To those that have been wondering where I’ve been THIS time, I’ve been away focusing on finishing my book, “Daddy’s Doing Hair?!?!?”. I have a difficult time focusing on more than one project at once, so I decided to restrict my writing efforts solely to edit and proofread the book. I have to tell ya, trying to proofread my own work has been VERY difficult. Every day, I always seemed to find a better way to say something that I had already said…a less wordy way to relay a thought. So, needless to say, there’s been a LOT of time spent doing rewrites. I’m sure that there are more hiccups to be found, but at least I can breathe a little bit now that the first pass has been done. (The things you do when you don’t have the cash to pay a professional editor, huh?)
Anyway, the goal is to start a Kickstarter page to help fund the printing of the book in the next few weeks. I’ll keep you all posted on when that happens. But in the meantime, I thought I’d share with you the “Thank you” section from the prelude. There are so many people that I want to thank, and I’m sure that there are some names that I probably forgot to mention…but those of you that know me personally, know that I have the attention span of a tsetse fly and any omissions are purely due to lack of concentration.
Thank You’s
I’d like to thank several people for making this book possible.
God… There are so many reasons why I HAVE to thank you first. You blessed me with the girls. You blessed me with the ability to put my thoughts into words. You blessed me with all of the experiences that I needed to have in order for me to grow. For these things and countless others, I thank you beyond the words that my limited mind can muster. Nothing that I could say would be great enough to thank you for all that you have blessed me with. You bless me even when I don’t deserve it. I don’t have the words that can convey my thanks enough.
Josephine Sutton. ( Mama) Wow, I owe you so much. If it were not for you, I wouldn’t have had the belief in myself to think that I could EVER write this. You were the first queen in my life. You taught me what it was to be a man when I had no example of what a man was. You kept me away from all of the negative influences that could have taken me, and you kept the darkness of the world at bay with the light from your strong spirit.
I may have been hungry…but I was never starving. I might not have liked all the free vegetables you got from all over Wallace, but they kept me alive. Now that I am an adult with my own kids, I see that you were doing everything within your power to keep us going. Your efforts did not go unnoticed. Your sacrifices did not go unappreciated. Your story will ALWAYS be told and it will always be told with fondness, and entwined with exultation of your determination, character, and all surrounding love. Words of you will draw breath even after we all have long moved on from this world.
Sharon…… I would never have finished this without you pushing me. I would never have SURVIVED raising the girls if it had not been for your calming presence. I would not be the man/ Daddy that I am today without your guidance. Thank you for being the love of my life and my absolute best friend.
Tee and Kee a.k.a. The Girls… I thank you for allowing me a place in your lives. Please know that I never took it lightly. I know that in some places I fell short, but my plan was to ALWAYS end the day with you guys being a bit stronger and my goal has always been to enable you two to live WELL and fearlessly after your mom and I are long gone. You guys have become strong, beautiful, intelligent, lil ladies, and I’m glad that we got to take this ride of parenthood/childhood together.
My brothers, Nathaniel, Bobby, Dale and Sidney … Each of you contributed to the man that I have become.
Nathan – You taught me the necessity of having to simply slow down sometimes, and to keep working on a problem until I got a solution. I still remember the ONE time that I went fishing with you. I got my line all tangled up and you let (made) me work on it until I got frustrated, and then you pitched in and helped me untangle it. It would have been much easier to just cut it and start over, but because you wouldn’t allow me to take the easy route, I began to learn the value of patience, persistence, and perseverance. Since then, there have been many days that I received a sense of accomplishment from fixing a problem instead of abandoning it when it became difficult. That small lesson was my first step in the marathon of my believing that I am stronger than any situation that I am confronted with. Thank you.
Bobby – You’re my superhero, man. Like I always tell you, NO superhero ALWAYS wins. Superman gets beat up. Spiderman gets taken to the brink of death. Batman ends up in bandages. What makes them superheroes is that they never QUIT until they win. That’s how I see you, big brother. You might not always win, but you always get up swinging. You ALWAYS believe that your win is on its way and you never give up. You NEVER give up. I thank you because I get my fighter’s attitude from YOU. I coined a phrase because of you. I’m sharing it here for the first time. “The only fight that you are guaranteed not to win, is the one that you don’t fight.” You helped me learn how to always fight. Thank you.
Dale – Dude, you have GOT to be the hardest worker I have EVER seen and probably one of the best all-around MEN that I have ever been blessed to know. I know that you thought that people weren’t watching as you were picking up cans to pay for your daughter’s band instruments, but I was. And your toiling away even to this day isn’t in vain. We see you. Thank you for my work ethic.
And the late, Great Sidney D. Sutton – I miss you bruh. Man, your love of your family was OBVIOUS to anybody with eyes. I remember talking to you about how our family may have our issues, but our how we were all good people with good hearts. Man, you personified that. You may have had your faults, and we may have had our moments, but I could never question whether or not you would be right there for any of us if things hit the fan. As you would tell me, “Man…I’ll fight for you…just let me get a hit of this inhaler so I can catch my breath first.”
All of you cats hold a piece of the formula that made me, and I appreciate it.
Now, to my sisters….Joann, Wanda and Charmaine.
Joann, what more can I say besides, “Who loves ya, baby?” Joann, your laughter was always the most infectious thing in my life. To this day, there are very few things that I enjoy more than making you laugh. To you, I owe my ability to see the joy in the situation, no matter how dire it may look on the surface. You have taught me how to see the light at the end of any tunnel. You never lose your smile. You never stop laughing. Just being near you makes people feel better.
Wanda “GAL”, in MY mind, you’re one of the toughest women in the world. A wise person once said, “It wouldn’t be called “going through” if you weren’t expected to come out the other side. It would be called ‘going in’.” Whenever I think of that saying, I think of you, and I keep going.
Now….Charmaine. Girl, you need to know that you are my heart. Ever since you were small, you were always my partner in crime, knowingly or not. Lil sis, you will always have a very special place that no one else in the world can even hope to get close to. I know how tough things are for you sometimes, so a lot of what I do every day is in the hopes that I can eventually bring a bit more joy into your life. My work is just as much for you as anybody. Know that. Now, here’s something that I never shared with you. The basic format of this book came from you. Here’s the story…
One time, when I was in the Air Force, and I was visiting home on leave, I found a notebook in Mama’s room. The notebook itself was nothing special; just a ratty old spiral notebook with handwriting all over the cover. I still don’t know why I even opened it, other than it was part of God’s plan all along, but when I did, a transformation began in me. What I read were some of the most beautiful, most honest, most poignant, most inspiring words that I have ever read. On those pages, a young, pregnant girl had written letters to her unborn baby. She had written about how scared she was and about how she didn’t know how she could raise a child; still being a child herself. She wrote about her dreams of moving away from small town Wallace, NC, and doing big things that would take her far beyond the limits of Kenan Loop Road.
The soul of those few pages stayed with me. They sparked in me a decision that once I had kids,that I would be the best that I could be for them. That I would approach my days with them with honesty, that nothing would make them feel like a burden to me…and that my heart would be their heart.
Something that has come to me since that day, however, is the realization that dreams don’t have expiration dates. I have learned that the crossroads in life don’t have to lead to dead ends, unless we let them. Life is ALWAYS going to happen, but the key is to not let the living of life get in the way of living life. Charmaine, we can still do big things, lil sis. The things on the pages of that ratty old notebook are about to send us on an amazing journey of learning and discovery.
This all comes from you.
And lastly… Thank you to Rueben Richardson. (I bet you didn’t know you were involved in this, did you?) You revived and gave focus to the idea of “Dadddy’s Doing Hair?!?!?!” with one simple question one day. You walked up to me and asked, “Man…what did you do to have such a strong relationship with your girls?” Right then, I realized that maybe there was something that I had to offer other men raising daughters. Your question made me realize that the rumor of the demise of Black Daddyhood is GREATLY exaggerated and that I need to share my story.
Welcome to Daddyhood!
Daddy's Doing Hair?!?!? 