I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: Reflections

  • three years of the war in Ukraine and our long term memory loss

    three years of the war in Ukraine and our long term memory loss


    Three years ago today, February 24, 2022, Russia without provocation invaded Ukraine. I know it – you know it. On March 16, 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed a joint session of the United States Congress to ask for America’s help, and I published this piece on that day.

    In listening to an emotional virtual appeal by Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy to the Congress of the United States this morning, I felt the despair of this leader who had watched his beautiful country together with many numbers of its men, women and children obliterated by an evil neighbor for reasons known only to that neighboring country’s president and his supporters.

    If President Zelenskyy could sing, and I don’t know whether he can, he could have closed with some of the words and music of “I Look to You,” singing along with the American gospel group Selah from their album Hope of the Broken World:

    “As I lay me down, heaven hear me now. Winter storms have come and darkened my sun. After all that I’ve been through, who on earth can I turn to? I look to you, I look to you. After all my strength is gone, in you I can be strong. I look to you.
    And when melodies are gone, in you I hear a song. I look to you.

    I don’t know if I’m gonna make it. Nothing to do but lift my head. My levees are broken, my walls have come crumbling down on me. The rain is falling, defeat is calling, I need you to set me free. Take me far away from the battle – I need you to shine on me.”

    The people of Ukraine are looking to us and our Allies around the globe for help to stop not only the physical crumbling walls but also the assault on our vision of freedom and our democratic way of life. Make no mistake, as President Zelenskyy has consistently reminded us, the destruction of Ukraine is but the beginning of a world war against securing the blessings of individual liberty for all people and for their posterity.

    I have a dream, Zelenskyy said to the Congress today, but I also have a need to reclaim the skies over Ukraine, to stop the senseless bombing of my citizens and our homes. The Ukrainian President is looking to us.

    Yes. We see you, we hear you, we feel your pain. We will respond with gratitude for your fight against a common enemy to serve a greater good.

    Photo by Katie Godowski on Pexels.com

    **************************

    We Americans suffer from long term memory loss – the lessons we painfully absorbed about world wars, global conflicts, political corruption, identifying our enemies, supporting our friends – all 20th. century instructional tools we have conveniently forgotten in this 21st. century have now come home to roost in a new administration that seeks to say No to the needs of our Allies and Yes to the demands of our enemies. Shame on our leaders, shame on us for electing them.

    Photo by Eugenia Sol on Pexels.com

    Slava Ukraini. For the children.

  • Old King Cole vs. Old King Don

    Old King Cole vs. Old King Don


    Old King Cole was a merry old soul,
    And a merry old soul was he;
    He called for his pipe, and he called for his bowl,
    And he called for his fiddlers three.

    Old King Don was a grumpy old soul,

    and a grumpy old soul was he;

    he called for his pens, and he called for his friends,

    and he mowed down democracy.

    Heh, heh. Sometimes I have to entertain myself and cross my fingers somebody else thinks I’m as funny as I fancy I am.

    Since 1709, the Brits have had a nursery rhyme about the fictional Old King Cole. Starting this week in 2025, the Americans across the Pond from the Brits have a chief executive who fancies himself to be a King with the absolute authority to demolish democratic rule in these United States.

    Hear ye, hear ye, hear ye, Elon and Don – we ain’t picking up what you’re putting down. The next time we vote for a King, your names will be deleted by the thousands of people affected by your doge department layoffs.

    Read the room, guys. Your ship has sailed.

  • T-Gate or Tea Party – what’s next?

    T-Gate or Tea Party – what’s next?


    “It’s well-documented that transgender people, especially transgender women of color, were leaders at Stonewall and in the movement for LGBTQ+ equality. Removing the T from a government website certainly doesn’t change that.

    I’m in my 40s, and the Stonewall Inn was designated as a National Monument less than a decade ago. For most of my life as a transgender man, the government has not marked our history or celebrated our achievements. LGBTQ+ people were fighting for justice long before Stonewall, and we’ll keep fighting long after.

    The government does not determine our value or worth. LGBTQ+ people know who we are, and no presidential administration can take that away.” – Jace Woodrum, Executive Director of ACLU of South Carolina

    On Thursday, February 13th., the National Parks Administration removed all references to transgender persons from the Stonewall Inn National Monument website in response to an executive order signed by President Trump on his first day in office, an EO designed to be anti-transgender across the entire federal government in its scope. ABC News reported the following saga of what I have dubbed “T-Gate.”

    What used to be listed as LGBTQ+, has been changed to LGB.

    “Before the 1960s, almost everything about living openly as a lesbian, gay, bisexual (LGB) person was illegal. The Stonewall Uprising on June 28, 1969, is a milestone in the quest for LGB civil rights and provided momentum for a movement,” the website now says.

    The Stonewall Inn in New York City’s Greenwich Village became a national monument in 2016 under former President Barack Obama, creating the country’s first national park site dedicated to LGBTQ+ history.

    ***********************

    Full disclosure I had lived in Seattle, Washington, for a year in that summer of 1969. I was twenty-three years old, single with no prospects, no lesbian dating sites, singing in a Southern Baptist church choir with typical homophobic rhetoric coming from the pulpit. But I still loved the music and made a major life decision to return the 3,000 miles to my native Texas to enroll in the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth in the fall of 1969. God does work in mysterious ways, I am here to testify. My first long term lesbian relationship began in the seminary with another woman who shared more than our love of music. Twenty years later I learned about the uprising at the Stonewall Inn and understood my debt to the brave transgender women who risked their lives to spark a movement for equality.

    What if, I wonder, the new president decides to ban all historical sites that refer in any way to a “T.” Hmm. For example, think about the Old South Meeting House in Boston, Massachusetts, the site of the Tea Party in 1773 which sparked the first revolution against oppression in America. Colonists disguised as Indigenous Americans boarded three ships in the harbor and dumped 342 chests of tea into the river. Should we take the “Tea Party” off the historical sites since the colonists were really a rowdy group of immigrants who thought they shouldn’t be ruled by a King?

    National Archives


  • I ain’t missing you, am I? Yep

    I ain’t missing you, am I? Yep


    From gospel singers Ethel Waters and Mahalia Jackson to Motown’s Diana Ross and the Supremes of the 20th. century to Jennifer Hudson and Beyonce who light up the 21st. century with their musical magic, I have always loved to hear talented Black artists sing. I have one particular favorite from both centuries, and her name is Tina Turner. I celebrate her memory for her contributions to Black history in this special month.

    Every time I think of you
    I always catch my breath
    And I’m still standing here, and you’re miles away
    And I’m wondering why you left
    And there’s a storm that’s raging
    Through my frozen heart tonight
    I hear your name in certain circles
    And it always makes me smile
    I spend my time thinking about you
    And it’s almost driving me wild
    And there’s a heart that’s breaking

    Down this long distance line tonight
    I ain’t missing you at all
    Since you’ve been gone away
    I ain’t missing you

    No matter what I might say
    There’s a message in the wire
    And I’m sending you the signal tonight
    You don’t know how desperate I’ve become
    And it looks like I’m losing this fight
    In your world I have no meaning
    Though I’m tryin’ hard to understand
    And it’s my heart that’s breaking

    Down this long distance line tonight
    I ain’t missing you at all
    Since you’ve been gone away
    I ain’t missing you

    No matter what my friends say
    And there’s a message that I’m sending out
    Via telegraph to your soul
    And if I can’t bridge this distance

    Stop this heartbreak overload
    I ain’t missing you at all
    Since you’ve been gone away
    I ain’t missing you
    No matter what my friends say
    I ain’t missing you, I ain’t missing you

    I can’t lie to myself
    And there’s a storm that’s raging
    Through my frozen heart tonight
    I ain’t missing you at all
    Every time I think of you
    I always catch my breath

    These lyrics written in 1984 by John Waite became a #1 hit on Billboard’s Album Rock Tracks, then covered by other artists through the years until it reached Tina Turner’s Wildest Dreams album and tour in 1996 where it found a home in the hearts of millions of Turner’s fans – including mine.

    From the Spring Hills Baptist Church choir in Nutbush, Tennessee as a child of the late 1940s to concert halls around the globe that set ticketed attendance records including her largest venue with more than 180,000 fans in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1988 Turner entertained and amazed millions of people for nearly six decades with her raspy voice, high energy, sexy self. Her ability to overcome, to survive and thrive in a man’s music world were an inspiration to everyone that knew her story.

    Thank goodness for YouTube videos of Tina Turner who has often been referred to as the Queen of Rock and Roll – I watched my favorite, the Amsterdam concert, through tears when I heard she had left the building permanently two years ago in 2023.

    Every time I think of you, I always catch my breath…sometimes it’s hard to let go, but it’s okay to still miss you.

  • Congressman John Lewis (1940-2020)

    Congressman John Lewis (1940-2020)


    Congressman John Lewis, civil rights activist and politician, passed away on July 17, 2020, after a brief battle with Stage IV pancreatic cancer. He was eighty years old. The next day then United States Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) issued the following statement:

    Congressman John Lewis was an American hero—a giant, whose shoulders upon many of us stand. Throughout his life, he showed unending courage, generosity, and love for our country.

    As the son of sharecroppers in Alabama, John Lewis’ courage and vision placed him at the forefront of the civil rights movement. As the youngest speaker at the 1963 March on Washington, John Lewis knew the importance of bringing people together for an America that lives up to its ideals of liberty and equality for all.

    It was an honor to once again join Congressman Lewis this year in Selma, Alabama in March for what would be his final walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where just 55 years ago, Lewis was among those beaten by state troopers as they bravely marched from Selma to Montgomery for the right to vote. I was moved by his words: ‘On this bridge, some of us gave a little blood to help redeem the soul of America. Our country is a better country. We are a better people, but we have still a distance to travel to go before we get there.’

    We are grateful that John Lewis never lost sight of how great our country can be. He carried the baton of progress and justice to the very end. It now falls on us to pick it up and march on. We must never give up, never give in, and keep the faith.

    I will always cherish the quiet conversations we shared together when he inspired me to fight for the ideals of our beloved country. My prayers are with John Lewis’ family, loved ones, and the nation as we grieve this tremendous loss.

    No photo description available.

    For me, Black History Month would be incomplete without remembering the courage of John Lewis in the Civil Rights Movement on Bloody Sunday at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. I have stood on that bridge, heard the voices of the oppressors and the oppressed as they sang from the pages of a distorted hymnal written in blood through the centuries.

    I still miss him. I miss her, too.

    ********************

    Never give up, never give in, and keep the faith.