Looking Back In Order to Move Forward!

“Daddy, what color does a person have to be to get a taste of colored water?

The head librarian of the library in which I work does not like this picture book, “A Taste of Colored Water” by Matt Faulkner. She does not like the book illustrations and she thinks that that last line of the book leaves the reader hanging, perhaps wanting more than this final word.

I say, “I guess you have to have been raised African American in the Jim Crow South to understand the impact of the word ‘colored.’”

“Oh, I get it, “ she responds, “but the book just doesn’t work for me.”

I do not bother to tell her, my Caucasian counterpart, that the line almost brought me to tears when I read it to the third grade class.

Synopsis of the book: Two Caucasian cousins in a small town hear from a classmate that there is a water bubbler (water fountain) in the city marked “Colored.” The cousins are fascinated by, and marvel at the idea of colored water and wonder how they can get to the city to drink from this mystical fountain. The irony of this story, aside from their desire to drink from the colored water fountain, is that the fountain is on the grounds of City Hall and the two children will have to walk between the words “Truth” and “Justice” that are carved into stone blocks to get to the fountain. Fate intervenes and the children do get to the city. They rush up to that marvelous water fountain, but there are other things happening that day, things that involve people waving placards and singing freedom songs and fire hoses and policemen attached to snarling police dogs. The water fountain is atop a hill and the girl cousin looks down and notices the interaction of the police and the protesters. Suddenly the water no longer holds her attention; she shouts, “Stop! Stop! – but [her] throat was so dry, and [she] started to feel dizzy, like a nest of hot bees was swarming in [her] head.” A policeman intervenes before the boy cousin can sip from the fountain, shouting, “Get away from there boy! That water ain’t for you. It’s for coloreds!”

I grew up colored in the Jim Crow south. I hated being colored. No, not colored as in I hated being Negro. I hated that word colored, the negative connotation and the way it rolled off the tongues of the majority culture in my small town. There was nothing marvelous or mystical about being colored in the south. The appellation separated you from the “real” people and singled you out as different. It devalued you and marked you as a non-entity in a society that took pride in individuality and non-conformity.

Never underestimate the power of a single word. Colored has the same effect on me today as it did all those years ago in my small north Texas town. It ranks alongside being asked by a sales clerk “May I help you girls? “ It rankles and it irritates and it shoves me back into a place that’s narrow and dark and bitter. "Colored," such an innocuous word, devoid of morality or moral, and yet it has the power to transport me back to a time when I felt the weight of the color of my skin each and every day.

Change has come to America, but it just takes one word to remind me that due diligence is in order if we are ever going to overcome the consequences of prejudice and racism and the power of one word.

“Daddy, what color does a person have to be to get a taste of colored water?”