Black Sheep
I used to think that was just the character of a quaint little nursery rhyme I learned as a kid. Ya know…baa baa black sheep have you any wool, yes sir yes sir three bags full. One for the master and one for the dame, one for the something something who lives down the lane. I was in for a rude awakening though.
My first experience with racism was before I was born and it’s something I encounter almost daily now. Growing up as the only mixed child (until my brothers came along) in a family full of white people, most of whom were (and still are) bigots is something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. When yours is the darkest skin in the room it’s hard to fit in for sure. It’s even harder to feel safe though. I learned at a very young age it’s not safe to be your authentic self.
I’d like to say to you that only the color of my skin made me stand out from the crowd. I’d also like to say I’m a millionaire but it’s not polite to lie. I learned that I was the literal and figurative black sheep of my family before I even really knew what that meant.
Allow me to digress a bit…only my sister and I hold degrees even though all of my siblings graduated from high school or got their GED’s. Before us, the next person to graduate from college was Uncle Lenny. Before him it was my grandfather. Most of my mom’s side of the family are uneducated. Please understand that this does not mean ignorant. You can in fact be one or the other and sometimes some very well educated people are also ignorant but I’m not sure we’re ready for that conversation yet. At any rate…
Along comes me…fist I don’t look like anyone else in the family really (though I did get my grandfather’s dimples which have now become a legacy) and truth be told I didn’t much behave like them either. At 17, I had my own apartment and decided to join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My former Pentecostal preacher of a grandfather was disgusted. I remember him asking my mom why she had “let me join that cult” and everything. This however isn’t a religion post so we’re gonna table the religion discussion and may revisit it later.
I’m 17, I’m Black, I’m LDS, I’m not pregnant and I’m still in high school. I am also now painfully aware of how much of an outcast I am in my own family. The only family I’ve ever known. Talk about setting the stage for an identity crisis man. To top if off, one of the jokes my mom always told is how I wasn’t really her child because according to hospital records I was released 3 days before she was. I used to pray my real parents would come find me…they never did because despite what hospital records said I was in fact part of this family…at least when it came to DNA anyway.
By 17 I felt like a scapegoat if nothing else. I was a mess and my family had made me that way. I didn’t know what to do with myself; I did a little bit of everything save drugs and alcohol. Nothing had ever happened to me that was good after someone drank or got high and I was too big of a control freak to take those risks.
One night, while sitting at the Ira Keller Fountains in Portland, Oregon, it all came to the surface. It erupted like St. Helens had when I was 6 and I was no kind of ready. I had no idea who I was, I didn’t feel safe being any version of myself and was convinced everyone I knew and loved would be better off without me. A sadness overwhelmed me unlike anything I had ever experienced and in that moment, and several of the moments that followed, I didn’t think life was worth living. Wait let me be more precise…I didn’t think I was worth living.
More than 30 years later, I can still see myself sitting at the fountain that night. I can still feel the sadness. Hell I can even still remember what I was wearing.
In my family of origin I didn’t see myself physically represented in any of my aunts, uncles, cousins, grands, or even my own mom. It doesn’t end there though…I remember hearing how I couldn’t be a “true Smith” because I didn’t like mustard, rabbit food (aka salad and most vegetables), science, math, beer, and the like. With no point of reference for my father’s side of the family I had no idea whether or not these traits that made it so I couldn’t be a “true Smith” did in fact make me more of a Green or not. So…I created my own narrative. I mean surely it HAD to be the Green side of me that hated mustard loved literature, reading, music and art right?
Imagine the identity crisis present when you’re the literal and figurative black sheep of your entire family. I’m in my 51st trip around the sun and haven’t even been secure in my identity for a decade. Sometimes I find myself wishing black sheep still existed only in nursery rhymes.
Originally published June 17th, 2020 and updated today.