Category Archives: Uncategorized

What you discover may surprise you. Welcome to The Place of No Hope. I will be your tour guide for our time together. What you experience on your visit may surprise you. You may think that you know what awaits you, but you do not. Not unless you have been here before. First, take aContinue reading “The Place of No Hope”

Fifty-two years is a lot of unfinished business. This post is drawn from parts of my memoir, From Where I Stand, a story of love that crosses time and race. In this excerpt, William Lucas and I meet again for the first time in five decades. William and I plan to meet on April 1, 2022. AprilContinue reading “April Fools”

One of the Black singers said, “You know, it’s curious, but none of the white people I’ve ever met have ancestors who owned slaves….” We stood outside Riverside Church in New York City after morning worship, a group of white and Black singers, all of us members of the Riverside Church Choir in the lateContinue reading “Reckoning with Nehemiah”

In December 1969, Ridgecrest Baptist Church, the church my father had pastored for nine months, voted to dismiss him, 27-11. The night before, buckshot had ripped through the middle of a party in the parsonage, narrowly missing friends of mine, both Black and white. Ridgecrest fired my dad because he refused first to cancel theContinue reading “Beyond the Reach of Resurrection”

Bringing people together has always been a dangerous proposition. The man in the black and white photograph is looking to his right. The camera captures him from below, emphasizing his stature. His right hand is extended, the long fingers spread wide. Caught mid-speech, mid-sentence, mid-thought, he is intent on what he is saying. His narrowContinue reading “Dangerous Proposition”

In honor of my mother for Mother’s Day, 2026. The photo is black and white, but I remember the deep wine red of the couch. I used to run my small fingers along the raised design of roses and leaves, tendrils and vines. But in this photo, my mother is a newlywed, and I wouldContinue reading “My Mother’s House (revisited)”

“An integrated party? In the Harricans?!“ When his daughter Bettie told him that a white friend at school had invited her to a party out in the Harricans, Mr. Oney Edwards peered at her with a look that ran the gamut of incredulity. The “Harricans” was a region out to the west of the smallContinue reading ““You going to that party?””

What follows is an excerpt from my memoir From Where I Stand, a love story across time and race.  The place is Wake Forest, North Carolina. The time is summer of 2021. The windows are down, the AC is off. The July day is hot, but not humid. The Carolina Chocolate Drops are wailing onContinue reading ““They remember.””

This post is an excerpt from my memoir From Where I Stand, a story of love across time and race. The place is six miles to the west of Wake Forest, North Carolina. The time is 1968-1969. In 1971, Wake County schools were mandated to be fully desegregated. The story follows on the heels of myContinue reading ““…a few miles up the road.””

This post is an excerpt from my memoir From Where I Stand, a story of love across time and race. The place is Wake Forest, North Carolina, a small town of about 4,000 people. The time is 1967-1968, about three years before the total desegregation of Wake County schools. Beginning in the late 1950s, my fatherContinue reading “Goddess of Discord”