I called my mother in Detroit at 5a.m. on a Sunday morning in June 2003, not thinking that a call that earlywould frighten her.
“Happy Father’s Day,” I told her,listening as she moved around on the other end to start her daily routine ofcoffee with the morning paper.
It was my way of paying tribute tothe special black woman in my life.
Her response was classic: “You meanto tell me you scared me for that?” she said, trying to get her heart to stopracing.
I was at Florida A&MUniversity, sitting in a dorm room. I was living there as a counselor,chaperoning several boys of high school age for a summer program.
It was the first real money I was making after I’d lost mygood-paying job at the Home Depot. No matter what the bills were looking like,my mother was making sure they were all handled.
My parents separated shortly after my twin brother, Michael,and I were born. She raised her three children on her own. When my father diedin 1992, my mother was forced to take on a role she never thought she’d haveto: being a mother as well as a father.
When Mike wanted to know aboutgirls, my mother took on the father role and told him. She also made it herduty as a mother to tell him which ones to stay away from. When I joined thehigh school football team, my “father” would accompany me to the practices, butmy “mother” would appear before the end, cursing a coach for making me playthrough a nosebleed. When I decided to try tennis, it was “dad” who got outthere with me on the court to work on my backhand. “Mom,” on the other hand,would make sure I wasn’t overdoing it by hitting the courts too much.
Women are doing things every daythat make you wonder why they are still not seen as equals in such areas assports, the workplace and even church. My mother taught me early on that womenshouldn’t be looked at as the weaker sex. She fixed cars and computers, andhelped us move and build things. She also cooked meals, cleaned the house, gavehugs and offered encouragement.
She is the reason I am in love withblack women.
Looking at the example I lived withuntil I came to FAMU, I see strength, courage under trying times and theability not to take nonsense from the superior beings.
In anybody else, those qualitiesare all turn-ons. Beyoncé sang a song on her solo debut about the man she wantsin her life for the long haul. She paid tribute to the man who shaped her imageof a black man — and men in general.
”I want my husband to be like my daddy,” she sang.
And I want my wife to be like mymommy.
During our June 15, 2003, conversation,I took about five minutes to tell my mother all the things that others mighthave missed by living in a single-parent household, but that I didn’t. Then Ithanked her for being a mother-father and making sure I didn’t go withoutanything while under her care — and beyond.
“Just my way of saying I love you,”I told her, forcing back any emotion.
“I love you, too, baby. Can I goback to sleep now?”
Marlon A.Walker, a senior newspaper journalism student at Florida A&M Universityfrom Detroit. He is deputy copy desk chief at The Famuan.