Me with John

John* I don't know where to start, gimme a question.

Jaha* When you remember the house on Orange Ave. what do you remember first?

John* 2060 Orange Ave.

Jaha* What do you remember first?

John* Uummm, what comes most to my mind was before Don and I started school. You know that picture of us with mama, and Don is crying? That picture was taken at 2060 Orange. I remember the guy setting up the camera. I remember Don being so fussy during that. When I look at it now and realize Don was crying all that time, it just kind of... I was curious as to why he was so fidgety. Just thinking back on it, as an adult, looking at the picture, I go back to that moment anytime Don and I have conversations. It helps me to put a perspective around our encounters. Sometimes they're very confrontational. For whatever reason, I sense that confrontation to be related to that moment and time. I don't know why. I just notice the difference in our countenances. I'm pretty laid back and he's pretty animated.

I see myself relative to my siblings

Jaha* So where are yall again?

John* We're just before Janice.

Jaha* I can never name it right.

John* I grew up between Jimmy and Don and Patsy. We got in trouble together and hung out together. I liked staying at home with mama and my sisters. Don and Jimmy would have to drag me outside and play. I would never wake up and say, "Let's go outside and play." I followed them out. Wesley drive or Leigh Court was our running ground. Whittier Elementary was where we went to school.

Me and Patsy are the quiet ones. Jimmy and Don were the ones who created the mess we got into. Anyway I found myself the quiet one of all them, similar to what I am today. Most times I preferred the company of my sisters or my mother. I wasn’t that athletic. I didn’t care to play kickball or whatever ball.

Jaha* When did you move to the west side?

John* Don and I started the 7th grade at Franklin, then we moved to 1291 Taper Street.

I went through high school and started college at Claremont in Pomona and went there for two years. After two years of Claremont, I didn’t want to stay there. I wanted to go back east. I had never been. I found this college called Connecticut College in New Haven. Therman was living in Pennsylvania and I figured I could go to see him. Mama and Daddy didn’t like it, but they were happy I was still in school. I got there and I had no interest in school. I traveled. I even went to Michigan one weekend with someone. I failed out of there. I ended up staying at Therman's. Angela had been born. She was maybe one or two.

Marilyn was into computers and I understood the kinda of work she was doing. I was trying to find work in Pennsylvania. Eventually I wasn’t finding work and I ended up going back to California.

I came back to the house and spent that whole summer getting high with Dundy and Don. Mama pulled me aside and said, "Either you go to work or go to school." I remembered Marilyn was working in computers and so I went to Control Data Institute. That’s how I started working in the field I'm in today. That was 1974. I started working in the payroll department of a company in Los Alamitos.

Therman was living in L.A. at the time. No, he was back east. We ended up talking one day one or two years after I started my job. People were asking me if I was going back to school. And I said I didn’t have a reason to because I already had a job. Therman was the one who went into why I should go back to school. He said it was the "ticket of ability." He said, "Just imagine years out when you don’t have a degree. The degree is the stepping stone to have the door open for you." The next semester I enrolled at Cal State Dominguez and transferred to Cal State Long Beach. In 1976 I had my degree.

(Break)

John* With this reunion coming up, Ive been thinking about my brothers and sisters and the excitement of seeing everybody in one place. I've been thinking about my comfort with it and my ambulance of it.

Jaha* Why are you ambivalent?

John* It's been a long time since we got together. It's the first time a niece or nephew put it on, except Ronnie who is kinda like a brother. The first time since Therman has been there.

I'm trying to open up conversations so that it gets a little deeper. I'm concerned about the future. You guys will survive us. We are the generation to go next. Ummm, I don't know what word to use besides ambivalent.

I'll be looking at all these people in terms of where we are in our lives, with Patsy dealing with her illness and I have my illness, Mildred is in her seventies. That's on my mind. On the good part, we all will be together. We'll get to talk to each other.

Jaha* Get together and go deeper and talk about what?

John* Like what's the legacy we wanna leave? I wanna talk about where we've been and what we've done. What can we do to help make the transition into your older ages different from ours. Like I'm single and got money saved. What can I do to help structure your children. Like getting a house and school and that kinda stuff. Talk about substantial things.

Jaha* Will you initiate those conversations?

John* I have already with Therman while he was here. I talked to your mother about it. She and I have a trust created that tells how we want our estates distributed when we leave this earth. My idea is to give some money to some charity, the church, how much I don't know. There is an amount that's there, but it can change over time. To provide that money for scholarships for people related to me and to support the black community at large.

Jaha* But will you introduce those conversations to us?

John* If there's is an opportunity when everybody wants to hear it, then I'm open to have the conversations.

The only thing I expect for the reunion is to talk about how to move this generation forward. You should have something to talk about. Your children are going to college. How are you going to support them? There's you, Roshann, Ronnie, Angela, I believe you guys have an idea of what you wanna do, but Joshua, Deon, Darius are just starting families. Like, I think about Mama and Daddy who had land in Louisiana and just let it go and didn't even try to claim it. We shouldn't let that happen.

That brings up other issues at looking at my brothers and sisters. I don't know, start at the top, Troy is gone. He has two children and grandchildren in Alaska. Since Troy has passed, how many people have engaged with them or gone to Alaska? It seems like with his absence we're not even trying to reach out to Betty. When she stops through here, I try to get together as often as I can but I'm about the only one. We owe it to Troy to try to be more inclusive. I don't even know if you know that Kim and Tony aren't together. He's going through a divorce and nobody is reaching out to him. There's no reason for that to happen when all that's required is to pick up the phone.

Jaha* Wow. That's why I just wanted you to talk. I couldn't have asked that.

John* Yeah, we are so disconnected. I see myself as a conduit that people tend to come through or go through to get my perspective. I've been talking to Darius since Val and Don split up. He's committed to going to school and he needs help financially and all that kinda stuff. He's been floating. With the break up of Don and Val and his brother acting half crazy. He's hurting. Not sure how to engage in stuff. Yet he's comfortable enough to talk to me. I'm committed to helping him with what I can.

Jaha* Where is he going to school?

John* He got accepted to Texas U. He wants to go for psychology and philosophy. The reason why is that his calling is to the ministry. I understand that. That's the depth of the conversations I'd like to have. I wanna know what's going on in your life. I'm open to hearing whatever is going on.

So that's basically where I'm coming from. I'm not a bs kinda person. I just wanna know where you're coming from and wanna evaluate it against my perspective of things. I have no obligations to agree with you.

And so to kinda deviate, with my sisters, I can talk to them about anything and everything. They open up about what's going through their minds. They ask me about how I'm feeling and what's going on in my life. They reach out to me to get involved with misunderstandings. I wish my brothers can have that same type of relationships with them. They are missing out on the opportunity to have that relationship. Just because they choose not to engage. Not just brother to sister, but man to woman. They empathize with me. They worry about me. I know they love me. There is no question they would do anything in the world for me. I say that about my nieces too.

It's my willingness to respect you as women and nieces and sisters. To empower you or to just give you the understanding that I'm there to give you what's necessary. But allow me to give my input. No flexing of muscles or trying to stand bigger. We come together as equals regardless of the ages. We can jump into conversations without all the shit that don't matter to nobody. I wish I could have the same relationship with my brothers. That's the Davis side of the family.

I do see a gene of Davis vs. Gray. The males in the family are more dictated by the Davises and the women are dictated by Grays.

Looking at the Davises from Daddy's perceptive and looking at the Grays from Mama's. Daddy was withholding. He didn't necessarily give you a basis of his thoughts. He would just give you blunt statements formulated however it was formulated. He would give you his opinion without telling you how he arrived there.

Whereas the Grays are more outgoing, more gregarious, more fun. You can read them pretty well. Most of the sisters have that. Bobby is probably is less Gray than Davis.

Jaha* You think Bobby is more Davis?

John* Yes. Of the sisters, she's the most.

Jaha* Why?

John* In my opinion, one of the things about the Davises is that we don't want to acknowledge our weaknesses or frailties. I could sit here and be in pain and never get on the phone and tell somebody. That's a Davis trait, trying to be strong but really not. We don't want to expose our limitations. That's why we laugh a lot. The Gray side is a lot more...willing to state what the problem is. The women may take more time to do it, but when they do, they do.

The Gray's are a lot more intuitive about approaches in life. More sensitive. More willing to take in a whole lot of variables to find a center and stand on that center. Janice, Mildred, Patsy, Bobby. They stand on their centers. They know their limitations in terms of being pushed past their core, they know their core. That's what I learned from my sisters. I am probably more Gray than Davis, which is unusual for a male in the family.

Let me tell you something.

Jaha* Ok.

John* Separate from the blog. Write it down though because I don't know if I'll ever say this again.

(We take a break from the blog and talk.)

(Back to the blog)

Jaha* Whatever happened to Rocco?

John* That story? Uuggggmmmm.

Jaha* I liked him.

John* Everybody liked him. I liked him. I had spent eight years with him. He formed all these relationships with my family, even Janice wanted to invite him to her wedding. When we were together and his mother or his sisters would call to speak to him, I would just hand him the phone. I didn't think about it. But I didn't know them.

I had come back down to Long Beach and he was still in San Francisco. While I was in Long Beach we were fighting a lot. He came down to the house and just said he wanted to end the relationship. He said he was embarrassed. He said I wasn't someone he would take home to his family. It really hit me that he knew my family but I never knew his. I said "Ok." He walked out of the house. I was really hurt but...

In 1988 I took an HIV test with a friend of mine and we found out that we were both positive.

Jaha* A lover or a friend?

John* A friend. I took him to Life Springs and he challenged me to take the test and I did. I said, "I'll go with you and we'll find out together." He ended up dying within five years of finding out. I found out in '88, Rocco and I broke up n '86.

Jaha* Did you ever tell him?

John* When he walked out that day that was the last day I talked to him. We communicated through letters about the business we had to settle.

In '86 he left and I'm dealing with all that. In '88 with Art I find out were both positive. That was enhancing stress. I had started plans on the house to do some remodeling and thinking I was going to get some quicker response from him and low and behold, the money wasn't coming in. People were pushing me to pay. I couldn't afford to stay there or finish the project. I couldn't live in the house but they had started the work such that I couldn't live there. Then at the time with Mama and Daddy in their situation, I moved in.

I knew I had to go somewhere and I had a job and that was the good thing. I continued working and let it play out however it was going to. In '88 when the doctor told me that I was HIV positive, I looked at him and said, "Now I know." From the Life Springs experience I just said, "It's in your hands, God." I resolved that I would die. I didn't think I would survive much longer than Art did. I thought I was going to die before anybody in the family. I didn't want to burden Mama with the reality of it. With what she was dealing with with Daddy, she had no reason to know about me. Because they didn't know, I couldn't tell any of the siblings. I just laid my life in God's hands.

The doctor wanted to put me on AZT which was the only thing out there at that time. God gave me the wherewithal to know that I'm wasn't feeling sick or down and there was no reason to take it. I told the doctor I would start when I had a reason, like when something showed up on me. He looked at me kinda surprised. I knew I was gonna have to adjust my life to deal with it.

By this time I'm still at the house and dealing with the loss of Rocco and the stress of HIV. Without a house. Adding all that stress lead me back to the house. What amazed me was that no one really inquired about the house. I was amazed that no one ever asked me about it.

Jaha* Grandmommy talked about the house all the time.

John* But not with me.

Jaha* So why did you move to Utah?

John* I was put on notice that my job at LAX was going to end. Unless I transferred to Tennessee I had to go to Utah. This job in Utah was presented to me and I just looked at it from the point of, I would have had to move to Tennessee, so the thought of moving was already there. I had no idea of what it would be like or how it would be. They set me up and I fell in love with the nature of the place. I thought, "What's keeping me in Long Beach?" I told Mama I was going to take the job in Utah.

I was happy with what I saw here. California had changed. I told her that she should put her house up for sale. Obviously she wouldn't. I told her she should get out with Daddy where she could live around doctors. Knowing that Daddy was not to live long and that Bubba was being challenged, I knew I had a value to be there with Mama and Daddy and Bubba in the house.

I had a revelation that death was going to occur in that house within the next five years. It was going to be me, one of them or Bubba. I knew that death was eminent. When the opportunity to go to Utah came for me I thought, "What reason was there to stay here." I thought it could be a new beginning for me. Frankly, was I ready to handle what I thought was to occur? Meaning, the death of someone that close to me. You know that Bible phrase, "Let the dead bury the dead?" That was running through my head. It just wasn't my turn. If I had been there as they passed, I don't know how... it was just better for me not to have been there. Before I left I knew Bubba was not going to live. Within one or two days of me leaving I told him to see a doctor. I begged him. He would not go. It became clear to me that I could not be here for what was going to occur. I couldn't witness it.

I had to go. God set up the circumstances. He set everything up to fall in place. So I got here and I started getting the word that Bubba was sick in the hospital and he died. Daddy and Mama continued another two years. Mama's death was a shock. I thought she would last much longer than that. So in that three year period, I don't know how I would have handled it. To be in that house and three people died. God had to know that I wouldn't have known how to deal with that. I thought I was going to be the first one to go. I think it was God's way of getting me out of there to center me on how to deal with losing Rocco. I think what's important is what I've become in this family since all that death. And then Therman getting lost in the wilderness. I think this was the blessing to get me strong enough to build us back where we are today. I don't think I could have been there for the family had I stayed in Long Beach.

Jaha* I think that about moving out here. I think that living here has added years to my life. I love L.A. but I would have been doing the same ole same ole. Not that it was wrong, but just the same ole.

John* Which is walking death to me. Me living here, I got back in the church and I don't think I would have ever. I'm around the best doctors as far as HIV. Seeing the family through what it has gone through. Troy dying. I had the experience that I had with Mama and Daddy. I got to show the family me as caretaker. I'm there for you. I don't have to be in your face. Seeing all my brothers go through their divorces. Then Therman comes back. I can't tell you what load is off of my shoulders with him back and enthuasitcally taking on the role of big brother and male head of the family. His absence... knowing he was not dead made me made me mad. Throwing his responsibilities all the way down to me. I'm sitting here worrying about my last days and then to take on those responsibilities.

On Don's comment about how we lined up at the church. Yes, I responded voraciously to him. But it was in respect of this. He and Val had just come into town the day before the wedding and all of a sudden he's talking about, "How come we're out of order?" Trying to get everybody in the same room to decide how we were going to do this... Then he says that. No, you just don't have a say right now. I wasn't trying to question his idea, I was just...you just got here. Just go along with it. No matter which way you look at it, somebody was going to be out of order. Yeah, I could have said it nicely but...

Don accepted my homosexuality and he found religion sometime thereafter. Like every person they become a little overzealous. He was trying to save me and Bubba and wanted us to accept Jesus like he had. I was like, "How do you know we don't already have Him?" 'Cause we didn't live like he lived. Since our adulthood he's always challenged me. I don't know what it is.