THOUGHTS ABOUT MISSED MOMENTS OF LIFE

THOUGHTS ABOUT MISSED MOMENTS OF BLACK-LIFE – millions of lives billions of moments This thought has come to me in many forms so I’ll attempt to give it coherence in this post. What I want to focus on is those moments missed while struggling to stay alive. The American government has robbed black folk of more than their labor pride heritage culture freewill family-hood spirituality and self but has also prevented them from experiencing those moments that could have enriched and given purpose to their lives. Following my four years plus of service in the Marine Corp my Father arranged for me to be hired at a large steel manufacturing company in Milwaukee, a company he would retire from after more than thirty years. I’d never been inside dad’s workplace while growing up and it was fascinating to me. Starting out I was a GOFOR, you know, go for this go for that. I worked my way up to assistant press operator; huge machine as tall as a three story building that shaped steel into frames for trucks automobiles and farm equipment – including siloes; during WW-II the company manufactured bombs tanks and other war material. I went to the company’s welding school to learn rod and gas for line work. Line welding is a blend of humans and machines producing parts at a high rate of speed – this is piecework: more parts meant more money. Each person on the line pushes the other to go faster. Repetition gave me and the other workers rote memory – meaning we didn’t have to use a lot of brain power to do the job. That was particularly true of me. I planned my development and that of my family while working on that line. Now I’ll give a morbid twist to my story. A slaver sells me to the company, the company puts me to work on the line for no money, the company hires a driver with a whip whose job is to make me produce lots of parts all day every day into the night, the company allows me to stay in a shack with my wife and kids but the company attends to their needs – they look to the company for everything. I can’t protect my family, I can’t buy my kids candy, I can’t give my wife flowers, I can’t have time for romance, I can’t walk in a park, watch the leaves fall, watch a sunset, speak my mind, I can’t choose to live and at the same time stay alive. We owe it to our ancestors to mend our broken lives – to heal the pathology (sickness) that still plagues us. www.adolphusward.net