Black and Proud

Dear Tom,

Growing up, I didn’t daydream about love and marriage like other girls my age. From school to helping Granny with the laundry, there was so much work to do—when I finally got a moment to myself, I wasn’t foolish enough to imagine what I could never have. I knew that after I finished my education, I would come back home to take care of Granny and help with the laundry business. My life was already laid out for me, and love definitely wasn’t a part of the plan.

The past few years—coming to the North, studying medicine, meeting you—have been amazing. I found everything that I never thought I could have, and then much more. But all this time, one crucial thing was missing: me. As you now know, I’m colored; and my name isn’t Patricia, it’s Pinky. In the North, far away from Granny, Miss Em, and all the rest, I was able to pass for white and enter another world. For the first time in my life, I wasn’t  inferior. I wasn’t harassed. I wasn’t called names or spit at. I lived as an equal, without the constant presence of racism and discrimination. Passing changed everything—suddenly, I knew exactly what I was missing. I knew all that I could have if not for the label of “colored.”

Eventually, though, I came to see that the privileges I enjoyed while passing were meaningless because I wasn’t myself. I was denying my identity: the African-American heritage that I am so proud of and the Granny that I love so much. As much as I wanted to keep my life in the North, there came a day when I realized I couldn’t do so at the expense of myself. Can you try to understand? Going to Denver would mean running away from my identity forever. It would mean leaving my people. It would mean a lifetime of pretending.  You’ve got to make a break for it, you urged me on that fatal last day, get away from it! But I don’t want to get away from anything. I’m black, and proud of it.

I’m staying in the South with Granny, for good this time. I’ve converted Miss Em’s house into a clinic and nursery school for blacks, thus doing my part to bring my people closer to living the kind of life that I did as a white woman in the North. I hope you can one day understand why I made the decision that I did; why it’s so important for me to be myself. Please believe me when I say it’s better this way.

I am sorry, though, for the way that things ended between us. I really did love you, Tom, and appreciated your withholding judgment on my true identity and your support throughout the trial. I just wasn’t willing to pretend to be someone that I’m not. In the end, I loved myself and my blackness more than I loved you.

I wish you a lifetime of happiness, and hope this letter finds you healed. I’ll never forget you.

Yours,

Pinky Johnson

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