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It took me 2 weeks to get there, but I am so glad I was able to make it…and use my gift card to Five Star Cinemas. I loved the jarring effect of the 4 little girls church bombing. It’s like…you know it happened, but to see it in such graphic detail brought tears to my eyes…and I was holding back tears for the next 2 hours. I am so profoundly moved by images of my past, images of my ancestors. I am conscious of the sacrifice; everyday men and women doing extraordinary things.
What many of you may not know is that I lived in the south for some of my formative years and went to the “Bridge Crossing “Celebration in 1995. That’s what they called it, The Bridge Crossing. Without being down there, I would have not known about the march until well into my high school years. Hey! I just thought of a positive aspect of living in Mississippi! That rarely happens. Anyway, I lived in Brooksville Mississippi at the time, but had a friend who lived across the state line in Panola, Alabama. Thanks to my favorite Uncle we got to hit the back roads as he was out babysitter. This friend just happened to be his girlfriend’s niece.
She was going on a school fieldtrip to the Bridge Crossing, as they called it, and asked her teacher if I could go too. And whadaya know, he said yea even though I wasn’t a student at the school and didn’t even live in the state. My mom drove me to their school, signed a field trip form on the spot, and left me in this random ass school person’s care. Goes to show you how neurotic people are today. No way would a teacher allow a kid from another state to just hop on the bus and go on the field trip with them in 2015. It exemplifies the community aspect of black life in the Dirty South.
The only person I knew was her and I knew of this boy named Marshal that she had an uber crush on. So we sat and giggled and did the things that 14 year old kids do. We get there and fall off the bus. My memory is fuzzy, but I remember the one caveat before we could have fun was to go to a museum in a building. So first thing we went to the museum. It was not well lit and up some narrow wooden stairs in an old building in Downtown Selma. Once that was over we was at the stage cuz our real motivation for wanting to go on the field trip in the first place was to see the 69 Boyz. You know it was all about that Tootsie Roll Remix!
What I do remember is some dude (not the lead rapper) in the group doing the “to the left to the left “moves while down in a split. I was impressed and enamored. Don’t question my country 14 year old logic. Lol! I also remember the local boys being behind the times. They still had them gumby half blonde boxes like Kwame. We was all like…ewwww. I bought snacks and those rainbow colored see through plastic rings that were all the rage back then.
In retrospect, I wish I would have walked across the bridge. They shut down traffic for the celebration so that people could retrace the steps of the marchers. I was just young and disinterested. I mean, I was steps away from the bridge, but was too busy being a teenager to realize the importance of the ground I was walking on. There’s a scene from Selma when they are marching through downtown and they turn right onto the bridge and it hit me…I’d been there. I’d walked on that same street, but I just didn’t turn right onto the bridge.
Photo Sources:
http://www.terragalleria.com/america/alabama/selma/picture.usal38146.html
https://www.etsy.com/listing/122669895/vintage-lucite-rainbow-ring-clear
http://the-struggle.net/the-edmund-pettus-bridge/
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