I'm so happy and grateful for my parents

When I journal I start it out with I'm so happy and grateful for. I thought I would do it on my blog today insteatd. I've tried to be in quiet meditation but my thoughts keep spinning around issues of race and history.

On this historical day, history was being made long before. It's all I keep thinking about today.

My parents Joan Newby and Robert Newby are the people to me that make this day even possible. Barack and I are about the same age. When i was a baby my parents were trying to get jobs as teachers. They were both told that they weren't needed because they already had "colored" teachers. My father was hired because he spoke the King's English. My mother was denied roles in college musical productions at K-State in Manhattan Ks, my father was part of the first sit-ins in the nation in Wichita, Ks. The list goes on of what my parents endured and participated in. They took chances because if they did not then they would have been stuck in places that did not fulfill their spirit, and as we see even on this day, sitting and waiting for things to change, was not an option worth taking. So I dedicate this blogspot to my parents. Barack Obama stands on their shoulders, as pioneers.

You don't have to be Malcome X, Martin Luther King, Harriett Tubman to be known as a pioneer in history. Most pioneers never make it into the history books because there are so many. Those that worked on the local level like my parents. My parents who influenced school districts, city governemt, universities, and national policy.

I also think about how so many people are entrenched in racist thinking, resentment of how people of color learn to exist, survive, excell and simply be among those who would rather they not. But I don't want to think about that because there are so many more people I know that choose to think inclusively.

Thank you mon, dad, grandpa childs and all the ones who came before you whose shoulders we stand upon.

Peace IN