Praying For Clouds
11 May 2011 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: black, depression, georgia, happiness, heat, husbands, life, love, racism, white, willow trees, wives
Summer is always so hot. Even the trees droop in sweaty depression praying for rain or any form of liquid. Georgia weather was always muggy, something Janice had noticed immediately upon her arrival to the southern, back-wooded state. She had been living in Georgia now for the past 8 years, something she wasn’t sure she enjoyed, but none the less, she didn’t have the money to uproot once more and leave town or her husband. Not yet anyway.
She ended up in a small town, the kind where southern hospitality was just a show and racism dug deep into the ground. Lynchings still took place, as far as she knew, but they were in secret, and often more than not they were covered up by the local sheriff’s department. It was a predominately white town because of this. She supposed she should be scared, a black woman such as herself, but for some reason she wasn’t. She lived right smack in the middle of these white southerners and she did right well by herself.
Besides, she did house cleaning for the locals, and they seemed fine with that. As long as she stayed under them, they felt no need to antagonize her. Along with that was the fact that she was a lighter skinned beauty that kept to herself. She didn’t sass anyone and she sure as hell didn’t think poorly of anyone, especially no one that hadn’t done any harm towards her person.
She was, however, a little ashamed of herself. She knew she should be outraged by the injustices of what she faced everyday and the things she saw the locals do, but she wasn’t. She took it with a quiet acceptance and prayed for their souls. A large favor for those who had done nothing for her.
It was funny how the civil rights movement had been done and passed, and that in the year of 2011, not much had changed in this town. She always laughed silently as she passed buildings with signs that denied a “colored” person admission, or racially separated bathrooms that still littered the public scene. She wondered how they had managed to keep the town so tightly locked in the old ways, she supposed no one cared to change it and the town folks were happy just the way things were.
She would then think about how she was kind of the same as the town. Quiet, reserved, subservient to her husband, and always giving up her seat to her fellow, bleached neighbors. She never questioned much, never pointed out the law, always respected white folks more than they ever deserved and she had always been underpaid for her hard work. She had always allowed herself to be treated lower than dirt and smiled politely even when the only thing she really wanted to do was reach her arm out and slap the white off of people.
Things would remain the same so long as someone allowed them, and as long as this town kept its ways, no one would ever be brave enough to do anything about it. Besides, she was kind of hoping her husband would slip up and they’d lynch him in the woods like all the others. She smiled to herself as she sat down under the willow tree in her yard wondering why she was thinking such thoughts.
Maybe it was just the Georgia weather.
