Some scenes in some stories linger and linger and linger. This particular story lingers because it represents a rather large transition in my life, the way I saw the world, and the way I moved around in that ever changing world.
I was on my way out of identifying as a Republican.
The irony of being identified as a Republican is one all by itself. That particular party is not typically aligned with the poor, the needy, minorities, and other things that I had come to identify with. How I could be a Republican and live in poverty in East Texas is still beyond me. I think we identified with someone's statement that to win the vote of a poor white people is to lead them to believe that they are better off than a poor black person. That is hard to read and hard to type and read.
The occasion was Washington, DC, late August, 1997. It was the occasion of the first mediation hearing with the first African American farmer. I had flown into DC from Abilene early that morning and found my hotel down Pennsylvania Avenue. Full of energy from the trip and in anticipation of the following day's event, it dawned on me that the White House was right up the road and all manner of other government buildings, so I put on my running clothes and headed that way.
Along the way there was a Starbucks where there had been a shooting, there, over across the street. There, looking down upon us all was the Washington Monument. There is the White House. There is the Congressional Building. Around them all I went. Slow and stead wins the race.
After making the loop, I ran past the congressional building, and there, standing and talking with two or three others outside the door, on the street beside a car, was a famous Texan. My impulsivity got the best of me. Took no thought that I would interrupt her conversation and that I was sweaty from the run. I simply came upon Anne Richards, former Democratic governor of the State of Texas, stuck out my hand and said, "Hello, Mrs. Richards, I'm Waymon Hinson from Abilene, Texas and I am glad to meet you." With her warm smile, she said as we shook hands, "Well, I'm glad to meet you." I made haste to get away from her, a tad embarrassed now at my intrusion.
The next day would get here soon enough and I had to return to the hotel room and make sure that I was prepared for the mediation hearing. Little did I know that there would be a war of sorts about my being there in the first place. I wasn't prepared for that. Little did I know that the legal counsel for the farmers, James Myart, and Michael Sitcoff, lead attorney for the Department of Justice, would almost come to blows. Little did I know or anticipate the intensity of the hearings.
Such it was when the learning curve is steep in white American when supporting Black farmers who are mistreated as they farm while Black in America.
That is the story for another day.
In terms of politics, I was nearing the point of no return. I could no longer have a completely clear conscience about identifying as a Republican because by and large, this particular party has no heart for farmers of color like the Democratic party.
I was on a collision course with myself. I had been invited to step out of my white world and enter a world that was completely foreign to me. Once I got there and moved around in it for a while, there was no turning back.
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