I've always had an affinity for music. My mother jokes that I was singing along with the gospel music on the radio on the way to church almost as soon as I could talk.
I've also always had an affinity for politics. I never really understood where it came from, as I didn't see either of my parents as political, until this spring.
When I told my mom that I had gone to the Democratic caucus this year, for the very first time, and that I'd been selected as an alternate for the congressional district nominating convention, she told me that her father would be very proud of me, that one of his descendants was taking an active interest in politics. Then, she told me about his history.
Not long after that, I was listening to my iPod at the gym, and I heard Alabama's version of "Song of the South", and it resonated with me.
Song, song of the south.
Sweet potato pie and I shut my mouth.
Gone, gone with the wind.
There ain't nobody looking back again.
This really is the truth. Those who grew up in the Great Depression in the South really try not to look back, because looking back has no meaning. They've been taught by their circumstances to always look forward, because there is always the chance tomorrow will be better than today. Perhaps this is why it took so long for anyone to tell me about my family history and how it was intertwined with the Democratic state party organization of Oklahoma.
Cotton on the roadside, cotton in the ditch.
We all picked the cotton but we never got rich.
Daddy was a veteran, a southern democrat.
They oughta get a rich man to vote like that.
This was my grandfather in a nutshell. A life-long Southern Yellow Dog Democrat, who believed that a yellow dog in the road was better than any Republican someone could nominate. He was a middle child of about 8 or 9 kids (I have trouble pinning everyone down on just how many kids there were). His older sister was a school teacher; his youngest brother was a mine supervisor. My grandfather was a party political operative in south-eastern Oklahoma who for his loyalty was rewarded with a series of political patronage positions.
Well somebody told us wall street fell
But we were so poor that we couldnt tell.
Cotton was short and the weeds were tall
But mr. roosevelts a gonna save us all.
A very accurate description of my family. Mr Roosevelt did save my family from starvation, if my mother's memories are accurate. Granted, she was a small child though all of this, but her older half-sister, who later would be a radio operator in World War II, verified much of what she remembers.
Well momma got sick and daddy got down.
The county got the farm and they moved to town.
Pappa got a job with the tva
He bought a washing machine and then a chevrolet.
Grandfather didn't get a TVA job. Rather, he was given a job running the company store at a state park in southeastern Oklahoma. When people quit coming to the park and the store closed, he was made a guard supervisor at the state prison in Mcalester. Once World War II began, he was given preference as a veteran and loyal Democrat for a supervisory position in an Oakland, CA, shipyard, where he moved his family for the duration of the war, and my mom's younger sister was born.
After the end of the war, the store reopened, and my grandfather went back to running it. One of my mother's clearest memories of the time was when he fired a white man from chopping wood, because the young man refused to work next to a black veteran. My grandfather believed that all military service was honorable and should be honored. He also believed that the segregation of Jim Crow was dishonorable and should be ended.
My grandfather's association with the Democratic Party in Oklahoma led to one other political appointment. When my mother was a freshman in high school, he was appointed to be an associate state fire marshal, thanks to the respect others in the party had for him.
My grandmother was a strong woman in her own right. In the mid-30's, she walked away from an abusive marriage to a moonshiner that had given her two children, and she moved back in with her parents, marrying my grandfather about 5 years later. She was 10 years younger than my grandfather, but a heart ailment compounded by a migraine took her when my mother was 17. Four years later, weeks after my mother graduated from college, the first in her family to do so, my grandfather died, leaving my mom responsible for her younger sister just as she was about to start her first teaching job. The move to Kansas and the stress of the new job, combined with trying to assure her sister graduated high school and then college led my mother to put away her own political involvement until 2004.
So, I found out that it makes sense that the girl from western Kansas, who always found her unapologetically liberal opinions to be out of step with those around her, would be right at home in the thick of political discussions and campaigns. I only wish I'd known more sooner.