Trayvon Martin

Can you image getting that call? It’s the call that every parent fears. It’s the call that tells you your beloved child, flesh of your flesh, blood of your blood, has died an untimely death.  Parents are not supposed to outlive their children.  The very thought tears my soul to pieces in a way I can’t describe. When I see the anguished but determined faces of Trayvon’s parents, I can only imagine their struggle to process his death while finding the strength to manage their grief and seek justice for him.

It is unnatural for a parent to bury a child.

For the last few days I’ve grappled with what I wanted to say about the Trayvon Martin case. I’ve struggled to articulate how the death of this young man has impacted me not just as a parent but as a black mother to a young son.  I know that I’m not the only mother – scratch that – parent who has been moved by this story of a teenage boy who was gunned down before his life has barely begun.  I know that I’m not the only parent who wonders how our country can quantum leap forward and elect our first black president on the one hand, while daily black mothers and fathers worry about their sons’ safety on the other. I know I’m not the only parent wondering how much longer our society can tolerate  our gun-obsessed culture that has made our streets even more dangerous with laws like “Stand Your Ground”.

It’s clear that Trayvon Martin’s death has touched a chord with people of different faiths, races and socio-economic backgrounds.  But this case has special resonance for black parents. We know that the world can be a dangerous place for our young men who, once they’ve reached their teen years, are often viewed as a menace to society just for being black. We know that our young black men are judged by what they wear, how they speak even how they walk. I think New York Times columnist Charles Blow  most accurately captures the questions this case raises about race, profiling and fear black parents of sons experience . If you’ve not read his nuanced op-eds on this tragedy, they are well worth your time.

I look at my beautiful son and wonder how can I keep him safe?

I asked this question of my husband the other night. “How do we keep him safe?”  When I look at pictures of Trayvon’s sunny, open smile and read his mother’s loving description of a boy who loved sports, math, was taking AP English and preparing for college, I think that could be my son.  When D2 and I are out shopping on the weekends, people constantly stop us to chat, give him high-fives or just lean down and say (as they do down South)”That is one pretty baby.”  I know though that in ten or twelve years time, those same people may cross the street , lock their car doors or hug their bags a little more tightly when they see him coming,  because by then he’ll probably be built like his dad – muscular and well over six feet. 

A recent picture of my son D2

And so like thousands of black parents have done before us (and like my parents did with my brother and Dr. D.’s parents did with him and his four brothers), we will have The Talk with D2 when he is old enough. We will talk to him about how to behave if stopped by the police (Keep your hands on the wheel. Look the officer in the eye. Don’t mumble. Don’t make sudden moves. Ask permission to reach for your wallet).  We will talk to him about avoiding parties where drugs and alcohol are consumed because (as my mother said to us growing up) if he is one of the only black kids there, it will be his face that is remembered. We will talk to him about dressing to make a positive impression (School uniform, yes. Button-down shirt and waist-hugging trousers, yes.  Sagging pants and baggy t-shirts, no.)  We will make sure his teachers know we have high expectations of him. That we will expect more of him even if they do not. And even then, we know that no matter how well-dressed, how well-spoken, how good a student he is, there will be some who will simply judge him because he is a young black man.

We have an opportunity to have a real discussion.

At this writing, it’s not clear whether Trayvon’s killer will be arrested, though I am optimistic the special investigator will now fairly consider all of the evidence.  I wish we lived in a “post-racial” society where we didn ‘t have to talk about why race still matters. I wish we didn’t have to talk about why young black men still are dispproportionately likely to die from gun violence than any other group in this country.  What I know for sure is that while nothing can bring Trayvon back, we have an opportunity – family by family, community by community – to have a real discussion about what it will take for us to build communities that are safe and nuturing for all children, regardless of race or socio-economic background. Afterall, Trayvon Martin could have been anyone’s son and that makes him everyone’s son.

I have to work hard to suppress my sanctimommy urges. Generally, I do a decent job. I’m guilty of  letting D2 watch back to back episodes of “Chuggington” so I can get a few extra household chores done; when he fights taking a nap I’ll let him stay up with the rationale that he’ll go to bed earlier (usually wishful thinking). And when he doesn’t feel like wearing clothes he’s free to run around the house naked (D2 calls this his “run naked” time). I try to be a chill mom.

I can’t lie though. There is one area where I’m slowly losing the sanctimommy battle: D2′s diet. I am more than a little bit obsessed with making sure he doesn’t live completely off of chicken nuggets and french fries (or “chick uggets and fwies” as D2 calls them). It started with breastfeeding. I exclusively breastfed D2 for six months (no cereal bottles for my baby!) and breastfed for 13 months. I made all of his baby food (cheaper and of course healthier). I was such the  smug mommy thinking that I was keeping my little one’s digestive system pure and free of nasty hormones and chemicals. My goal was to shape D2′s palate so that he would appreciate all kinds of foods, be it Thai curry or pasta primavera. He would be my toddler gourmand. The only sweets D2 knew were grapes, apples and other fruits. And juice? Forget it. Empty, junky calories guaranteed to turn my darling boy into a tubby tubster. As far as I was concerned  a full-on meth addiction couldn’t be far behind if I gave D2 juice. No question about it. Juice = drugs. Bad, bad, juice.

So most of D2′s two years were blissfully juice-free until that fateful day a couple of months ago. My next door neighbor has two little boys, Bowen and Austin, ages four and six. They adore D2 and D2 adores them. All three boys were playing happily outside when the youngest ran to the refrigerator and gave D2 a JuicyJuice juice box. I must have cocked an eyebrow because Bowen’s mom offered helpfully,  ”It’s real juice.” Well, I don’t really give D2 juice but I guess it’s okay this one time, I say.

D2 took that juice box and, no lie, sucked in down in 12 seconds flat. I watched as his eyes got wide. He had taken a bite of the proverbial apple and was forever changed. I could see it. It was as if he was thinking, “Man, mommy’s been holding out on me. This sh*t is good!” I waited. “More! More!” Uh oh. How about a nice glass of water? Milk? ”No! Joose! Joooose!” Crap. This went on for days. Every now and then he would look at me expectantly and ask for a cup of juice. Occasionally, I obliged. I filled his sippy cup with one part juice and thirty parts water. You could barely taste the juice but he was psyched by the pink-tinged water in his cup.  I let the reality sink in that my child had become a  juice head.

This was confirmed again one night when I took him to the grocery store to pick up a few things. I let him push one of the child-sized shopping carts to hold our items. I was out of V8 and so we headed down the juice aisle. That’s when D2 spotted the motherlode. First he spied a solitary shopping cart with a bottle of apple juice. “Mama, appa joose! appa joose!” he shrieked.  He ran to cart and tried to wedge the bottle out of the cart. That’s not our juice, D2. Put that back. “Joose! Jooooose!” I could sense a Def Con 5 tantrum coming on. He spun around and spotted a whole row of juice at eye-level and began loading bottles into his little cart. He grunted as he hefted a bottle in his little arms. “Joose, heaby!” (translation: heavy juice). Other shoppers looked on with amazement.  He managed to get three bottles of juice in his little cart before I cut him off. At the check out, we bought all our items except for the bottles of juice. When we got home, D2 eyed me suspiciously, “Joose, mama? Joose?” Sorry. No juice, baby. How about some nice milk? “Okay!” Crisis averted. This time.

I still haven’t totally relaxed my no-juice policy but every now and then, I give it to D2 as a special treat. He’s as happy as a little clam. It makes me wonder, am I being too uptight about not wanting him to drink juice? When we were kids most of us drank juice almost every day and we turned out okay.  What do you think? Are parents too controlling about what their kids eat and drink these days?