Category Archives: de rebus familiaribus

How we talk to our kids about racism in America and a list of antiracist resources.

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Above: 60,000 people marched alongside George Floyd’s family yesterday in Houston. He was born and raised in the city’s Third Ward.

Our daughters, ages 6 and 8, are nonplussed by some of their parents’ dinner table conversations these days.

“Why would anyone be mean to someone because they are black?” asked our youngest Lila Jane the other night.

After all, they live in what the Los Angeles Times has called “the most diverse place in America,” a city where they and their parents interact with every gradation of humanity every single day.

Tracie and I are trying our best to raise them as antiracists. But at their age, it’s hard for them to grasp the terrible legacy of racism in the U.S.

How do you explain to an eight- and six-year-old that a black man from our city, not much younger than their father, was brutally killed by a police officer simply because they suspected him of possessing a counterfeit $20 bill? How do you explain that three other police officers stood idly by as the man begged for his life and passersby pleaded with them to relent?

The other night at dinner they asked us point blank what had happened to George Floyd and why.

I make a living by speaking and writing. My friends often tease me that I always have something to say about everything under the sun.

But my voice failed me in that moment. I know the answer but I could not summon the words to articulate the explanation in a way that they would understand.

It will take years for them to wrap their minds around the disgraceful, ugly history of racism in our country.

“Some white people don’t like black people,” I told them.

“Why, daddy?” they asked.

“Because some white people think they are better than them,” I said.

They love their black classmates, they protested, clearly confused by what I had just told them.

“Some white people are mean to black people because they think they are better than them,” I said again.

“Why would someone be mean to my friend L [her classmate] at school?” asked Lila Jane.

“I don’t know the answer,” I said.

“But, daddy, you know everything!” said Georgia.

“I wish I did, sweetheart,” I said running my hands through Lila Jane’s long lockdown hair. “I wish I did.”

Tracie and I are trying the best we can to teach them how to be antiracists. But right now, the best way we can do that — we believe — is by example.

A good friend of ours asked me to share the below resources here on the blog. It arrived in his inbox via MBS.works via The New Happy.

I’m still searching for an answer for our girls. Someday I hope to find it. In the meantime, we’re trying to be “better ancestors.”

Thanks for being here and please have a look at the links below.

*****

“It is not enough to be non-racist, we must be antiracist.” — Angela Davis

“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” — MLK Jr.

What it’s like to be a black American wine blogger: “It was like a slap in the face, but yet just another reminder.”

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The following post was published on Friday by my friend and fellow Houston wine blogger Katrina Rene, author of The Corkscrew Concierge, on her Facebook. She has graciously allowed me to share it here (image via Adobe Stock).

I have been approached by a few people now asking what they can do. What should they say? I honestly don’t know. But…

I can tell you that I’m mentally exhausted and pissed as hell!

I can tell you that the anger and depression has taken my breath away and left me speechless with a great sense of futility.

I can tell you that my husband and I have had these conversations so many times that it’s as natural as “what’s for dinner?”

I can tell you that it cuts me to the core to listen to my husband telling my daughter (b/c I can’t do it!) that people won’t like her, not because of anything she did, but because of what she looks like.

I can tell you that while my daughter can understand such a message, my son (who has his own challenges) will be a different story altogether when his time comes.

I can tell you that I worry about my son, lose sleep because of his challenges, and know that the world will be so much more dangerous for him.

I can tell you that my husband is always outside in front of our house and frequently walks the neighborhood with the kids so that people recognize him and know that he “belongs” there.

I can tell you that if my husband has to knock on a neighbor’s door to return a package, lost pet, etc. he always takes one of the kids with him because he’s “scary” on his own and someone may assume he’s there to do them harm.

Speaking of our neighborhood, I can tell you that my deed restriction still has the old “racial restrictions” clause that only permits people of the “Caucasian Race” to dwell there. I was shocked to see it still there (with a line neatly drawn through it) when I built my house and it was like a slap in the face, but yet just another reminder.

I can tell you that my husband dresses “a level up” wherever he goes because he understands how he is perceived and that the same rules don’t apply to him.

I can tell you that I initially didn’t want my daughter to play tennis because no else there looked like her and I was afraid she’d be singled out. I can tell you that when she used to play matches, I would hold my breath if there was any sort of disagreement because I feared someone treating her badly.

I can tell you that my husband has been pulled over while “driving black” – not speeding, no broken tail light, etc. for almost an hour while the “peace officer” looked for something, expected him to react, but then eventually let him go. I guess he was lucky.

So just imagine if all of these things factored into your daily life, affected the most simple, basic decisions you had to make, and was always there in your consciousness. It’s 2020 and this is our reality. And sadly, ours is better than many.

Happy Mother’s Day, Tracie P! We love you with all our hearts.

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Happy Mother’s Day, Tracie P!

Just like me, you’ll never forget that photo, I’m sure. It was taken by a friend of ours on the occasion of Parker Elementary’s second flash mob concert, just a few weeks into the stay at home/work safe order in our city.

It was one of the scariest moments of our 12 years together. Was our community safe? Were our family and friends across the nation and the world going to be okay? What challenges would our own family face in the months that lay ahead? We’re still asking ourselves those questions.

But every day, like the morning of that concert, you get out of bed with a ready smile and hug for our girls, a new art or music project to keep them engaged, a special recipe to make our mealtimes colorful, and a coffee cup full of patience and tenderness for sometimes teary daughters and their often weary father.

Every day since the whole world changed, you have taught Georgia and Lila Jane — and me — about resilience. You’ve shown us how strength through hope, even in the face of uncertainty’s behemoth, is something we must never abandon as we carve out our new life in a world coming apart at its seams.

When we first met, I knew early on — we both knew — that we could build a life and a family together (remember how scary times were back then, dating in the thick of the financial crisis?). But neither of us could have imagined that we would be raising a family during a global pandemic. Today, on this Mother’s Day 2020, I can only thank my lucky stars to have a woman like you as my partner. Our daughters are blessed by your grace.

I love you, we love you with all our hearts. Happy Mother’s Day.

“WHITE WOMEN: Have you ever had to tell your kids people may HATE them because of their skin color?” Guest post by Kim Edwards Williams. #CareOutLoud

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“This is why we have to be explicit in saying that black lives matter!” wrote my wife Tracie on our Facebooks yesterday. Her note accompanied her repost of an op-ed that appeared in yesterday’s Washington Post, “Why is Georgia only now seeking justic for Ahmaud Arbery? We know the terrible answers.”

“I cannot imagine the terror he felt,” Tracie wrote, “when he realized he was being stalked by two white men with guns. This case has been buried and the buck has been passed until now, two months later…”

The post elicited a number of comments, including the following by our friend Kim Edwards Williams, who lives here in Houston. I reached out to Kim and asked her if I could share it here. She graciously agreed.

As Kim writes below, we need to share it. Please do.

G-d bless Mr. Arbery and his loved ones. G-d bless all black sons, daughters, mothers, and fathers. How is it possible that something like this can still happen in America in 2020? The answer lies in our moral negligence, in our ethical failure — as Kim writes — to #CareOutLoud.

Tracie, thank you for always speaking out. I appreciate you and your efforts.

This post is very important and powerful coming from YOU, but we need it to be on the timelines, IG posts, and Twitter OF ALL White women that say they ridin.

I’ve been sad, upset, crying (now), mad AF all in the last 5 hours. He was jogging y’all.

WHITE WOMEN: Have you ever had to tell your kids people may HATE them because of their skin color?

When your husband runs to the grocery store do you worry if he’s coming back?

When your family get pulled over by the cops have you or your kids ever have to witness their dad physically scared?

Have you ever had to explain to your silly, fun, kind loving, 13 year old son that his height and skin color is now very threatening to some people and teach him how to move through life. All while making sure that same son has the confidence to push pass all this bullshit, ugly crap to see his power?

They not listening to us, nor do they give a shit, but they will listen to y’all.

White women need a challenge to “care out loud for black lives”.

It’s a draining existence having to manage and kinda sorta protect the lives of our family members and this is DAILY mental work.

WOOOOOOAH……..vomit! I’m done let me go manage all my other responsibilities now.✌🏾

#IfYouMadPostIt
#CareOutLoud

Kim Edwards Williams
Houston, Texas
May 7, 2020

Image adapted from a photo by Johnny Silvercloud (Flickr Creative Commons).

“Ten years gone & you’re still turning me on.” HAPPY 10th ANNIVERSARY TRACIE P!

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Scroll down for the song I wrote for Tracie for our 10th wedding anniversary: “Ten Years Gone (and You’re Still Turning Me On).”

Tracie and I were married 10 years ago today in La Jolla, California where I grew up.

Our first kiss and first dance happened back in August of 2008 in Austin, Texas (at the Continental Club, where else?) after we’d already been in touch through our blogs for many months and many emails and texts had been sent back and forth.

By February of 2009, we were engaged. I had asked her to marry me after my band played a show in LA. We drank Bruno Paillard in our hotel room that night.

On January 31, 2010, we got hitched. Tracie’s dad, the Reverend Branch, officiated.

We drank Bollinger rosé all night that night at our reception at Jaynes Gastropub, one of our favorite restaurants, owned by our close friends, in San Diego.

After our honeymoon in Italy (where else?), we settled into a little house we rented in Austin. Both of our girls were born in Austin (Georgia in 2011, Lila Jane in 2013) and we brought both of them home to that little house on the corner of Gro[o]ver and Alegria (streets have never been so aptly named!).

In early 2014, we moved to Houston where we rented and still live in a bigger house in a neighborhood that we love and a community where we have put down roots.

Georgia’s eight years old now and Lila Jane’s 6. Our house is always filled with lots of music and now a couple of chihuahuas, too.

We’re still as broke as the day we met (well, maybe not quite that broke) and we still struggle to get by. But we’re all happy, healthy, and doing things we love and enjoy.
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Help us raise an MLK billboard over the Confederate memorial in Orange, Texas for MLK Day. Just $240 needed to meet our GoFundMe goal.

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UPDATE (January 15): We’ve reached our goal! Thank you so much to everyone who donated and shared. The GoFundMe is still active if you’d like to donate to our future efforts. We’ll probably raise another billboard in the summer. Thank you to all for the support and solidarity.

We are just $240 short of our fund-raising goal of $600 needed to raise a billboard celebrating the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King that will look down on the newly erected Confederate memorial in Orange, Texas where Tracie grew up.

Click here to donate.

We have already secured the billboard space: the artwork (above) will go live just in time for Martin Luther King Day and will stay up through most of African American History Month.

The sign was created by a designer from Orange.

It will also be up in time for our Martin Luther King Day protest of the memorial (from 2-4 p.m.). See details here. We hope you will join us.

And if you can’t, please consider giving what you can to our campaign. Every little bit helps.

Graphic designers: we need your help to fight racism in Southeast Texas

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“A time comes when silence is betrayal.”
— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Graphic designers: Tracie and I need your help to design an electronic billboard to be displayed across from the newly erected Confederate memorial in Orange, Texas (on the Louisiana border) where Tracie grew up.

We first began protesting the site — which stands on the corner of Martin Luther King, Jr. Dr. and Interstate 10, in view of the freeway — in 2017.

Last year, as part of our Martin Luther King, Jr. Day protest, we used a GoFundMe to raise money for an electronic billboard celebrating Dr. King and his quest to end racism in the U.S. The “ad” was displayed on a commercial billboard that literally looks down on the site from across the road.

You can see last year’s billboard artwork here.

And you can see images of the actual billboard here (on our GoFundMe).

Last year’s billboard was designed pro bono by a designer friend of mine. This year, we’re hoping that someone new will step up to help us with our campaign.

If you’re interested, please shoot me an email by clicking here.

Over the course of our efforts, Tracie and I have been threatened with physical violence, slandered via an anonymous “poison pen” letter, and told that “Jesus Christ [expletive] hates us.”

We stand undaunted by the cowardly efforts to silence us — yes, I’m talking about you, Sons of Confederate Veterans!

Click here to read more about our campaign.

Thank you for your support and solidarity.

Rock out with me, Tracie, and the girls this Sunday, December 29 at 13 Celsius wine bar

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That’s one of my favorite photos from back in the day. Tracie and I had just met for the first time the month before (following a six-month e-mance). But I was in East Germany playing a gig with my band Nous Non Plus at a European Green Party retreat (no shit).

Dany Le Rouge (yes, Dany himself!) was dancing with a beautiful girl dressed in red in the audience at that show.

The year was 2008 and things were finally looking up after an annus horribilis in New York the previous year (well, honestly, looking back on it all, it wasn’t so bad, except for the financial crisis).

We had just sold a song to the TV show Girls on HBO and one of the producers featured us on his playlist (that was huge!).

And this beautiful woman from Austin, Texas had just come into my life — changing it forever and for better.

Today, nearly 12 years later, I’m a dude in his 50s who plays 70s and 80s covers at funky downtown natural wine bars. Who would have thunk it?

This Sunday, our band BioDyanmic (I know, right?) will be playing two sets at one of my favorite wine hangs, 13 Celsius (which is actually in midtown, equally funky).

AND… the amazing Thomas Cokinos will be sharing lead vox duties with me. He is not only a super talented player but a super frontman frontperson. Really great.

Click here for the details but all you really need to know is that we will take the stage around 1 p.m. and that me, Tra, and the girls (yes, it’s kid-friendly) will be hanging out afterwards to see the other bands and to enjoy some great wine (at discounted prices; they do this crazy “Sunday Situation” discount program there). The small plates are also excellent (the girls love the charcuterie).

I hope you can join us to end 2019 in bellezza as they say in Italian.

NEW Parzen Family Singers album: “Day After Yesterday” (+ CHRISTMAS VIDEO)

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Happy Holidays, everyone!

The song in the video above is from Parzen Family Singers’ NEW album, “Day After Yesterday,” now out on BandCamp!

The girls and I co-wrote the first track, “Why Can’t It Be Christmas (Every Day of the Year).” I fed them the title lyric and a backing track. And then set them up with a couple of SM58s. They took care of the rest. I really love this year’s Christmas song (but then again, I love them all).

Lila Jane and I wrote “Paco Chihuahueño” for the newest addition to the Parzen Family Singers (it’s his growl at the top of the track). Our other chihuahua got a song on the last album so it was only fair that Paco get his. Lila Jane and I improvised the vox in one solid take. For real. I wrote the lyrics as the track was rolling and LJ was right there with me. I’ll never forget that moment. It was so cool and so much fun.

“Shut It Down” was inspired by a protest we attended outside a migrant processing center near downtown Houston. I made a few videos for social media at the protest and when I watched the videos back at home, I realized I could “sample” them and splice them back together as a track. The chants themselves inspired the groove. Like all of our songs, it captures a moment in our year, in our lives. The girls have been going to protests with us as long as they can remember.

The girls asked me to write “Day After Yesterday (Emilee’s Song)” for their cousin who was in a really bad accident this year. We’re happy to report that she’s doing well (just graduated from college, on track, as a matter of fact, cum laude). The title came from a favorite malapropism of Georgia’s. I’ll never forget writing the song and lyrics sitting in my F150 in a H-E-B parking lot. It just came to me, like I was channeling it. Lila tracked her vox like a pro, in just two takes. Her vox really take it over the top.

I wrote and sang “Ten Years Gone” for me and Tracie’s upcoming 10th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY! Ten years gone and you’re still turning me on/Ten years after and it’s still laughter and song. That’s the chorus. We’ve been planning our anniversary celebration and we both keep saying to each other: it doesn’t seem like 10 years have passed; it seems like yesterday! So true. If you listen closely you can hear one of the dogs barking on the slide guitar solo I played on my Taylor. I’m not sure what dog it was (I think it was Paco).

“The Mime and His Phonograph” is one of those songs that might have ended up on a Nous Non Plus record (if we were still writing and recording together). I’ve always been fascinated with the year 1888 (the year Nietzsche began to lose his mind). And so I tried to conjure images of what it might have looked and felt like when you wandered the streets of Paris then. To my surprise, I came upon a mime with a secret and special power.

Click here to listen and download now!

Happy holidays and thanks for the support, solidarity, and friendship.