans to the Americas. Today's post is continues as we get 1st hand accounts of what Slave Auctions were like.  Once in the Americas, slaves were sold, by auction, to the person that bid the most money for them. It was here that family members would find themselves split up, as a bidder may not want to buy the whole family, only the strongest, healthiest member. Slave Auctions were advertised when it was known that a slave ship was due to arrive via posters displayed around the town. When the slave ship docked, the enslaved men, women, and children would be taken off the ship and placed in a pen. In the pen, they would be washed and their skin covered with gr...