A Safe Place for Learning, in the Woods

I have two images I want to share with you. The first is a description of what is, and the second is a vision of what will be. Part of the second picture involves other people's dreams--dreams of a highway connecting Canada and Mexico, dreams of profits to be made by expanding businesses, dreams of paychecks sufficient to pay the light bill and send a daughter to school with enough money for her field trip. Those dreams aren't mine, sometimes aren't dreams I'd even have conceived--but because of them, my own dreams are going to come into being.

The first image is a simple description of what is, now, today. Today, in Mississippi, 40% of women are functionally illiterate. The Mississippi Delta, which runs south from my home in Memphis along the Mississippi River, is the rock-bottom most depressed area in the country, more impoverished than Appalachia, with fewer resources than many reservations. Come take my hand, and let's visit there for a moment . . .

First let's stop by Tiny's house. We'll leave the highway, and drive through an absolutely beautiful stretch of woodland before crossing the fields on the dirt road that leads there. The yard's a little scraggly, but the house is as neat as Tiny can make it, although the paint is peeling and the porch sags a bit. There's a garbage-bag-and-duct-tape patch visible over part of the roof, but the smoke coming out of the round metal chimney is welcoming, and Tiny herself grins broadly as she sees us. It's warm inside by the wood stove, the luxury of its heat welcome this winter afternoon, and Tiny tells us she thinks she's got it worked out so the wood will last all season this year. She lives here with her adult son and four of her grandchildren, and has a boyfriend who comes by every now and then to stay for a week or two. One daughter is in Germany now with an army boyfriend, but still keeps her belongings here, and another lives down in Jackson. Tiny offers us a cup of hot tea, made with the mint that hasn't died out in the front garden just yet, and apologizes that there's no sugar for it. Laugh at her jokes, at her joy, and smile at the timid doe-eyed gaze of the little boy who peers wonderingly from the doorway, wearing a pair of too-tight shorts and a thin blanket draped over his shoulders, bare feet quiet on the wood-slat floor. He whispers something to someone behind him, and a giggle comes from the shadows beyond the door; the response is whispered just a little too loudly, and we hear the boy's sibling ask, "Why's there a white lady here?"

Beside Tiny's Christmas tree, in the warmth of her home, we listen to her story, to her worries. It's getting cold, now, and while of course she's not been letting the kids wear their shoes at home, she's afraid she might have to let them in the wintertime, and then the shoes might not last the school year. Of course, it's a long walk to where the bus picks them up, and so in really bad weather it doesn't matter because they won't be going to school, but the worn-out shoes still bother her. She has other stories to share, too, many happy, tales of obstacles overcome, of successes and failures, of picking herself up and going again. She's bright-eyed, articulate, competent--she'd have to be, or her family wouldn't survive. She's concerned about local issues--about how Lashandra's new boyfriend beats her up and nobody seems to care about it, about finding good education for her grandchildren. Education's important these days, she explains, and she wishes they could have somewhere to use a computer. Tiny's never seen a computer, but she can write well enough to send letters to her daughter, although she doesn't really like to read, and the newspaper "writes too hard for plain people." It's not as if a daily subscription would be high on Tiny's priority list if she could read it, anyway.

As we drive away from Tiny's house, we start to see the other houses in a different light. Inside every one is a collection of stories, of dreams and sorrows and lives lived. We near a cluster of homes, a small apartment building in a local town, and everywhere are the eyes and souls of human beings, of people whose reality is different from yours and mine. Before this morning, we may have thought we lived in the same region of the same planet, but as we open ourselves to where we are, we begin to realize that we live in different worlds altogether. In this world we're visiting, the entire fabric of existence is something different than what we know, and the people who live here have learned real truths about life that might, in our alien universe, even be utterly false.

Among those truths, is that women who work can expect to make about $10,000 a year if they're fortunate, and that life itself is likely to interrupt and prevent anyone from actually realizing this potential. The truth is that kids get sick, life gets stressful, and it can be hard to keep a job. It's hard to get one in the first place if you don't have a car. Another truth is that the best jobs are the ones that give you uniforms, because you don't have to figure out how you're going to get clothes presentable enough to wear to work. McDonald's offers just enough benefits to disqualify your kids from state health care, so it's not really a terriffic option, but they'll hire almost anyone. Cleaning staff for almost any business is terrific--they usually do give you a uniform, and the environment's often nicer than most other work. Of course, most folk outside town in the Delta do farm, at least a little bit, so there's plenty of work to be had at home, too. When the truck's loaded full of watermelons and driven into Memphis to bring home cash, all the world can seem wonderful for a time. Greens from the garden can, with effort, be kept coming in almost year round, so farm families aren't as likely to go hungry.

And, people are often happy, proud, bright-eyed and not wanting pity or outside support. There are plenty of reasons to smile, and a lot of love to be had. Sunshine and summer rain are always free, and there's often music and lovemaking and jokes and family gatherings to bring joy. Because of the way we as human beings interact with our world, tending to associate with others who share many of our circumstances, "everyone" seems to be in more or less the same place, and alternatives are often not considered. People cry when a baby dies, and bring flowers to the tiny grave, but it's not common knowledge that the infant mortality rate here exceeds that of many so-called "third world" nations. People shake their head when a woman comes to church with a black eye, and they may pray for her, but they also understand that her husband really loves her, down inside, and that men "can get like that" when they've been drinking and their women push them. People dream of getting rich in the casinos in Tunica, and talk about what they'll do with all that money, while dentist visits get put off yet again in hopes that they'll be affordable next month, and the tiny lines appear around a dreamer's eyes that signal the wear of stress on the body, hint of the death that will come earlier to someone living here, in this world, than it might somewhere else.

There's another perspective of this picture, too. Dell, FedEx, and several other big companies are all excited about expanding south from Memphis into northern Mississippi. You see, there's this big international highway planned to go through in a few years, and Memphis is already a transportation hub for the whole country. Labor and land are cheap, and it's a bright place for corporate optimism. The executives are excited and full of energy, with big plans for building new factories and warehouses, and generally showing a tremendous profit.

Of course, they might just be in for a surprise. Yes, labor's cheap, but remember that functional illiteracy rate? Call Tiny back to your mind--she's only around 40, might just be enticed to try one of those fancy new factory jobs if she can get a ride in. All we need is a GED or two years' work experience, and she's hired . . . now OK, Tiny, here's the terminal on the floor, here's the tracking software, and here's how you enter the stock numbers when you pull material from the shelf . . . you're ready for that, right?

Now, Tiny's one hell of a strong, capable woman. She's raised three kids and buried two, and overcome obstacles in the meantime that would have overwhelmed many of us. But is she really going to remember that, when the trainer goes away and she's struggling to get the little arrow to point on the square where it belongs, the first time she's ever been near a keyboard in her life? Do you remember the first time you tried to use a mouse? While we're at it, did anyone really make sure that Tiny understood what she was signing, when she took the job?

Corporate America, for all of its optimism, might not really be ready for northern Mississippi. And northern Mississippi may not be ready for corporate America, either, although its residents could desperately use the income from any source. (For my own preferences for supporting local small business over corporate invasion, see some of my other writings. We'll leave that soapbox alone for the time being.) Meanwhile, know that I personally have every bit of confidence in Tiny and others like her, to be able to do what it takes to survive--they've done so for longer than I've been alive, under some incredibly difficult circumstances. So I don't presume to be able to go in as the Big College White Woman and tell them what to do. I want to ask them what they want, and help them get there by sharing whatever skills I have, but more importantly I want to recognize and reinforce the abilities these women already have, and help them empower themselves to take advantage of the corporate guys--instead of the other way around!

So now, let's jump ahead a couple years. Driving down the road now, we see a simple sign for a place that didn't exist before. It might be named "All Our Kin," but then again it might not--those kinds of details can change in the course of making reality of a dream. Whatever the sign says, though, it points to a unique kind of outpost in the woods, tucked away just off the highway in northern Mississippi.

There's a nice if simple home here, back a little behind the main building. That's where I live, with my kids, and maybe it's big enough to house a friend or two or maybe there's another place next door, but either way I don't run this thing completely by myself. For one thing, I happen to believe that "community" offers one of women's greatest potential strengths. We're headed for the other building, though, and you're welcome to visit my house for a cup of coffee and conversation later.

We walk inside, and you see a computer lab with 16 terminals--maybe two of those by now, but at least we can visit the first one. There's a whiteboard in the room, but no other fancy equipment. This is the financial heart of my dream, where I can teach "computer literacy" much like I did at the University of Memphis. The women who come here may start out having never touched a computer before, or maybe not--many of my university students weren't sure which end of the disk to insert, at the beginning of the semester. But they'll leave here able to use Microsoft Office well, able to put up a web page, able to navigate both a Macintosh or a Windows machine. Give me two weeks with anyone literate, and she'll have that much. And if you're wondering how useful that is . . . walk into your local Randstadt (temp service) office, and tell them you're ready to pass a test on Microsoft Access. They'll offer to start you out at $15 an hour--a paycheck you can survive on, with benefits and room for advancement. Meanwhile, the so-called "Welfare-to-work" programs seem to be taking several months to teach our women to ask, "You want fries with that?" or "Mind if I get that trash can now, sir?"

But that's not the limit of my dream, at all. You see, the corporations will fund that much, because they don't mind outsourcing their training at all, and there's a desperate need for skilled workers in the area. And the corporations pay pretty well for that kind of thing. They pay enough, in fact, to maintain the facility, to keep the utilities running and the bathroom stocked, maybe even to offer overnight bunkhousing of some fashion. And, that means the building, the rooms, the land, the space, would all still be there on the weekends and after classes. That's where the rest of my dream comes in.

You see, computer skills and the usual "job training" isn't enough. I want to see women empower themselves, grow personally, come to recognize their own strength and bask in it. I want rural women to encounter "feminism" without fear. I want women trained to recognize domestic abuse, and ready to act to prevent it. I want spiritual gatherings, meditations, workshops, and events that have nothing to do with a computer and everything to do with my larger goal, that of empowering women to realize their full potentials, and of networking us all so that we can cooperate to accomplish still more. And all of this, I and those with me can do, in this space we create. Best of all, to the glee of my own twisted little sense of humor, while I'm sitting in another room in the building, sharing a feminist library with other women, learning myself from spiritual gatherings, healing workshops, and more, I'm going to smile at the thought that the corporations are paying for it.

The women I work with, I hope, will feel strong enough to step forward in whatever directions they choose, unafraid. If I'm truly fortunate, they'll often choose, perhaps after a time spent in the corporate workplaces available, to open their own small businesses, to create their own success stories. They'll be aware of the larger world, of the issues that affect us all, of the diversity of experiences by which so many different women come to define "the world."

And I, tired, happy with what has already been done, will turn my mind to solving the next puzzle to approach, and the next, and try to keep the whole boat floating, with all of us rowing together. I think we can do it.

If anyone reading this is interested in hearing more, or in participating, I'd love to hear from you. Already I have a possibility of what land to buy, and the strong and ready advice of an older woman firmly embedded in the local community, who thoroughly understands the economics of the region and is ready to help. Among those who have offered their assistance are a retiring state environmental engineer who will make sure the land itself supports the facility, our water is potable, and so forth. Another has a lifetime of valuable experience in the military and as a Scouting volunteer, as well as a paramedic's license and a plan for nursing school; she simply seems able to do or answer absolutely anything I've ever thrown at her. Another is a police detective with a couple good degrees and a good head on her shoulders. There are even some options for funding I'm investigating. So it's going to happen. If, by whatever coincidence, you'd be interested in helping to make this vision a reality, click that e-mail link below and tell me! All mail answered within 24 hours, I promise, under ordinary circumstances.

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