THEY’RE MINE. THE BROWS ARE ALL MINE.

in ,

How my mother claimed autonomy in her hardest season.

photo courtesy of visual creative

Complications from diverticulitis and a mild stroke earned her two months away from home, split between the hospital and a rehab facility. Thankfully, there were no lasting deficits, but the blood loss left her in a weakened state. Outside of therapy sessions, she spent most of her time in bed or seated in a reclining leather chair, where I gave her sponge baths and helped her into loungewear sets.

I surprised her with two pairs of cute sunglasses and a sassy new wig. The bangs were too long, so I covered her shoulders with a wastebasket liner and gave her a choppy, salon-quality trim with professional shears. I finished the look by tapping a bit of concealer under her eyes and dabbing her lips with a sparkly Pat McGrath gloss.

photo courtesy of ph-m-tr-n-hoan-th-nh

Momma inspected herself in a handheld mirror. She tilted her head, checking the angles. There was a pause; her shoulders stiffened slightly. She drew the mirror closer to her mouth. Her glossy pout caught the light — the shimmer flickering pink, gold, green. Slowly, she lowered the mirror, exhaled, and fixed her gaze on mine.

A million-dollar question ensued.

“Where are my eyebrows?”

She never blinked. It was a demand, not a request. In that moment, her brows were of utmost importance – and I had come up short and failed. Miserably.

Let’s dip a toe into my own psychology for a spell: I love my mother beyond measure, overanalyze everything, and tend toward the sensitive. Add a dash of guilt to the mix, and what do you get? A self-inflicted purgatory of analyzing, navigating, and reliving every decision I’d ever made as a caregiver — like “disappearing” her old Almay “brow” pencil. The dark green expired one that leaked glitter everywhere.

The function of eyebrows is rooted in evolution: protect the eyeballs from sweat. The aesthetics of eyebrows is subjective, mutable; a relevance that aligns more closely with the spirit of Melani Sanders’ We Do Not Care Club:

We do not care if they’re sparkly and green. EYEBROWS are EYEBROWS.

photo courtesy of jessie koranteng

As a caregiver, I had signed on to relieve Momma of burdens that undermined her autonomy – not dissect its overall essence and reshape it to suit my preferences. I was the assistant, not the CEO. And that’s exactly where I wanted to be.

She’d held onto that stubby crayon because it wasn’t junk to her. I’d thrown it away like the decision had been mine to make. The realization of this overstep slapped me straight into next week. 

Shout out to next-day-eyebrow delivery: You selected a template shape printed on paper, cut it out with scissors, and held it in place above the eye. Then you dampened the paper cutout with a cotton ball and carefully peeled the paper away: revealing a surprisingly realistic, polyvinyl tattoo that lasted four or five days.

Later on, she was seated in the armchair by the window when the nurses came to check her vitals. She was dressed in her favorite pink loungewear: freshly washed, soft against her skin. Her choppy ‘do and glossy lips refracted all but the most obvious signs of weariness her health battles had etched across her face - effectively disguising the hell she endured.

She was magnetic. One by one, the nurses and therapists circled about, offering compliments:

“Ooh, look at you!”
“That gloss is everything!”
“Girl, that haircut!”
“Okay, now! Who did your brows?” 

Momma basked - barely. And then she turned slightly toward me with the gentlest fluttering of lashes. A glance. Nothing more. But it held everything all at once:

Watch. Learn.
This is how it’s done.

She turned back to her audience, lips stretched into the slightest, faintest smile. Not rude. Just… practiced. A quiet acknowledgment of what she already knew to be true: 

“They’re mine. The brows are all mine.”

And just like that, they were.

I had spent so much time holding on: correcting, tracking, trying to right the perception of wrong - like love required a tally. Post-stroke, post-bleed, post-diagnosis - she was still brilliant, with nothing to prove. She instinctively let go of what was no longer useful. And when it was gone, it was gone.

There was no good reason to stay tethered to a linear reality. It didn’t serve us. It only got in the way.

The Pat McGrath lippie sparked fire under the room’s fluorescent lighting as her admirers puttered about. Her lashes met mine again, fluttering. I fluttered my own right back.

I still had so much to learn. And that was okay.

I was the daughter. She was the teacher.

She was still in the lead. Always would be.

WARM LIKE WINTER

in , ,

Memory, protection, and the women who still shine.

February 2019 – Henderson 

photo courtesy of francisco jose murcia

The first blizzard in over a decade blanketed our neighborhood with four inches of snow.

It was late, about 10 p.m. She was sprawled on the sofa watching one of her home renovation shows. The fireplace was going, making the living room feel too warm. 

I knelt on the loveseat in front of the window, tugged open the blinds, and caught a glimpse of white.

“Is that snow?”

Momma’s voice went up an octave like it always did when she was excited. Sixteen years had passed since she relocated from the heartland to the wild, wild west, but she was still a Wisconsinite at heart.

She shifted suddenly to have a better look, startling Ebony, who jumped from her lap and darted upstairs. “Sorry, Eb,” she called after him.

“I’ll get our coats,” I said.


February 2019 – Henderson, Upstairs

It was lying across the head of my bed where I’d left it earlier: a chocolate mink pea coat with a suede sash. Ebony had already claimed it and curled up on top, his face turned toward mine. He slow-blinked when he saw me. I kissed his forehead and moved him gently to the foot of the bed. He leapt to the floor in a bit of a huff. “Sorry, Eb,” I called after him.

The lining sagged slightly and the edges were a bit frayed. I once caught Ebony grooming it when he thought I wasn’t looking. Twenty-three years earlier, Aunt Myrtle had gifted it to me with a new satin lining intact and my name embroidered inside. Even a non-fur person like me had felt the love. 


April 1996 – Milwaukee

Inside the pocket, there had been a folded page from Allure: a photo of Kate Moss wearing the same design.

That spring I had designed a calligraphy banner for the Delta Memorial Endowment Fund’s Annual Literary Luncheon. I enjoyed spending the day with Momma, Aunt Myrtle, Auntie Clara, their sorors. Michele Wallace was the keynote speaker – I read her books in undergrad, fangirled from afar. Meeting her in person and hearing her speech had been more than payment enough, but Aunt Myrtle insisted.

Aunt Myrtle had only worn it a handful of times since buying it in 1978, and she had it restored to pristine condition for me. Steamed lining, reinforced seams, meticulous stitches. She draped it across my shoulders and I felt the weight of history and love in one gesture. My name, embroidered inside.


January 2018 – Los Angeles

After nineteen years of living in Southern California, I hated forced air. I never once turned on the heater. When the cold crept in, I welcomed it. I sat on the sofa or bed, cracked the window, and let the air sting my arms, wrapping myself in the coat instead.

What started out as a casual, secret affair grew into love. If someone rang the doorbell unannounced, I made a beeline to the closet, hid the coat, and pulled on a sweater before answering. As if I were hiding winter itself. 

Los Angeles never gave me snow. The coat became my snowbank, my private blizzard – a winter wonderland that lived only in my apartment, only for me.

So when I packed up to move to Black Gardens later that year, it was one of the first things I pulled from the boxes. Desert nights can be colder than people think.


February 1978 – Milwaukee

When Momma opened the drapes that morning, our driveway was encased by the tallest mound of snow we’d ever seen. The city plow had stopped short of our house, leaving the mountain behind like an afterthought.

Normally she would have been up early, already laying her coat and suit across the bed, already getting my school clothes ready, already setting out cereal bowls. But not that morning. She stayed in her robe and made pancakes.

After breakfast, we bundled up in parkas and snow pants, went outside, and pressed our arms and legs into the snow. Elbow to elbow, we carved angels into the white.

February 2019 – Henderson, Night

photo courtesy of ka newborrn

I crossed the hall to Momma’s bedroom. A cotton puffer jacket rested on a chair. I hesitated, then opened the closet. Rows of black velvet hangers. There it was: a blonde mink pea coat with a suede sash. One she had owned for forty years. Rarely worn, not her favorite, but somehow it survived four houses and two states. Somehow it had always escaped the bags of SafeNest donations she packed every six months and left by the curb.

She slipped it on. I slipped mine on. Our elbows linked.

Two coats, two women, stepping outside into a living snowglobe. No plows, no green “Keep Milwaukee Beautiful” salt chests. Just desert silence. Flakes dusting our lashes and melting on our tongues like unleavened communion wafers.

We strolled arm in arm, laughing like schoolgirls, warm in each other’s presence.


February 1993 - Philadelphia

I ignored the “Do Not Cross. Go Around” yellow caution tape that partially blocked the scaffolding on Chestnut Street after a deep snowfall. It was a tiny stretch – six yards at most. Rerouting pedestrian traffic to a roadside path seemed rather extreme. This was Philly; cars didn’t yield worth a damn in the best of weather. Besides – I’d be quick.

A mini-avalanche from above hit my head and knocked me flat, muffling my “WTF?” screams. Just powder, not ice. Three men across the street pointed to the signage, back to me again, and doubled over with laughter. Half chuckling and half humiliated, I stood up, brushed off, and went about my business. 

I had my warning. It struck like lightning and flattened my arrogance in an instant.


June 2023 – Milwaukee 

The plan was for Auntie Clara – my mom’s lifelong best friend and fellow Delta soror – to accompany me to Momma’s funeral, but she had injured her back and was still on the mend. So I went to her house after the service.

We sat on her sofa with her daughter Kim for two nights straight, catching up over hugs and plates of barbecue.

She shared memories of my mother, both silly and serious.

Like channeling Snow White: 

“Her parakeet, Petey, would fly straight to her shoulder, content as could be – and glare at everyone else in the room with his beady little eyes.” 

Or dressing like Mary Tyler Moore:

“The Black Mary Tyler Moore,” she corrected. “One windy fall morning I pulled into the office lot, and there was your mom stepping out of her Oldsmobile Cutlass: A-line turtleneck sweater dress, matching hat, curls peeking out, fresh lipstick. I thought, she’s gonna take off that hat, spin around, toss it in the air, and flash that little lipsticked smile right in the middle of the lot. Then I thought, nope. Not the Black Mary Tyler Moore. She wasn’t about to ruin that rollerset before 8 a.m.”

They had each other’s backs, from their childhood friendship through the evolution of their careers at MPS as principals, administrators, and board members.

Momma advocated for Black teachers and students, but constantly fought against systemic efforts to block her autonomy.

“Your mom was directly involved in overseeing programs for children enrolled in public schools, especially Title I and other federal initiatives. She was promoted, given new titles, but others tried to strip her of authority - moving her, renaming her roles, taking away real decision-making power. She kept working for Black children even as the system tried to box her out.”

Auntie Clara fought against the unwritten rules limiting Black teachers per district. 

“At that time you could have one, maybe two Black teachers in a white school, and limited numbers of Black teachers per district. It wasn’t written anywhere, but it was enforced like law. We fought to break those rules, but every appointment came with a fight.”

When Momma’s promotion was announced, her car was vandalized in the parking lot. 

Then the anonymous phone calls came: men tied to the teachers’ association, trying to bar Black teachers. Every night, every fifteen minutes or so.

Auntie Clara ramped up her efforts by planning an out-of-state meeting with California legislators. And on the evening before catching her flight, her garage was firebombed.

“They said, ‘Call it off. Call it off.’ When I refused, they burned down my garage. They traced accelerants from the garage to my kitchen windows. The firemen told me it was professional. That was the cost of insisting that Black children deserved principals, teachers, and curriculum that reflected them. That’s the kind of danger we faced for simply demanding equal footing.”

She stood in her nightclothes comforting her daughters while firefighters battled flames meant to erase her.

Momma always downplayed the danger in front of us. Her phone conversations were hushed, sotto voce, spoken in code. I strained to catch bits and pieces. She could spin why we had a loner car for so long, or why there had been a fire in Auntie Clara’s garage. But she couldn’t explain away the time Aunt Myrtle – then serving as an assistant principal – was physically assaulted in a classroom.

She came to our house a few weeks later, her jaw broken, rewired, her teeth replaced. The sight of her injuries made everything click. I finally understood: Aunt Myrtle, too, had stood in the line of fire simply for showing up as a Black woman in power.

July 2023 – Henderson

Two months after Momma died, I found a 1963 newspaper article commemorating Delta Sigma Theta’s 50th anniversary. It was accompanied by a black-and-white photograph of my young mother, Aunt Myrtle, Auntie Clara, and their fellow sorors. Sharp, radiant, call-to-action ready.

I knew the cost behind that shine.

Outwardly elegant, but not about fashion. It was rooted in love, in service, and commitment to community. They built the intellectual and activist scaffolding for generations to come. Growing into the women they were always meant to be.

I struggle with the history of the coats when juxtaposed with the larger reality that fur represents. A sacrifice offered by an unwilling animal down to the skin, with a cruelty that can never be overlooked or diminished.

Indigenous traditions acknowledge the breadth of sacrifice that animal consumption represents. Expressing gratitude, honor, and not wasting any part of it – all of these align to hold the memory as sacred.

Perhaps the coats carried some of that same lineage. Maybe they were less about vanity – and more about protection. Visible armor when navigating rooms of importance. Insulation to brace the cold without flinching. Buffer to keep moving forward with dignity. Shield against resistance. External noise. Imminent danger. Accelerant fire. All of it.

August 2025 – Henderson

“I don’t ever despair when it comes to education. Children will make it, they will succeed. But it has always taken women like your mother: principals, administrators, sorors – willing to endure the politics and the danger, to carve out spaces where Black children could thrive.”

— Dr. Clara New

Aunt Myrtle and Auntie Clara: this piece is for you. You are brilliant women who carved space for justice, who taught me that elegance is power and courage is style. You made a difference. You will never be forgotten. You are part of my mother, and part of me. And you still shine.

By now it’s obvious: every piece that holds my mom becomes a love story. Clearly, this one is no exception.