The Counterpublic Papers vol. 5 no. 24

Twelve years ago this fall, I had an incident at the school of engineering. They had their fall reception out on their patio, and while drinking a pop on the patio after my first class, I had what the kids would now call a Patio Patty moment—the secretary of the department accosted me. When I asked to speak to her superior, he escalated it by calling security.

(I didn’t tell Patty I was a professor—I didn’t want to. I did tell her superior, only to have him tell me if I didn’t leave, he’d call security. I didn’t leave.)

I waited for them—even though it made me late for a therapy appointment—and when they came (two black security officers, one white one) I explained to them what happened. The white security officer was flabbergasted, the black ones less so (they knew exactly what had happened). When Patio Patty gave her report to one of the black officers, I heard her say “he started making furtive gestures and I felt threatened.”

(When I later told one of my former undergrads who’d become a public defender in NYC about patio patty’s report…she stopped me. “I know, I know. ‘Furtive gestures right?’” I didn’t even know that was a thing—I’d never even heard the term before.)

I ended up filing discrimination charges that went nowhere, because I was the only witness. I got an apology from the Dean of the School of Engineering and that was it.

(The black security officers who helped me are still at Hopkins and we speak to this day—in fact, earlier this year i found out that Patio Patty reported the officers to their superior saying that the officers gave me special treatment because I was black.)

Anyway.

A year or so later an editor from The Urbanite reached out to me, wanting me to write about “self-segregation”—about the practice of blacks (and other discriminated against groups) segregating themselves. I didn’t want to write that story.

I wrote instead about what happened to me. About how that dynamic often shapes the decision blacks and other groups make to live around black folk, to attend black churches, to join black organizations.

The Urbanite had a happy hour the first Tuesday of the month, right before their new issue came out. I got an invite when the issue I appeared in came out.

I went.

And didn’t stop.

….

Among the folk who also didn’t stop was a married couple maybe ten or so years older than I. I don’t remember the first time I talked to them, and it took me a long time before I even remembered their names. He was from Toledo. She was from Wisconsin. But they both claimed Brooklyn. She worked for Hopkins. He was retired, but was a writer/culture critic/grantsmaker/speech writer. We’d talk politics, sometimes music. And drink up all of their free wine.

(I’d usually do it wearing a fake name tag. Jack Sprat. Jonathan Sprat. Marc Steiner. Jésus. Jefferson Davis.)

I finally got around to remembering their names. Probably around 2011 or so, when the husband invited me to his wife’s birthday party. Might have been my first crab feast ever.

Don and Beth.

….

So one of Don and Beth’s things is cooking,

The day before Memorial Day, going back to around 1982 or so Don would have friends over for BBQ.

By the time Don had settled into Brooklyn, it’d become a thing. In fact, before Brooklyn became a thing, Don and Beth’s BBQ was a thing.

If you knew your way around a Village Voice column, a saxophone, a camera, a Billie Holiday solo, you were there.

When they moved here to Baltimore, the BBQ didn’t stop.

Don and Beth probably invited me the first year I’d met them. But my mind around Memorial Day was usually occupied by Detroit—which had one of the largest electronic music festivals in the world. And on top of that, I didn’t really eat meat like that. From 1989 until about 2005 or so I could count on my fingers the number of times I’d had red meat or pork. So BBQ’s weren’t important to me, unless my family was doing the cooking.

In 2012, I decided to go.

I didn’t know it was possible to fit that many people into a house.

And I didn’t know it was possible to barbecue that much food.

Hell. Some of the meat we ate I didn’t even think was legal.

So many people drove from Brooklyn some suggested we briefly change the zip code.

I didn’t know that a kitchen could become a soul train line.

It would go through the night. I remember leaving more than once at around 6am. After a while, I started bringing my kids and would have two shifts. The with kids shift, and then the after kids shift (when I would usually start drinking the rum punch). Even though I don’t BBQ that much I know my way around a grill. He’d have so many cooks and would be so proprietary, that instead of doing that, I’d cook Cinnabons (the best in the state)…which would be gone within an hour of me putting them on the piano.

(Yes, the piano. Folks would bring dishes and put them everywhere on the first floor except the kitchen sink.)

The day before Memorial Day swiftly became my favorite day of the year. The day after found me beginning to count the days before the next one.

….

The day my marriage began to formally dissolve I went to their house.

When I lost one of my best friends several years ago, I drank with them.

When I needed someone to stand for me during my divorce hearing, Don was there, extremely ill with the flu.

When I needed a car—Don and Beth found someone with a car to offload.

There’s only one person I can think of who has done more to keep me healthy and sane.

I wouldn’t have been with them today, even if the world hadn’t done a 180.

After all those years, they retired the BBQ. Their plan was to take all of the cooks for a much needed vacation for all those years of service.

It didn’t happen, though it’s possible they do something virtually.

We’ll likely repurpose Memorial Day after this year. (To get a sense of what that might look like take a look at today—Sunday’s—NYT.)

But alongside the people we lost, take stock of what we still have. Take stock of what’s worth fighting for.

At the last BBQ last year my intent was to gather as many people within ear shot for a toast, but the BBQ kind of has its own rhythm and I didn’t do it.

Consider this, that.   

While I’m toasting, take some time to do the same. Again, all we have is each other. We’re not independent. We’re not dependent. We’re interdependent.

I’ll see you next week.