10 years of celebrating Manchester

I participated in the 10 gathering of people of African descent and other residents of Manchester on August 7th. It has been a long road and hasn't really gotten any easier and in some ways present administrative challenges that become more ingrained each year. But it is a community treasure and personal delight to see people dancing, talking, smiling and hanging out in the park moving to the soundtrack flowing from the stage.

When I moved to Manchester in 1992 after living in Chicago for over 30 years my friends and associates would often ask me how I managed to remain in Manchester. I told them then what I would tell you now if you asked, "we create community wherever we go." It is much like the title of my friend Roy Morrison's book, "we build the road as we travel." In many ways the annual African/Caribbean Celebration is a wide path on the my journey to community in Manchester, NH.

From my earliest days in New Hampshire I recognized that a major challenge then, and continuing even till today, for people of African descent was/is social isolation and cultural alienation. In 1992 there were limited to opportunities to gather in public places for anyone in Manchester and those few that did exist (Christmas parade, St. Patrick's Day parade, etc.) were usually not welcoming for people of African descent. Shortly after arriving, at the behest and in agreement and collaboration with my wife, we began to host activities like the annual Kwanzaa event, annual Black History Month film series, and other activities that served as platforms for community members to meet and share their experiences. The activities began to put little nicks in the armor of social isolation. Part of the significance of the experiences that we hosted was the cultural content. It served to address the cultural alienation experienced when you live in a world where the rituals, ceremonies, images and practices are all foreign to you. This feeling of invisibility was countered through programs that provided cultural affirmation by reflecting cultures from across the African continent.


This year was one of the biggest and best events so far. Of course, each year for the last ten years we have felt or been told the same. Well, we celebrate the fellowship and look forward to the next time in Manchester, NH.




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Ending the new beginning

I guess it was about six to eight months ago that I claimed I was going to be good and post on a regular basis. Unfortunately and not unentirely unexpectedly I remain a "slogger" instead of a blogger. Some many things happen so fast that it seems almost a waste of time to take the time to document what is happening in my life and what I think about what is happening in the life of others.

However, I think of my blog often and fondly. For me blogging does not serve a commercial purpose. So it is, by my definition of life, a toy. Being a toy and having toys and even playing with toys is not a bad thing even though they have that connotation in terms of adults in American society. Being able to take a break and enter the world of toys and imagining is a powerful skill, ability, and power to have. In fact being able to play with toys opens a door into an inner world that is akin to being in trance. During this period we are hypersensitive to suggestions.

Trance can work both ways just like dreams. If you enter a trance, either self-induced or induced by others, you view your imagined environment as real. During this period you assume the trappings and behaviors of your imagined world. What does the brain know? If we turn of the internal critic, the mental 'governor' then the brain accepts the mental manifestations provided it and in turn expresses them physically. This thought has a number of parts to it. It connects to stories of people who exhibit physical infirmaties when adopting different personalities. It connets with the behavior of our dream self and the impact that our waking self has on it. It relates to our waking self and the impact our dream self can have on it. It relates to religious estatic possession, demonic possession and daydreaming. All this from toys.

This brings the mind the impact of contemporary videos and wii-electronic environment interfaces, and such. What does it do to us and our chilcren to not have a stick that we can mentally transform into a horse or a cardboard box that we can transform into a house? Toys can be useful. Money is not the end all and be all. Saying that reminds me of the maxim that those who feel that way usually don't have any and won't be getting any. But I think the wisdom of the Native American Cree proverb ('only when the last tree has been cut, the last buffalo hunted, the last fish has been caught will the White man realize you can't eat money) is the last word on that. but it doesn't let any of us off because "the White man" in this proverb is a metaphor for the culture of consumption that many of us partake in.



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