Generational Weight

Everyone walks through the world with some type of weight that they carry. For some it can be their actions, for others, it can be their thoughts, for few it is history. History matters, not only to those whom it affects but also to those who have a deep understanding and connection with it. For me, this weight is the history of my ancestors, how and why they came to America, and the expectations that I carry from hundreds of years prior to my existence. Specifically, the African American side of my family harbors a rich history of their arrival to America. Spread through word of mouth and tradition, I walk through the world with the intangible weight of what it means for me to be half African American, a Nazareth, and a Ridley.

Beginning with my father, the Nazareth name came to America in an ever so familiar way. Given the luxury of European genetics and name, the comfortable upbringing of a happy dual-parent household was only natural. However, they still had struggles. Through my grandmother being Irish, coming to the United States by unimaginable means through the Atlantic, and my grandfather’s German family being beaten and berated during World War II, they prevailed. This allowed them to lead a relatively plushy life for their children, restricting many from the weight that my grandparents endured in their lifetime. Although the Nazareth Family was certainly not exempt from weight, such as being a parent after military duty, struggling to raise four children, and dealing with the elderly ridden with dementia, it was not the same weight that the Ridley family carried.

I speculate the Ridley name, is not the name of my family, but rather the name of the slave owner that first bought my family. In reality, I may never know how my family came to be, from where, or when, as information like that tends to get lost in the historical wind whenever examining black families. Talking with my Uncles and cousins in the car as we listen to rap music where the stories sound far too familiar to our own, is one of the few times that I learn about the past of my family. “I was curious too,” my Uncle Dan tells me. “I looked up the Ridley name on Google, but all I could find was some dumbass plantation.”. Unsurprisingly this conversation only happened once, even though every time we were together we were always trying to flex about some new information we found about ourselves. But our findings always pale in comparison to my grandmother, the family historian as I like to think. 

‘Bam’, as we call her, is always finding new people whom the Ridley family never knew were connected to us. Her discoveries are always exciting as you never know who you’re going to get. A new cousin, uncle, or aunt is always one call away from reality. For Bam especially, this is a dream come true, as her childhood living in a ten person family, in a small three room Boston apartment, bred a deep necessity to care for others, no matter who they may be. So on she goes, providing food and love to anyone who she calls family, even if they don’t share the same last name. But the stories, relationships, and family ties all live and die with her. Leaving only speculation about how my family came to be, and where we came from.

No amount of spit that I pour into a tube, and send to a lab, will reveal the secrets and connections that my family members and I hope to one day uncover. So we struggle on, never understanding the relationship between one another, weighing ourselves down with the awkward feeling of being unknown. Hundreds of years of separation have left deep scars on even those who are thought to be unaffected. The youngest children are examined thoroughly for evidence of their relationship with distant relatives as a way to facilitate the connection of a questioning family. Once these comparisons start, they never stop, passing on the feeling of alienation towards the youngest of the family who may look different, often causing a deeper rift between those of us who seek the truth of where we come from.

I, too, carry this weight of being unknown, and undefined. Everywhere I walk, I imagine that I am once again forced to prove myself as was taught to me at a young age. This weight will most likely never be taken away from me, in the same way that I will never discover my family’s true history. A weight so distant to the Nazareth family, but all too real for the Ridley’s. A divide in myself that causes me to undermine the weight of alienation, and its effects on me today. Although intangible, the weight is real and is what I walk through the world with every day.