Growing Popcorn

 When I was around eight years old, I learned about the process plants go through when they grow from a seed. I did little experiments to see how they grew under different conditions. I placed seeds in clear containers... some with just wet paper towels, some with rocks, some with sand, some in nothing but water, and some with soil. I was able to watch the growth process and learned hands on what worked and made a plant grow. I was fascinated with seeing the seeds break open and watching the roots come out and begin to stretch themselves out and take hold. Of course, some of them only grew to a certain point. The ones that I placed on wet paper towels opened and branched out, but not having soil to expand into, they died. But not before I got a really good look at the beginning of the growth process. It was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen.

My mom had a garden in the back yard and I started helping her tend to it. I learned to spot weeds, when it needed watering and so on. I decided to plant something of my own. I didn’t have any seeds or seedlings from my experiments left, so I decided to ask my mom for some seeds. I didn’t care what they were, I just wanted to make something grow. She promised that the next trip into town, we would pick me up some flower seeds that I could plant along the front walk leading to our front door. I didn’t have much in the way of patience back then. I didn’t want to wait a few days... Then I thought of it! Every week, we had family movie night and we made popcorn to go with it! SEEDS!! I asked my mom if they would grow and she said she didn’t think so, but we could find out. She pulled the big bag of popcorn kernels out of the freezer and gave me a handful.

Feeling victorious, I ran outside, grabbed a trowel and the watering can and got my hands in the dirt. I was going to make something grow! In my mind, we would have popcorn for life! I carefully planted the seeds along the walkway and gave them a nice dousing of water. I knew it would be a few days before they pushed their way through the soil, so I went out and checked them each morning. Finally, they sprouted! I ran and got my mom and showed her, she smiled broadly and said I’d done a good job. I was so very proud and began planning my future as a farmer.

A few days went by and I walked out to see my crop, and found that the plants had been cut back! I called my mom out to the front yard and said something had happened to my plants. She looked at them and pointed out that they were still alive and growing. I asked her what happened to them, and she told me that my dad probably cut them, not knowing what they were. I realized that we hadn’t told him about my project, so I would have to let him know.

Then I forgot to tell him. A few more days later, I woke up to the faint sound of the lawnmower running. MY POPCORN!! I jumped out of bed and ran outside just in time to see my dad run over my crop... and he was going for the gusto! He ran back and forth over them and he looked determined and downright vindictive about it. I literally screamed on horror! “DADDY STOP!!”

He looked up at me in surprise and turned off the mower. In tears, I ran down the steps and over to where he stood and fell to my knees and ran my hands over my butchered plants. My father’s surprise dissolved into confusion and concern.

“What’s wrong babygirl?” he asked.

I tearfully answered, “You killed my popcorn!”.

“What?”

“You ran over my popcorn plants with the mower!” I pointed to where they were planted.

“Popcorn? I’m sorry babygirl! I thought they were weeds!” I looked up at him and saw pure guilt on his face. He was mortified. “I didn’t know. I never would have run over them if I’d known.” He knelt down next to me and looked at the mutilated plants. “I’m so sorry.” He hugged me and wiped the tears off my face.

“I forgot to tell you,” I sniffled. He hugged me again and offered to buy me some flower seeds to plant along the walk and assured me that he wouldn’t harm them in any way. I planted marigolds and zinnias, and I planted more popcorn in my mom’s garden... Those were the first and last plants I would ever grow successfully. I have the proverbial black thumb. I can’t even keep a cactus alive. I had one for two weeks and it died. I even tell people not to give me plants because it’s not fair to the innocent plant.

Many years later, I would be diagnosed with my mental disorders. It was something else I didn’t tell my dad. I didn’t tell my mom either. Not right away. I had gotten into the habit of only telling them what they wanted to hear. Since I didn’t understand my disorders, I didn’t talk about them. As I discovered who I am, both in the realm of my mental illness and outside of it, it got harder to tell them what was going on with me. Since I didn’t tell them how much I had fallen apart, they didn’t know what not to say or do as I was going through the painstaking process of putting myself back together. They said a lot of wrong things, completely not knowing that it was hurtful and even set me back in my recovery. The more they hurt me, the more that I kept from them. I was literally fighting for my life, and they didn’t know it. My point, and I do have one, is that you can’t expect people to know the things that you don’t tell them. In the years since, I have tried to tell them more about who I am, and my relationship with them is a struggle towards open communication, but there is so much they still don’t understand because I didn't opt to bring them along on my journey. As a result, they will always only have part of the picture.

People who care about you will say the exact wrong thing at the exact wrong time and it is painful. But do they have all the information? I barely spoke to my parents for several years BECAUSE they didn’t have all the facts. When it comes to your recovery or anything important or life-changing, talk about it. There are people you love who are only working with small pieces of information, and don’t have the whole picture. The new flowers you are planting haven’t grown into something others fully recognize, and might look foreign to them. Tell your story. Advocate for yourself. Your path is your own, and it’s unique to you... so just don’t let anyone run over it with a lawnmower.

Acceptance of Who I Am

So... I was shot-gunning a cigarette with a gay guy named Joe as we were sitting in a local bar that was popular in the gay community, and I was quite relaxed. I have always been comfortable with gay people. I would later learn that for a portion of my young life I was “gender fluid” ... Neither of the labels of “boy” or “girl” seemed right to me then, though I identify as female (she/her) now. It wasn’t something I struggled with or anything. 

 As I sat there in the bar surrounded by people I barely knew (most not at all), it was the first time in years that I felt like I was in my element. I wasn’t even drunk (yet) but I was very much enjoying my cold beverages and the new people I was meeting. I just felt free. Joe was a friend of a friend, and he and I hit it off and were engaged in light conversation. At some point, I mentioned that I have always been comfortable with gay people and that I didn’t understand why other people had such a problem with it. He smiled and said, “It’s because you are a person who has spent their life wanting to be accepted for who you are, so you automatically accept others as they are.” I hadn’t thought of it that way. I wasn’t even fully aware of the fact that I desired acceptance. I have always just been unapologetically “me”. 

I was a product of my upbringing. My parents had always delivered a message of love for others. They were missionaries. I found it fascinating that I was raised in a community in which many members vilified the very people who accepted me based solely on who I am. Being a multiracial child in the 80’s was tricky depending on the country you lived in. I grew up in the Caribbean and fit right in with the other kids and race wasn’t something that came up that I was aware of. I was just me, without the influences of American views on whether I was black enough, or not white enough (and those are two very different things coming from the people on both ends of the color spectrum). I was a teen the first time I was asked if I considered myself black or white. Quite frankly, I wasn’t aware that I was supposed to be a crayon. My sophomore year in high school we were in the States for a year.  It was jarring to see that the cafeteria was segregated - Seemingly by choice. I started to sit with some white people that I had met at church before the school year started, but the looks they gave me when I approached them let me know real fast that I wasn't welcome AT ALL. I didn't know any of the black kids, but assumed I'd probably get the same treatment, due to my sister and black family members teasing me about being too white. I split the difference and sat with the weirdos... mostly because they were the most interesting people who fit in everywhere and nowhere. In hindsight I realize that they were like me in that regard. As time went on, I would learn that the race thing mattered to a lot of people, but it is only recently that it has come to matter to me...but not in the same way it does to other people. I have slowly over time come to be aware of how deep racism runs in society. I’m appalled, saddened and stunned by the scope of it. I was ignorant of how far we HAVEN’T come. 

I find myself in a unique position of being an outsider and insider at the same time. I’m learning... and what I learn, I apply and freely pass along, starting with my daughter. 

The father of my daughter is a white man. His family hated me for my skin color, and eventually he did too. When we divorced, he and his family told my daughter, who looks white, to never let anyone know she is part black. She’s is an adult now and declares her ethnicity with pride. She’s learning right along with me and we are exploring what it means to be ALL that we are, together. She is also pansexual and has autism. The beauty of it is that we are living in a time where it is slowly getting safer to be our authentic selves with most people. 

Aside from being multiracial, a mom, and a daughter, I am also a wife, a mentor, and a connoisseur of pimple popping videos. Yep! I said it! It turns out everyone is looking for acceptance. It’s universal when it comes right down to it, so, let your freak flags fly! 

I grew up straddling two races, two cultures, two social groups... and for a time, two realities -what I thought the world was supposed to be, and the way the world actually is. And that’s ok. I learned that I don’t have to be one or the other in order to be me... I met Joe in 1999, and he was living in the closet for the most part because he was a 6th grade school teacher... in Oklahoma. He knew a lot about acceptance. I never saw him again, but still claim him as a friend and I mark that night as the time when I became a conscious ally for civil rights for EVERYONE. “And the powerful play goes on that we may contribute a verse.” My verse begins with, “Hello. I’m Abanna Cheshire, and I am a Blended American... and totally mental.”