My mom travels with an old radio she plugs into bathroom outlets from the Atlantic Ocean to Lake Michigan. Its speaker’s metal lattice tells you more about its age than what pumps through it. Over decades of summers sharing various iterations of the “standard double room,” I’ve heard an eclectic mix. Right wing talk radio–to “get the other side”; local jingles burned into my brain forever–“Goin’ to the fair, goin’ to the fair. Goin’ to the Northwest Michigan Fair…”; and whatever regional music the now lethal snapped-in-half antenna will bring in.

This week it’s been Froggy something-or-other. (Why are country stations called “Froggy”?) My mom singularly calls it “country western” and says she wanted to hear the stories. We’re not a pop country family, not that there’s anything wrong with it. “Country western music is made of stories,” she’s said a dozen or thousand times in the past week.

The other day as I was using my mom’s magnifying mirror to see the horrors of my pores in stereo-vision, I stayed for exactly one song, one story. Somehow Froggy sniffed me out and sent me its current (only?) social justice anthem: “Somebody’s Daughter” by Tenille Townes (a Canadian).

I drive home the same way
Two left turns off the interstate
And she’s always standing
At the stoplight on 18th Street
She could be a Sarah
She could be an Emily
An Olivia, maybe Cassidy
With the shaky hands
On the cardboard sign
And she’s lookin’ at me

Bet she was somebody’s best friend laughing
Back when she was somebody’s sister
Countin’ change at the lemonade stand
Probably somebody’s high school first kiss
Dancin’ in a gym where the kids all talk about someday plans
Now this light’ll turn green and I’ll hand her a couple dollars
And I’ll wonder if she got lost or they forgot her
She’s somebody’s daughter
Somebody’s daughter
Somebody’s daughter

Aside from those preppy white girl names, I felt grateful to Tenille for telling her country western story on Froggy and we are, this very week, staying on 18th Street in Ocean City. I laughed when I read Taste of Country’s article titled “Tenille Townes’ ‘Somebody’s Daughter,’ the Boldest Song on Radio.” Okay, country western, let’s calm down with the hyperboles. A dash of poverty and a sprinkle of potential opioid crisis does not the “boldest” make. Still, this is good. Art reflecting life.

Townes got at a few powerful themes in her song, a few that really drive me. Everyone has a story. There are an infinite number of circumstances that can bring someone to her knees. Assumptions about strangers are often ignorant and ill-conceived (I really need to work on this one with bros). Be grateful. And, you should always keep granola bars in the door pocket of your Toyota Corolla.

Update: This article tells the story of a man who pan handled on Roland Avenue near Hampden. This is basically the real-life version of the song above. The universe…she knows.

My friend Erin Drew (a comedian, writer, beacon of light, all around lunatic) has her own podcast. AND I GOT TO BE ON IT! Please listen to educate yourself about the school system…something that literally affects ALL layers of society.

Amanda is the Director of Scholar Development at Lillie May Carroll Jackson Charter School. She coordinates career days, college visits, mentor programs, and meets with every one of her 8th graders’ families to help plan for their daughter’s high school future and beyond. In this episode, we talk about first-time teaching experiences, urban education, race, secondary trauma, teacher retention, and the complicated lottery system for Baltimore City high school placements. Read more at https://givemethedeets.libsyn.com/season-3-episode-3-with-amanda-doran-eby#HmXEwEY5ZTi2ccCS.99

https://givemethedeets.libsyn.com/season-3-episode-3-with-amanda-doran-eby

You will come of age with our young nation
We’ll bleed and fight for you, we’ll make it right for you
If we lay a strong enough foundation
We’ll pass it on to you, we’ll give the world to you
And you’ll blow us all away
Someday, someday
Yeah, you’ll blow us all away
Someday, someday

– “Dear Theodosia” by Lin-Manuel Miranda, Leslie Odom Jr. from Hamilton

Dear Young Lady,

Even though I saw you today for the first time in months, I see you all the time. I see you in children younger than you who walk the halls in pleated skirts. I see you strolling to school in West Baltimore, three feet tall, holding hands with a momma. I see you in the squeegee kids and their drive and lack of couth balanced out by their wide smiles. I see you when I pass a house with windows that’s among a row of vacants. I see you in red hair dye and abandoned binders and an old card you wrote me. I see you in faces and hear you in songs and imagine you turning on your heels so gracefully like when “Yip” is playing. When you texted me on Mother’s Day, my heart grew three sizes. You told me you knew I’d be a mother soon and that I’d sort of been one to you–I’ll take it.

When you told me what’s going on in your life, I hope you know I heard you. And that time you said you wondered what it’d be like if you grew up with parents like mine, I never stopped hearing that. When you smiled big enough that I could see the new tooth you’ve got poking through your gum, I was reminded that you are still a child. That although you just unloaded a set of stories most wise and well-supported adults couldn’t persevere through, you can’t vote or drive or buy a lottery ticket.

Those times I catch myself saying something like “Slow-close cabinets are a life saver,” you and your presence in my life, are among the factors that help me stay in check. You wouldn’t know this but you help me see my minutia and how trivial it can be. When you rattle off even a few of the things your mom has put you through, I lose my breath. And I get it back when I see in your face that you know you deserve so much more. More than someone who spelled your name wrong the day you were born or left you to raise yourself or doesn’t call or stops sending you money for food.

I asked you how you picture your life in September and you said you cannot do that. Not where you’ll be living or where you’ll start 10th grade. What pops into my head is that although you can’t imagine what three months away will look like, I can see what I hope for you in twenty years. And so I’m asking myself, is this something that growing up in a good family grants you? The ability to see the future? The agency to create it? The vision of the steps to get to a goal? So I try to keep my face neutral but I know the answers are yes, yes, yes, and yes. If only I could touch my pointer to yours and zap you with some of what I’ve got. If only I could stare you in the eyes and transmit how I imagine you as a happy, successful adult. If only we could enter some alternative universe where your name on your birth certificate matched the name you’ve always used and all the other good things, or just reasonable things, that followed that first act.

Young Lady, I will probably keep writing you letters I can’t show you. And to you, I will reveal a fraction of what I say in these. I try not to scare you when I tell you how much you’ve taught me and how amazed I am and how strongly I feel about your future. I’ll be seeing you…

Love,

Ms. Eby