no limits.

Dear Melissa,

Today is a special day. And not just because Mommy has the day off work, though that is always cause to celebrate (unless Mommy has been put on bedrest; but that wasn't your fault) (until you start giving me lip and then, yes m'am! it was, so check yourself). And today is not special because I just dropped you off at daycare so I could go to this cool, little hipster coffee place I know downtown and mooch off their free wireless internet access. It's not special because I'm going to hang out here all afternoon and write my butt off.

And possibly my eyes. I think I'd really like to be able to say "This one time? I wrote my eyes off!"

Today is a special day because it's Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. By the time you're able to read this, you'll know all about him. But here is how I explain him to my first graders every year (maybe your first grade teacher will have a similar explanation):

Once upon a time, lots of people in our country didn't like lots of other people in our country because their skin was too dark. They thought that white people and black people shouldn't live near each other, go to school together, eat at the same restaurants, or even drink out of the same water fountains. But saddest of all, they couldn't even be friends.

Then, one day, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. came along and said: "Hey! That's not fair! EVERYbody should go to school together, eat together, drink out of the same water fountains. Everybody should live together and just get along.

That's called Peace, getting along. (And then I teach first graders the sign for Peace, which is two fingers held up. And then someone teaches me the hip hop sign for Peace, which is two fist pumps against his/her chest followed by kissing the two Peace sign fingers, which is followed by holding the Peace sign in the air.) (At the end of this very involved hip hop Peace sign, I must resist the urge to go: "Peace out, dog.")

So. Anyway. Dr. King and a whole bunch of his friends--white friends and black friends--all got together and had parades and speeches and wrote letters to the editor about it. They even got the President of the United States to say it was time for everybody to get along.

One day, somebody who didn't want different colors of people to get along and didn't like Dr. King just went up to him and shot him. ........Yes, he did die. Nope, sorry. When somebody shoots you, you usually die. Guns are bad, leave them alone. No, I don't want to hear about the gun movie you just saw. We're talking about Dr. Martin Luther King, not the movies. Dr. King is buried in Atlanta and you can go visit his grave. No, he won't be there for you to talk to. Because he died. About 40 years ago. Yes, he's gone. Forever. No, he isn't coming back. Because he got shot. No, the doctors couldn't fix him up. Yes, everybody was sad. No, he's not alive anymore. Listen! I'm sorry! But Dr. King died, he's DEAD. Okay?! Let it go.

The point is: the person who killed Dr. King didn't win, because the rules changed anyway. And now we all go to school together, drink out of the same water fountains, eat together, and some of us white and black people even get married, live together, and have babies named Melissa.

The End.

When you're old enough, Melissa, you'll learn it's actually not as simple as that. You'll find out there is still deep, ugly prejudice in the world; that some people don't like other people because they aren't light enough or they aren't dark enough; because they don't speak English, or because they speak English too well; because they don't have money or they have too much money, because they live in the neighborhood's trashiest house or because they painted their house green instead of brown; some people will hate you because you don't go to the right church in the right neighborhood. Some people don't like how other people pray, or that they don't pray at all; some people hate other people because they have purple hair, wear too many floral patterns, and have a lot of tattoos. There are a lot of differences in the world, and some people don't like Different.

You'll eventually figure out that there are still lots of people out there in the world who wish there'd never even been a Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Like, one day, we might be at a restaurant eating dinner as a family, minding our own business, and you'll see someone give our family a nasty look; maybe they'll even say something to us as they leave, something that will confuse you or hurt your feelings.

And then Daddy and I will have to explain they think like that because they're hurting on the inside, that because they hurt so much on the inside they don't know what to do about it, so they feel like they have to take it out on people they don't know, people who've never done anything to hurt them. We'll have to talk about how the way you treat other people says a lot more about you than anyone else.

One day when you're big enough, someone at school will probably ask, "What are you?" or "If your dad is black, why's your skin so white?" or "Why don't your mom and dad match?" And then Daddy and I will have to talk about how we're all the same on the inside; that people are people, not colors.

When you're all grown up, one day we'll watch GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER. And I'll tell you how this movie was exactly the way it was for me when I introduced your Daddy to my Mommy and Daddy. Except your Grandpa Bill was the Katherine Hepburn character who was shocked but philosophical and accepting, and your Grammy was the Spencer Tracy character who was shocked and it took a lot of talking and re-educating to get her to climb down from the ledge. She still has issues about it, but they're under control now and that's okay, because life is about progress not perfection.

By then, you'll be okay hearing about this because you'll know how deeply in love your Grammy was with you the instant she met you, that your heritage and skin color didn't even matter because she was far too concerned about how many times she was going to get to hold you and play with you and babysit you and buy you really odd baby toys like that one that buzzed all the time.

....though we now know for a fact Grammy had her Methodist ladies' prayer group bugging God to give you "good" hair. I mean, hello? Did those Methodist ladies stop to think that maybe God was a tad insulted by that? He DID invent "bad" hair, too, after all. And also, it's not like God doesn't have a whole bunch of other crap to worry about, like global warming and world poverty and who's going to win American Idol this year.

But by the time you're able to read this? You'll probably laugh like I did and go: Oh, Grammy! How'd you get to be so crazy, lady?? (But good lord, don't actually say that last part out loud to her. She'll retaliate by giving you a bizarre gift whenever possible; probably something that buzzes a lot.)

And that's why today is so special: it's Martin Luther King Day, and Martin Luther King, Jr. was one of God's gifts to the world. Dr. King taught us all to be proud of who we are; he showed us by example why we should judge each other by the content of our character, not the colors of our skin. He told the world that hatred was like darkness: only light can defeat darkness, and so only love can defeat hate.

You are a mixture of so many different heritages: Welsh, African, German, Cherokee, Scottish, French. You are a mixture of so many different people: you've got your daddy's eyes and chin dimple, my lips and face shape, your grandpa Bill's hairline, your grandma Eula's sweet nature, your Grammy's cheeks, your grandpa Charles' big smile, your Uncle Chad's odd sense of humor (really, Melissa, really? That hocking sound people make right before they spit is THE funniest thing, ever?? Classy!).

But most importantly? You're a little girl who gets to grow up in a world where there are no limits for you. No limits to what you can do. No limits to who you can be. NO LIMITS.

Tomorrow, we are getting a new President, and not only did you get to go to the polling place and help me vote for him before you were even born, he's also someone just like you: a mixture of many different heritages, many different people. But most importantly, we're getting a good man who wanted to make a difference; a good man who said: there should be no barriers for me, my children, or anyone else. And people really listened to what he was saying, and he won.

NO LIMITS.

When I graduated high school, your grandpa Bill wrote me a card and at the end of it, he said: "Now that you're going out into the world, you can do anything you want to do. Make it a better place than my generation and I did."

When you're big enough to read and understand this, I hope that's the kind of person you'll have turned into: someone who wants to do better than the people who came before her did; someone who dreams big, impossible dreams; who knows we are all far more alike than we are different; someone who is not defined by her gender, her color, her language, culture, ethnicity, or religious belief system; someone who doesn't define other people by theirs.

My act of service on Martin Luther King Day was to write you this letter, but also to promise to help you grow up into a person who brings light to places where it's dark, and love to people who only know hate. My dream for you is that you'll know what a blessing you are to so many people and you'll be proud of where you came from, but also that you'll feel blessed by all the people who cut a path through the forest for you: people like Dr. King and Ghandi, for teaching us about change and courage; Jesus for teaching us about love and forgiveness; Buddha for teaching us about acceptance and peace; Mother Teresa for teaching us about service and healing; your white grandparents for letting love win; your black grandparents for never blinking an eye; and everyone you will ever cross paths with who will love and accept you for who you are, exactly the way you are.

Children are proof God still loves the world and believes in our possibilities; you are proof that God loved and believed in me. You are the love of my life, and I'm deeply blessed that, of all the little girls in the world he could have sent to me, God gave me you.

Love,
Mommy