“Writing is easy: All you do is sit staring at a blank sheet of paper until drops of blood form on your forehead.” — Gene Fowler (credited, but I think the quote is older still)
I have (virtually) finished my book. Six-seven years in the making, I’m (virtually) finished with Nothing But Love in God’s Water: The Influence of Black Sacred Music on the Civil Rights Movement, Volume 1. Oh, there is still the odd nit to pick. And, once I send it to the publisher (Penn State University Press), there will likely be lots of email flurries between my computer and their editors. It ended up at 83,000 words, for those of you who are interested in such things. More than a thousand footnotes. And only one or two snarky comments.
That means I am free to resume blogging, which I’ve missed. Once I started the actual writing, I put almost all of my other writing aside. Thanks to Gardner Campbell, I’d found blogging to be a helpful tool, emotionally and creatively.
As those of you who have written books, dissertations, theses, screenplays, songs, symphonies, and very, very long letters home may know, it is a curious feeling to complete something this large, something that has been a this big of a part of your life for such a long time. I’ve moved (twice!), kids have gotten married, dictatorships have (hopefully) fallen, Baylor’s athletic programs have flourished, my knees have failed me. The feeling of finishing is not really sadness, it’s not really relief. It’s just … curious. As Robert Haas once said: “It’s hell writing and it’s hell not writing. The only tolerable state is having just written.”
I’m not so sure about that. The research (for the most part) was exciting. The writing (for the most part) was exhilarating. The rewriting (for the most part) was rewarding. The finishing? Slightly melancholy.
It’s not so much that Volume 2 is left to do, either. I haven’t discussed a deadline with Penn State. (For you blessed few who have NOT heard me rattle on about the book, Volume 1 covers the use of black sacred music as a form of protest from the American Civil War through the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Volume 2 will cover from the earliest Sit-Ins and Freedom Rides through Albany, Birmingham, Selma, Chicago and Memphis through the Poor People’s March and Resurrection City. At least it will if I live that long.) For me, the act of completion the last couple of days has been something akin to … melancholy. It is bittersweet. I’m not sad or blue, just … reflective.
Part of that may be due to devoting so much of my life to a single topic, even something as far-reaching and complex as this one. You wonder, at least I do, did I miss something along the way? What did I give up over the many weeknights, weekends, and supposed vacations I worked? Yesterday, I heard Harry Chapin’s “Cats in the Cradle” on the radio and all but broke into tears. How many times did I tell the kids “No, I’ve got to work. You go on and play.”? Once is probably too much. Sorry guys.
But what has kept me from completely wallowing in morose introspection has been my unshakeable belief that this topic matters. The longer I got involved in the interviews and research, the more convinced I became that this vast, far-reaching subject is worthy of continued study. I suppose every writer, fiction or non-fiction, thinks the same way, ultimately.
But here’s why I believe that a better understanding of the Civil Rights Movement is important today: It’s an on-going process. WAY too many people in this country of all races and creeds, of all genders and ages, still do not enjoy the full fruits of democracy. Too many poor people, too many people with differing ideas about sexuality, too many people with various physical, mental and emotional challenges do not share equally in the guarantees built into our Constitution. And when one person is denied their civil rights, we all suffer…
Is the study of the power and influence of African-American sacred music of the past 150 years still relevant? I really, really think so.
Perhaps you saw this little story, tucked away in the margins of most news sources. An African-American couple – male and female, for those of you who care about such things – sought to get married in a Baptist church in Mississippi. The congregation denied them that privilege. Even the Tea Party Republican governor was appalled: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/03/mississippi-governor-wedding-ban-unfortunate
Alas, this just as easily could have happened (and probably has, we just don’t know about it) in Texas or Alabama or Illinois. This topic will never go away. In a nation that was founded with a significant portion of the population considered to be inferior, this problem is likely to always be with us, in one form or another. It’s like racism (and the other –isms) are in our national DNA somehow.
So, I’ll take a little break. I’ll wait for the edits from the Penn State University Press editor. I’ll begin to leisurely organize yet again the mountains of research I’ve accumulated for Volume 2. I’ll vow to spend more time with Mary and the kids and grandkids and friends and family. I’ll read more. I’ll email you.
And I’ll out-wait this odd little feeling of … (virtual) completion.