Skip to main content

Prince Brought Out The Florida Evans In Me

We didn't watch a lot of Good Times in the 1970's because my mom didn't approve of the way it portrayed black families as poor, uneducated and living in substandard housing.


But for whatever reason, we did watch the episode when James Evans, the family patriarch, died.

His wife Florida, true to the strong black woman trope, unflinchingly carried on with life. No tears, only work and shouldering the burden of children in mourning over the loss of their father.

Until...until she broke. She broke not in tears, but in anger.

I was too young to understand the many layers of Florida's anger bursting through the screen that night, but I could feel it; and I can still feel it even now, some forty-odd years later.

Today, I felt Florida's anger when I heard that Prince died. It came to me as an overheard byline while I was about to scoop up the salad I brought for lunch.

Internally, I broke down like Florida:

damn!!!
"Damn, Damn, Damn!!"

But I swallowed it back, and for the rest of the day, I was irritated and stumbling for a reasonable explanation why I was angry over a stranger's death, untimely and unexpected as it was.

The reason hit me in waves as I listened to streamed coverage of his death, his music and celebs interviewed for reaction: his music served as ties that bound me to a different place in my life's arc -- whether or not I realized it then -- that are slowly, but surely being erased.

I saw Purple Rain at Capitol Court Theater. Back then the Capitol Court complex was the place to be. Now, it's just a shadow that hovers in one of the ZIP codes with a high poverty rate. Now, if you're a certain age, you don't even remember Capitol Court because it's been renamed.
It's gone.


Then there was the song Purple Rain. I never understood what it was talking about, and it was always kind of a sleepy song in my head. Yet, when I hear it now, I remember my mom loving it. Outside of Bohemian Rhapsody (because chorale, and she loved chorale) and the video for Atomic Dog (I don't understand it either), there were no pop songs she liked.
But mom's gone too.

And then there's Let's Go Crazy. If I close my eyes, I can still see myself in stocking feet, lashes caked in electric blue mascara under dimmed lights and dancing like a maniac to it with Jenny and John at one of the junior year sock-hops. I didn't have a clue that life's downs (and ups) would knock on my door in as little as eighteen months later.
That invincible feeling: gone like Capitol Court and gone like my mom.

The feelings that whispered security and invincibility to me are slowly fading one by one; but I guess there's something in remembering what they felt like and that they were even there to begin with.

But still: Damn, Damn Damn!!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

What 6 Christmas Songs Got Wrong

After Thanksgiving, a birthday party last week, another birthday party this week and Christmas coming up next week, I am officially overwhelmed. It'd take more time than I have to explain what yet needs to be done and if you're like me, you're probably overwhelmed and don't have the time nor inclination to read it all anyway. But even with an overflowing plate, I still love the Christmas season -- from setting up the Christmas tree that we got two weeks ago and decorated only yesterday, to lighting bayberry scented candles, to every Rankin & Bass Christmas Special, and the music. Oh, the music. Songs have a way of putting you in the Christmas spirit, warming your heart and next thing you know, you're hugging a stranger in the elevator. Okay, um...maybe that's just me. But alas, all songs are not created equal; and the following Christmas songs inspire and awaken anything but peace on earth and goodwill to men. 1. Christmas Shoes : This song makes my

Racism & Prejudice: Brothas from a Different Mother

Next week I’m attending  a seminar on defining racism. Should be interesting because: 1) I’ve been living in the skin I’m in for nearly 43 years and I’d like to hear about any advancements on the topic; and 2) back in college, some class I took defined racism as movement, advancement or otherwise being prevented and/or restricted based upon race .  Embedded in the definition was that racism took two parties – someone in power (the racist) and someone whose rights were being violated. So according to that definition, racism is an action , not an attitude . One is a disabling trespass while the other is prejudice . I tend to agree. It’s my belief that Martin Luther King and the thousands of civil rights fighters stood up against racism . They stood up against actions that prevented people from the pursuit of happiness – whether that meant voting, drinking from a common bubbler, or not ending up as Strange Fruit on a Poplar tree when all they wanted to do was get from P

The Moments That Are Given

Mom! It’s graffiti! It’s art... on a shoe ! I have to try it on. Please...can I? It was my 12 year old’s first foray into heels. A big moment in our little lives. Working full-time when she was an infant had stolen other big-little moments from my camera’s eye -- the first time she rolled over, the first time she sat up unassisted...the first firsts. Newly, gladly and willfully unemployed for the first time in 15 years, I took a picture. The picture wasn’t as much of an attempt to catch up on lost firsts, but rather a net to capture a butterfly’s moment of the moment; because if history skips a generation and the math holds out, there are more years behind me than ahead. My mom died at 63. Her mom died at 47. I’m 46. I’ve checked all over my person for a stamped expiration date, from the flabby inside parts of my arms, to the backs of my knees and other parts of my anatomy that shall remain nameless here.  There is no such date. Yet, there is a possibil