Civil Movement

My early childhood memories mostly revolve around being dirt poor and all the experiences that can take place with being one of four children raised by a young, single mother who had to work full time. We often lived in dumps in neighborhoods composed of other families who lived in dumps. As was often the case in Mobile, Ala., many of those families were black.

My three sisters were my earliest friends. They were who I played with most often. I didn't spend a great deal of time outside, but I would spend hours inside playing house and listening to records with my siblings. It wasn't until I began preschool that I had my first real interactions with other children.

The day care my little sister and I were to attend was not too far from our house. I remember the brick building surrounded by a chain-link fence with bushes inside the fence. There was a large field next to the building. Kickball games were played there.

One other thing about the place: My sister and I were the only white people there.

On our first day at the day care, we were greeted by the smile and open arms of a very large black woman. The two of us were also greeted by the stares of about 30 black children. We were the clear minority, and even though my two-year-old sister and I didn't realize it at the time, we were the pioneers of a two-person movement to integrate the once-all-black day care.

There was no coverage in the local or national media of our daring display of bravery in our desire to be equally read children's books to during story time. No uplifting church pulpit speeches to support us in our quest to play with the same blocks once reserved only for black children. Gov. George Wallace was not there to keep us from playing on the playground slides.

Would we be served snacks or lunch? Or would my sister and I, like two stray marks on a blackboard, be erased? Would we be allowed to sit at a table with other kids during lunch? Or would we be directed to the section of the day care reserved for whites?

My sister was taken away and sat in a 'whites only' high chair and a plate of food was placed before her. With the courage of someone well beyond her two years, she ate her lunch. I, on the other hand, stood in a line where I was given a warm plate that was quickly taken away from me by a different smiling large black woman. Just as I expected: I was not to be fed here.

A moment later, the plate, now full of hot pinto beans, greens and some kind of meat, was given back to me. The same woman then held up two pint-size cartons of milk and said, "White or chocolate?"

I found her joke to be in bad taste and cruel. Still, I knew I would have to learn to fit in if I was to survive, so I asked for the chocolate milk.

I sat and quietly ate my lunch at a table with other children. They talked, joked and acted up with each other, but I could feel their eyes on me. I knew I wouldn't sleep during nap time — too afraid to close my eyes.

Outside time brought with it a new kind of fear, so I chose to stand close to the teachers, who seemed to feel sorry for me. I was relieved when my mother arrived to take us back to our dumpy home.

During the following weeks and months, my sister and I learned the system and found ways to fit in. I was unusually strong and would impress the other boys with my arm wrestling prowess. My sister was just cute and had soft hair.

I developed crushes on some of the girls there and courted them with brave acts of silliness. I was always chosen last to play kickball and was sometimes picked on, perhaps because of my being white, or possibly because my hair was too long and I was wearing my older sisters' hand-me-downs.

Things changed for me and my sister at Christmas. The day care was putting on a Christmas pageant and recreating the story of Christ's birth. I couldn't act and my singing was terrible, so I got to stand with the parents and sing "Silent Night, Holy Night." My sister, though, landed the part of an angel.

On the night of the pageant, the day care was packed full with the families of my schoolmates. Like many of my fellow students, I had been looking forward to the performance. Despite my musical deficiencies, I had fantasized that my voice, and not my color, somehow would set me apart from the other children. The comfort I'd hope to gain by having my two other sisters and mother there with me was quickly lost in the ever-growing number of black relatives flowing through the doors to see the play. I hadn't considered how much more out numbered we would be.
I then began to wonder how I would be treated by the friends I had made at the day care. Would they act the same way they now did at school, or would they ignore me, afraid to admit to their parents that they have a friend who is white.
What would their parents, grandparents and other siblings think when they saw a small tribe of whites at their joyous Christmas ceremony, which had probably enjoyed years of performances without scandal, least of all the integration of the pre school their children attend.
Maybe they thought our car broke down outside and we were just coming in to use the phone to call for someone to come get us. Maybe we were lost and came in to ask for directions. No matter what scenario was imagined, the underlying theme was that we were in the wrong place.
As the program began, I took my place among the parents and at the moment when the three wise men approached Joseph, Mary and the manger, I sang the parts of "Silent Night" that I could remember. The angels filed in and took their places in front of the Nativity scene.

Jesus was completely upstaged. My little sister, dressed in a white gown with paper wings and an aluminum-foil halo, stood in the middle of the row of angels, looking and smiling at all of the families. The teachers glowed with pride as the other parents smiled back at the seemingly out of place child.
When the program was finished the audience erupted into appplause and whistles. As the angels tottered off the stage, the same large, black woman who greeted me and my sister on our first day at the day care, scooped up the lone white angel and carried her around the room. "They're all angels," she said loudly, "But you're our first white angel!" With that, for the rest of night, my sisters, mother and I were novelties, pulled around and introduced to parents, grandparents and brothers and sisters. Everyone wanted to hold my sister, who, still in her angel costume, was passed from person to person, her little blonde head lolling around like a fishing bobber in the middle of a lake.

In the weeks that followed the Christmas pageant, another white family brought their children to the day care. Then another. Things were changing because my sister and I didn't wait for the masses.