When I was a young girl, my mother would take me to Woolworths on 125th St in Harlem to pick up school supplies every year. After picking up my Trapper Keeper, pencils and rulers we would go do one of my FAVORITE things; go to the counter and get me a cheeseburger and strawberry milkshake. As I would sit on those stools spinning around until I was dizzy (or my mother made me stop! lol) I had no CONCEPT of the ability just to sit at a Woolworth counter and order food. I felt it was my Right to be served. I was served my beloved cheeseburger and milkshake and I ate with love and appreciation of those cheeseburgers that was slightly burnt on the outside and so juicy that the juice would run down my arms. As I grew older, my parents shared the struggle they had when they were my age to even be able to SIT at a Woolworth counter. They taught me and my sister about this word SEGREGATION. In school I learned Martin Luther King was good and Malcolm X was bad. I was HORRIFIED at an assembly where the school showed The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. The scene where the rebels killed Odetta and her infant stays vivid in my mind today. We watched Roots as a family. I cried and asked my parents the hard questions. I couldn't BELIEVE Mike Brady (Robert Reed) was using the N Word. Lorne Greene wasn't selling Alpo Dog Food but patting John Amos on the head like a dog. Vic Morrow was whipping Kunta and I damned near had a fit. I couldn't wrap my MIND around what I was seeing and reading. My school history books made slavery not so bad. They almost blamed Harriette Tubman for "freeing the slaves." It wasn't until college when I took an African Studies class that it became REAL to me. I thank my parents for raising me as a Christian First and a Black Woman second. I thank those who died so that I can be where I am and live where I live. My parents didn't teach me hate or racism. They taught me ABOUT racism, but never were racists themselves. On Election Night, I was in Pennsylvania working for the Obama campaign. When he won, I thought of my Mom. How PROUD she would have been to live to see a black President. I honestly cried for two hours off an on. My eyes were shut tight as a drum when I woke up the next day. My peers like my adopted "Mom" Rona Pienta knew it was a big moment for me, but I had a hard time explaining WHY. I felt we truly had overcame. In my own way I STILL do. Not simply because President Obama was black, but he was more that qualified to do the job. We had a conference call with then Candidate Obama and I snuck into the garage to cry(cuz I am PRIVATE like that) because the moment was overwhelming. Another worker had the same emotion and we stood together, me a black woman and he a hispanic man sharing one emotion that no one in that room could really and truly understand. I have multicultural friends and they will tell you-I have NO SHAME in putting someone in their place or give them a history lesson because I am a Proud Black Woman. I had no idea how many people remember no where I traveled in this world, I kept my straightening comb in my suitcase! lol I gave my former boss Janet Cowlan a coronary one night before a gig! lol I am 45 now. I miss those Woolworth cheeseburgers. I miss spinning on those stools. I miss my Mom. But I still carry that pure arrogance of you can't tell me where to eat, where I can go, who I can be friends with, and I now teach the young people who come into my life the lessons taught to me. It is my generations responsibility to take up that mantle and pass it forward and we are failing at doing that.