Celina's Job Well Done
On January 12, 1966, I was invited along with 3 white friends to dinner in Harlem. Our host, Bill, was active in the East Harlem Triangle Association and we had met him at the organization’s headquarters on 126th Street where we were working that month. Bill had evidently decided we looked like we needed a home cooked meal and had graciously invited us to his home for dinner.
We found the address in an old 4 story brownstone with two apartments on each floor. As we entered the building, we smelled urine and noticed that an empty apartment on the first floor had been gutted. The halls were unmaintained and there was very little lighting in the stairwell. We made our way to Bill’s third floor apartment happily surprised not to encounter any drug dealers as we made our way upward. As we prepared to knock on the door, we readied ourselves for an apartment that was as challenged as the building and neighborhood which surrounded it. We knocked and were quickly greeted by Bill’s wife Emily. She was well dressed and very friendly as she led us into a clean, well-furnished apartment. We met their two children who were working on their homework before dinner.
We shared a beer with Bill and Emily and then had dinner with the family. After dinner we retired to their livingroom and watched the first episode of the campy T.V. show, “Batman.” All during the evening, I had to keep reminding myself what lay just beyond the walls of that apartment. I found myself wondering how hard Bill and Emily had to work to keep the dirt, crime and chaos of their neighborhood from their door. It was a glimpse into a middle class black America which was not portrayed in the news. It was a study in pride, decency, determination and love of family that I have never forgotten.
My father was a school bus driver, my mom a cook in the school hot lunch program. They worked hard to maintain a home and give me the opportunities they never had, but they didn’t have to build an island to do it. When I went out the door there were no drug dealers hanging around the front door, just a lawn surrounded by open fields. Sure we would lose our electricity once in a while in a wind storm, but never because some drug addict had broken into the apartment next door and ripped out the wiring in order to sell the copper and get a fix.
The dinner with Bill and his family all came back to me as I watched President Obama introduce his Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor and then listened as she told her story. I reflected that while I was having dinner with Bill and Emily in Harlem, Sonia’s mother, Celina, was raising her and her brother 5 miles away in a public housing project in the Bronx. The housing project would have been a step up from the brownstone in Harlem in those days, but Mrs. Sotomayor’s little girl and little boy still faced extreme poverty, homelessness, crime and drugs every time they stepped out the door. Yet Celina raised a boy who became a doctor and a girl who is now nominated to be a Supreme Court Justice.
I think of this when I rear Rush Limbaugh, Pat Buchanan, and the host of the sports radio show all opine that Sotomayor just got the nomination because she is Hispanic. It is probably fair comment to say that when the field was narrowed down to a handful the fact that Sotomayor was Hispanic was a plus. But was it easier for her mother, Celina, to raise a girl who would be accepted at Princeton than it was for a white mother on the West Side of Manhattan? Every study shows that the best predictor of how well a child will do in school is the financial and academic success of the parents. Sonia and Celina were dealt no easy hand on that score.
Every study of crime and youth points to the neighborhood and the peers a child will be surrounded by as the best predictor of whether the child will run a foul of the law. Sonia and Celina were dealt no easy hand on that score.
Every study of the factors which lead a person to believing she could accomplish great things points to role models as an important factor. A white boy growing up in the 1960's had 8 white men on the US Supreme Court he could look to and say, “I can do that.” There were no women and no Hispanic on the Supreme Court in the 1960's. Sonia and Celina were dealt no easy hand on that score.
If one is concerned with equity, the question isn’t whether Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor was an attractive candidate because of her gender and race, the question is did Sonia and her mom have to work as hard as everyone else to get to the point of being considered? The answer is obvious. Sonia and her mom had to work much harder all the while trusting in America’s promise before America had ever lived up to it for someone like Sonia. Her success is an inspiration for all parents and all children. With hard work and a little luck even your liabilities can be turned into assets.
We found the address in an old 4 story brownstone with two apartments on each floor. As we entered the building, we smelled urine and noticed that an empty apartment on the first floor had been gutted. The halls were unmaintained and there was very little lighting in the stairwell. We made our way to Bill’s third floor apartment happily surprised not to encounter any drug dealers as we made our way upward. As we prepared to knock on the door, we readied ourselves for an apartment that was as challenged as the building and neighborhood which surrounded it. We knocked and were quickly greeted by Bill’s wife Emily. She was well dressed and very friendly as she led us into a clean, well-furnished apartment. We met their two children who were working on their homework before dinner.
We shared a beer with Bill and Emily and then had dinner with the family. After dinner we retired to their livingroom and watched the first episode of the campy T.V. show, “Batman.” All during the evening, I had to keep reminding myself what lay just beyond the walls of that apartment. I found myself wondering how hard Bill and Emily had to work to keep the dirt, crime and chaos of their neighborhood from their door. It was a glimpse into a middle class black America which was not portrayed in the news. It was a study in pride, decency, determination and love of family that I have never forgotten.
My father was a school bus driver, my mom a cook in the school hot lunch program. They worked hard to maintain a home and give me the opportunities they never had, but they didn’t have to build an island to do it. When I went out the door there were no drug dealers hanging around the front door, just a lawn surrounded by open fields. Sure we would lose our electricity once in a while in a wind storm, but never because some drug addict had broken into the apartment next door and ripped out the wiring in order to sell the copper and get a fix.
The dinner with Bill and his family all came back to me as I watched President Obama introduce his Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor and then listened as she told her story. I reflected that while I was having dinner with Bill and Emily in Harlem, Sonia’s mother, Celina, was raising her and her brother 5 miles away in a public housing project in the Bronx. The housing project would have been a step up from the brownstone in Harlem in those days, but Mrs. Sotomayor’s little girl and little boy still faced extreme poverty, homelessness, crime and drugs every time they stepped out the door. Yet Celina raised a boy who became a doctor and a girl who is now nominated to be a Supreme Court Justice.
I think of this when I rear Rush Limbaugh, Pat Buchanan, and the host of the sports radio show all opine that Sotomayor just got the nomination because she is Hispanic. It is probably fair comment to say that when the field was narrowed down to a handful the fact that Sotomayor was Hispanic was a plus. But was it easier for her mother, Celina, to raise a girl who would be accepted at Princeton than it was for a white mother on the West Side of Manhattan? Every study shows that the best predictor of how well a child will do in school is the financial and academic success of the parents. Sonia and Celina were dealt no easy hand on that score.
Every study of crime and youth points to the neighborhood and the peers a child will be surrounded by as the best predictor of whether the child will run a foul of the law. Sonia and Celina were dealt no easy hand on that score.
Every study of the factors which lead a person to believing she could accomplish great things points to role models as an important factor. A white boy growing up in the 1960's had 8 white men on the US Supreme Court he could look to and say, “I can do that.” There were no women and no Hispanic on the Supreme Court in the 1960's. Sonia and Celina were dealt no easy hand on that score.
If one is concerned with equity, the question isn’t whether Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor was an attractive candidate because of her gender and race, the question is did Sonia and her mom have to work as hard as everyone else to get to the point of being considered? The answer is obvious. Sonia and her mom had to work much harder all the while trusting in America’s promise before America had ever lived up to it for someone like Sonia. Her success is an inspiration for all parents and all children. With hard work and a little luck even your liabilities can be turned into assets.