May 28, 2023 By admin

Wanda’s Picks Late Spring, Summertime 2023

Souljourning 2023 is about to begin in a short week. Today we honor the Black Soldier on Memorial Day Weekend. Ase.

Lift them Up! Survivors of Domestic Violence and Partner Abuse. Tina Turner Ase!

Lift them up. Survivors of spousal abuse. Tina Turner Ase! “What’s love got to do with it?

Nothing!

Love has nothing to do with abuse.

Violence and love do not share the same entree in the lexicon.

Loved Tina Turner’s ouvere “Proud Mary”, “We Don’t Need Another Hero”, “I Can’t Stand the Rain”, “Rolling on the River”, . She strutted her pretty legs and moved her graceful head as she shook up the stage. Hers was a presence. She was a meteor at daybreak. With her there was never darkness.

May SHE, Ase, continue her soulful strut into the spirit realm, kicking butt as we remember her wonderful example of womanliness: sexy, sensual and all powerful womban.

She is proof: the Black womban can have it all, because without her, there is nothing at all.

We are day and darkness. All life is born here. What did Iya Angelou say about the jewels between her thighs?

On a clear night you can see forever once you step away from the clouds, chaos, light polution.

To all the survivors of spousal abuse, Nina Simone Ase! Halle Berry, living ancestor. . .

May you continue to thrive, excell and achieve. . . .

My mother, survivor.

May you continue to walk wellness Mama. My aunties and grandmothers living and walking in spirit — survivors.

You give me courage to keep moving forward without regret. Ase. Ase. Ase-o.

A Good Death, Honoring the Black Warriors on Memorial Day 2023

The Vietnam War is one of those wars one never forgets. Lots of young lives taken and other young lives ruined. Young families permanently impacted. Lots of people returned to later end up incarcerated, on the street. . . we step over so many wasted lives; war is bad.

Good for the economy, bad news everywhere else. Like pollution it colors a nation’s horizon. The blues give way to bloody . . .

Some say war is bad yet necessary. Some say death in battle is honorable except for those whose remains are dust, a flag draped over closed tombs or folded and handed to acweeping mom or wife or sister or brother.

Taps the eternal heartbeat that marks the end of life before it starts.

We don’t speak of trauma. The generational trauma that seeps into the pours of the survivors. More insidious than agent orange it contaminates a genetic pool leaching into the fragments left of broken lives pieced together with glue ill equipped to hold suppressed memories at bay.

The memories march forward on open landscapes . . . a gruesome promenade to darkness. . . eku.

Hawks circle . . .

Buzzards dive.

Viands tempt vultures who pause middive and retreat . . . forks and knives scattered as cloths fan and disappear on horizon

The future a much better place than now. The problem is the two share the same road.

What do we do with those haunting memories that assault us in our dreams? Alcohol, heroin. . . marijuana . . . nothing stops the memories . . . .except death and even then who knows. Some say they see these dead still walking. Even with eyes shut, their souls pace barren battlefields . . . guilt a perpetual TAP(s) on the shoulder.

BAYVIEW OPERA HOUSE INC. PRESENTS IN COLLABORATION WITH ZACCHO DANCE THEATRE presents: Flying to Freedom: Celebrating Juneteenth through Aerial Dance, Music, and Theater

This is a collective reflection on liberation by Bay Area artists, curated by Joanna Haigood.

June 16 and 17 at the Bayview Opera House (Ruth Williams Memorial Theater), San Francisco

Box Office: https://flyingtofreedom.eventbrite.com All Seats are free!
Listen to a wonderful interview with Joanna Haigood, Steven Anthony Jones and Veronica Blair on Wanda’s Picks Radio show Wed., May 31, 2023, 9 AM PT.

Angela Davis–Seize the Time @the Oakland Museum through June 11

Great exhibit. Really enjoyed it: the posters, Videos, interview with Dr. Davis, and the additional art and artist activists whose work shout Aluta Continua. (Ase Kiilu Nyasha) The struggle continues. The connection between activism and creativity is called out as Davis, once again, accepts her role as moderator of a movement bigger than her person yet we can’t deny her person as agent and activator.

Sparks fly literally in the Free Angela Davis global movement. Imagine that? A Freedom Movement for a Black Womban. Reminds me of wanted posters looking for the Black Moses, Harriet Tubman.

In a section on imprisonment, there are photos of San Quentin and of a neighborhood in Auburn, New York, where the state prison sits in community like a public school. I think again about freedom fighter, abolishionist, veteran, Gen. Tubman. This is her town. She built a residential nursing home for elder Black people. Formerly enslaved Black people and to build a prison here?! How despicable. I am traveling to Auburn this summer. I will send you dispatches from the plantation. You know slavery is legal? The conferderacy put Black people on the money. Harriet Tubman on a $20 note means nothing today if Black bodies are still collateral.

I really like the “into the light,” NAID Exhibit too. It just opened and features visual artists, sculptors. . . filmmakers. Artist Raven Harper speaks about her creative process. She is inspired by stories of her ancestors and African culture.

The Davis exhibit is not included with the regular OM admission. Sunday, June 4, a 1st Sunday, admission to the OM is free. It would be a good day to go. The Davis exhibit closes June 11. I don’t know if the free admission also covers special fees. Visit museumca.org The OM is located at 1000 Oak Street in Oakland.

Trauma Healing@MISSSEY June 24, 2023

Are you ready to learn today and lead the way to change tomorrow?

On June 24th we will be elevating the truths of trauma among Black women, girls, and gender-expansive youth.

Black survivor-leaders and field experts will bring their insights into how we can co-create a compassionate and transformed society that goes beyond being trauma-informed.

Get Your Ticket Today

Dr. Holly Joshi

Holly is a passionate Black changemaker from the Bay Area and the Director of the Center for Social Justice at Glide. She has 20 years of experience in racial and gender justice, community development, and criminal justice reform. She is the former Executive Director of MISSSEY and a nationally-recognized expert on gender-based violence prevention and intervention. She has worked on survivor-centered policy reform, served on task forces, and implemented strategic projects that amplify marginalized voices.

Ashante Taylorcox,
MA-MHC, LPC

Ashante is a dynamic speaker, survivor-leader, clinician, and Black changemaker from NJ with a passion to create safer environments and systems of care for BIPOC and LGBTQ+ survivors of trafficking. As the Founder and Executive Director of You Are More Than Inc, she is a nationally recognized expert in racial and gender justice and, over the last nine years, has worked diligently to improve the lives of marginalized survivors nationally.

Erin Michelle Turner Kerrison, Ph.D

Erin is an exciting Black sociologist, professor, and researcher from NYC. As a faculty member at UC Berkeley, her research and expertise covers fascinating subjects relating to the systems which compound structural disadvantages, violence, and negative health outcomes for individuals and communities. She’s an intellectual powerhouse driving positive change.

Get Your Ticket Today

WHEN

Saturday, June 24, 2023

3 PM – 6:30 PM

WHERE

The New Parkway Theater

474 24th St, Oakland, CA 94612

Accessible seating is available.

EVENT AGENDA

3 PM

Check In

3:30 PM

MISSSEY is hosting a screening of Dr. Gabor Maté’s powerful film, “The Wisdom of Trauma

5:00 PM

Black survivor-led panel discussion

and

Call To Action

6:30 PM

Post-Event Reception

WHY?

Black Women’s Skyrocketing Suicides:

Between 2001 and 2017, suicide death rates among Black girls age 13 – 19 rose by 182%

Link to Source

Black Women are Silenced After Violence

Only 1 out of 15 Black women will report her rape

Link to Source

What are we going to do about it?

Radically change our community.

William Rhodes @ Transmission Gallery

Transmission Gallery, 770 West Grand Ave, Oakland CA 94612, 510-835-2626 is pleased to present Threads of Consciousness, a solo exhibition of work by William Rhodes.

Tying together imagery and text through neon, found materials, wood carving, drawing, and thread, Rhodes’ work comments on the connections created by conflict, trauma, longing, and hope carried through the generations. Altar-like constructions illuminated with neon pay homage to personal experience and family legacy while reaching deep into the history of forced immigration, enslavement, and social unrest, examining both the searing moments of brutality and powerful moments of grace that imbue our national story with layered anguish as well as meaningful occasions of courage and conscience. A series of intimate thread and graphite portraits compliment the larger neon assemblage and hand-carved works, evoking a reverence for the connections that link one person to another across time and experience.

Originally trained as a furniture designer and woodworker, Rhodes affinity for handling wood and materials is well evident, while study and travel have stoked an appreciation of diverse cultures and non-Western art strategies. In this era of seemingly relentless new and now, Rhodes stands as a strong proponent of honoring the generational stories and humanity of elders in the community through his own creative pursuits as well as collaborative projects and events. The works in exhibition here are imbued with this recognition and affection, grounding each piece, binding past to present while offering a way forward as we reflect on and consider our dreams for the future.

Rhodes received a BA in Furniture Building and Design from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia and an MFA from the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth. Rhodes’ creative works are in the collections of various galleries and museums. Most recently, his work was included in the collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Rhodes, dedicates part of his time to art education, including art collaborations with schools in San Francisco, South Africa, Italy, and Egypt. Rhodes is the co-founder of a Black art collective in San Francisco. The 3.9 Art Collective was formed in 2011 in response to the declining Black population in San Francisco.

N’COBRA 2023 in Oakland, CA

The National Convention is June 22 – 25, 2023 @the Oakland Marriott City Center, 1001 Broadway, Oakland, California

Theme: “Honoring Our Ancestors: Continuing The Legacy”

Ase! to: Queen Mother Moore, Imari Obadele, Ray Jenkins, Chokwe Lumumba, Rep. John Conyers, Christopher Alston, Kalonji Olusegun, Ronald Walters, Marilyn Killingham, Omowale Kefing, Milton McGriff, Nia Kuumba, Njeri Algahanee, Conrad Worrill, Earline Arikpo, Kwame Afoh

About this event
N’COBRA’s founding meeting, September 26, 1987, was convened for the purpose of broadening the base of support for the long-standing reparations movement. Organizational founders of N’COBRA include the National Conference of Black Lawyers, the New Afrikan Peoples Organization, and the Republic of New Afrika. N’COBRA has individual members and organizational affiliates. It has chapters throughout the U. S. and in Ghana and London. It is directed nationally by a board of directors. Its work is organized through nine national commissions: Economic Development, Human Resources, Legal Strategies, Legislation, Information and Media, Membership and Organizational Development, International Affairs, Youth & Education.

We believe black people can embrace who they are, can define their future, and can change the world.
Our Mission: The Mission of the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (NCOBRA) is to win full Reparations for Black African Descendants residing in the United States and its territories for the genocidal war against Africans that created the TransAtlantic Slave “Trade” Chattel Slavery, Jim Crow and Chattel Slavery’s continuing vestiges (the Maafa). To that end, NCOBRA shall organize and mobilize all strata of these Black communities, into an effective mass-based reparations movement. NCOBRA shall also serve as a coordinating body for the reparations effort in the United States. Further, through its leadership role in the reparations movement within the United States and its territories, NCOBRA recognizes reparations is a just demand for all African peoples and shall join with others in building the international reparations movement.

N’COBRA is the premiere mass-based coalition of organizations and individuals organized for the sole purpose of obtaining reparations for African descendants in the United States.

For information contact: mail@officialncobra.org Phone: (202) 643-1460

March 8, 2023 By admin

Web Exclusive

I’m Alive

Today in the crosswalk, on my way to acupuncture, a car turned right (really left) in front of me—I could hear her apology as I waved her on. If I’d been jogging or walking a bit faster she would have hit me and I would not be writing this now. I had another half of the crosswalk to go before I was – as the kids say, “safe.”

I am invisible. No really. This has happened to me too many times. Normally, I am not at a light—I am at a crosswalk and the person driving doesn’t let me step off the curb or I get to the middle of the street and everyone does not stop. Sometimes the light is not green for the cars and they start anyway. The other day on Otis and Grand, the car never stopped crossing Otis. If the cyclist in the crosswalk had started riding, she would have been hit. People wave at me and mouth “sorry” when they make a right turn before I step off the curb, so miss me. They mouth “sorry” when they look up as they back up and would have hit me if I’d kept walking. They don’t mouth sorry when I feel the wind on my butt as cars turn behind me before I can get far enough away.

I am just saying. Invisible? Yes. Black women who are 50+ are invisible. I have lived in Alameda for ten years and have worked on the island for 25 and I think glowed in the dark up to 59-60. Now, I wear a reflector jacket and that doesn’t save me from near misses, but today was a first.

The driver came too close to hitting me. I was trembling. It is a good thing I was going to get a treatment not leaving afterward.

When I got home, I jumped on my bike. I had to get back into my body. I think she was still gone. She left me in the crosswalk. I had to reclaim my person, so I went for a two hour bike ride.

It was nice. When I got back home—I was in one peace again.

As I rode to the blue bridge—the bike bridge, I thought about how drivers might think cyclists are rude when we take up space on the road. However, we have a right to ride in the center of the street like cars. The reason we can’t always stay in the bike lane, if there is one, is because sometimes the road is not safe—full of debris or we’re riding defensively.

Have you ever been hit by a car door opening?

Another problem is drivers do not signal and we can get hit as a driver turns right, right into us. Again, like the pedestrian scenario earlier—it’s death or injury. I do not choose either, so I proceed cautiously and do not take any chances.

How can you help?

Do not turn when there is a person in the crosswalk. Do not rev your engine or inch forward if the person doesn’t move as fast as you want them to. Some people are not able to walk any faster. Imagine yourself at 65, 70 or 80 years old? My friend just turned 99 at the end of February and another is 101 last August. We are out there walking, riding bikes, taking up space—look closely.

By the way, babies don’t walk fast either. My three year old grandson was frightened when a driver almost hit him and screeched his brakes as he backed and then pulled back into his driveway. He was shaken. Imagine that on his conscience?

People like myself—invisible or not pay taxes. Our taxes are why you can drive on the nice roads. Shouldn’t we have the same courtesy, to be able to walk safely across the street?

Let’s not talk about the sidewalk, another place where pedestrians are harassed.

Dogs and their owners take up the entire sidewalk. The owners do not pull their animals to one side. Dogs bite people. They have teeth and they are dangerous. Sometimes on paths they are unleashed. I have been attacked as I waited for the light to change on Encinal and Grand. The owner says, “I don’t know why he is behaving this way. Really, put your dogs on leashes and put a muzzle on the ones with jaws that lock once engaged and dogs who are for protection.

I have seen people walking dogs as tall as ponies without a muzzle. A dog bit my brother between his eyes when he was 6. He could have lost his eye. The mark is still there. You do not know who you are passing in the street. Have a little courtesy. I do not know your dog or you. I just want to enjoy the nice day and breathe fresh air.

I had an anxiety attack in the store the other day when two huge dogs were running through the store. I tried to avoid them and there they were in the aisle with me or in line with me. Dogs and food do not mix. How unsanitary.

Back to walking while Black and over 60. I want to get back home in better shape than I left it.

Dogs are not people. Dogs do not pay taxes. Dogs do not have human rights. If I defecated on your lawn, would you be okay with that? Stop using people’s lawns as toilets. It’s trespassing and its nasty. Who gave these dog parents the right to make all the lawns their toilets? People want to argue with me when I protest. One man said as his dog peed on my grass: “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Can I shoot him? Can I shoot the dog? Can I shoot them both? I think about the birds on the beach that dogs are prohibited on and the owners break that law daily when the dog park is up the street. When I was a kid, dogs did not have parks. In some neighborhoods children do not have parks.

Dogs?! The thing is, these people who can’t or won’t see me, see dogs and give these animals human rights.

Yes, this note has been in my head for a while—invisibility and human rights. Even if you can see me, you know I am there. It is a case of: “I don’t see you because you are not anyone I need to recognize.

It’s real. It was why my ancestors were worked for free and showed up on ledgers next to farm equipment. Now that slave labor is illegal unless one is a possession of the state, slavery is over, so this Black woman is useless and so invisible.

It’s bigger than microaggressions—if a person driving a car or a person walking an animal with teeth that can harm me hits or attacks me, I am hurt. I want safeguards. I want protection. My person is valuable to me, if not to the person who puts me in danger. I want the city of Alameda to enforce the no dogs on the beach laws. I want the City of Alameda to enforce the traffic laws. I want the City of Alameda to make all the street lights pedestrian friendly, that is, have the walk sign turn on before the cars get the green light.

I want the City of Alameda to change the laws so that cars cannot turn right on a red light and that if a perdestrian is in the crosswalk and a car does not let the person get to the corner, the driver gets a ticket.

I want drivers who do not stop at stop signs get tickets. I want drivers who do not let a person cross the street before going either in front of them or behind them get a ticket.

I want drivers who will not stop at an intersection and let a pedestrian cross get ticketed.
I want all the speeding cars, that is, the cars going faster than 25 miles ticketed.
I am trying to get to 99, 100, 101 like my friends and if I keep living in a town where I am invisible in crosswalks, I might not make it.

Objectification is not a concept for me—it is why I look four ways before I step off the curb. The problem is—even if I could have seen the woman about to hit me and stepped back, I might have been hit by another car anxious to turn into the space I’d just cleared.

I am just saying. . . I cannot solve this alone and I am getting this treatment while white women and white men around here get the royal treatment. Our beloved supervisor Wilma Chan was killed two years ago in the places where I walk and ride my bike and the City of Alameda has not put any safeguards in place so that this doesn’t happen again. It can happen again. It almost happened again today to me and I was at a light. Supervisor Chan was walking across the street where there is a stop sign. At this 3-way stop sign, cars do not stop and if you walk too slow, I have had the cars speed in front of me before I get to the curb. Yes, just like the woman did today.

It was totally unexpected and scary. I am a driver too and some of the experiences I have had as a pedestrian and as a cyclist are unbelievable. I remember to be kind when I am behind the wheel and drivers drive around me speeding to stop lights on 25 mile an hour street.

Something has to change, so people are safe. Should we make everyone walk? Ban cars during certain times and days like they do in The Gambia, West Africa? On Saturdays, once a month when I was there a number of years ago, the community walked and were encouraged to beautify their neighborhoods with cleanups and plantings and household repair.

March 8, 2023 By admin

Wanda’s Picks March & April 2023

Theatre

Is God Is is the second production of Oakland Theater Project’s 2023 Season: History vs. Hope. OTP’s 2023 Season is a six-production lineup featuring groundbreaking new plays, re-imagined classic dramas, and the company’s first musical. The shows wrestle with the paradoxical tension between history and hope in today’s world. “If what the poets and philosophers tell us is true, and history is a story from which we can never fully escape, perhaps hope is the force that gives us the freedom to try,” said OTP Co-Artistic Director Michael Socrates Moran. “As we continue to face enormous uncertainty and profound disillusionment, theater, as a realm of illusion, has a role to play in how we might choose hope in a world that often seems committed to repeating history.”

About Oakland Theater Project:

Oakland Theater Project, formerly Ubuntu Theater Project, seeks to serve and heal the polarization and de-facto segregation in our community. The Oakland Theater Project was founded in 2012 by Michael Socrates Moran, William Hodgson, and Colin Mandlin in Oakland, CA. The Oakland Theater Project produces year-round professional theater for Oakland and the Bay Area is committed to creating compelling works of art that unearth the human condition and unite diverse audiences through revelatory and exquisite theater. Building on its ongoing tradition of offering pay-what-you-can tickets to every performance, Oakland Theater Project continues its commitment to radical inclusivity with pay-what-you-can subscriptions for the season, with sliding scale tickets for every performance. To subscribe, donate, or learn more, the public can call 510.646.1126 or visit oaklandtheaterproject The play livestreams and is available on demand beginning April 15, 7:30 PM PT

April 12, 2023, Wanda’s Picks continues its conversation with principles: Tanika Baptiste (Angie/She); Rolanda D. Bell (Anaia); Anthony Rollins-Mullens (Scotch/Man) about Oakland Theater Project’s Bay Area Premiere: “Is God Is,” by Aleshea Harris, directed by William Hodgson, Thursday-Saturday, 7:30 PM PT; Sundays at 2 PM PT March 31-April 23.

William Thomas Hodgson directs Oakland Theater Project’s Bay Area Premiere of Aleshea Harris’ multi-award-winning play “Is God Is.” After becoming a smash hit Off-Broadway in 2018 and a runaway success in London’s West End, this contemporary epic is finally making its Bay Area debut. Wanda’s Picks hosts a conversation April 5, 2023.

Is God Is, A Review

It’s the BAY AREA PREMIERE of Aleshea Harris’s play, “Is God Is” directed by William Hodgson. After becoming a smash hit Off-Broadway in 2018 and a runaway success in London’s West End, this contemporary epic is finally making its Bay Area debut.

Is God Is Review
by Wanda Sabir

I’d been looking forward to seeing this work. Since I have been attending theatre livestreamed I have to wait almost to the end of the run to see a work. Theatre for a New City as in NYC is the only theater I know that streams opening night and every play, live. I think that’s really cool. I love attending plays there because over the run, the work changes. The last play I attended was Ishmael Reed’s The Conductor, as in Underground Railroad 2023, passengers South Asian and Chinese. The Conductors Pullman Porters, no seriously, Black people.

I am so happy Oakland Theater Project (OTP) and the Aurora Theatre stream quite a few of their productions. I really miss live theatre. I wish I had enough money to give them air filters which would make the air safer for me to attend. So anyhow, Sat., April 15, I was in front of my computer watching this story of revenge. Twin girls, Anaia and Racine (actors Rolanda D. Bell and Jamella Cross) burned while three years old in a fire set by their father are raised by the state. When we meet them, Cross’s “Racine” has gotten a letter from a mother she thought dead.

Imagine that?!

At 21, the summons was like a command from God. The girls in the Northeast wilderness traveling home to a Jim Crow postmodern BLM southern town where they meet their mama in a nursing home who is dying or at least she says she is. The crime – being burned alive, is horrific and for 18 years “SHE” who is bedridden has been waiting for these girls to extract vengeance.

Tanika Baptiste’s “She” is the lord and the girls are her flock. “Bring me a piece of him,” she tells them.

The biblical references are a littered liturgy from David and his slingshot to Racine putting a rock in Anaia’s sock. It is a pretty effective weapon we know direct from Goliath, but it takes guts. Racine has enough guts for two. The brutality was up close, so retribution is also a sort of moral hand to hand combat. Anaia is gentle to Racine “the cute one’s” simmering viciousness. Cross’s “Racine” is angry. Her breath sparks.

The buried memories unexplained that haunted Bell’s “Anaia” of her mother dancing in fire and the confusion, do not make her want to kill anyone. She is slow to boil.

Mama looks like a monster, when they lift her blankets. It’s Dr. Frankenstein’s experiment all over again, only this mother who walked away (from a bad relationship), got a restraining order, wasn’t safe. The ex-husband broke into her house and set her on fire. Poured gasoline on her. Dropped a match and left his little girls in the bathroom with her.

It is a crazy story I believe because it happened to me and to my mother. (Our wounds are hidden.) My mother said the San Francisco police told her when she asked for protection, to take a walk around the block and go back home.

My Daddy sent a one-way bus ticket to the welfare department and the county cut my mother’s aid. She lost her housing. The state did not ask her if she wanted to go to San Francisco to meet a fugitive. The beatings which started in New Orleans before I was born continued in San Francisco.

Saturday night at OTP I felt like I was at a film where the Black women finally win. The cowboy loses. God might be able to handle vengeance but two young women . . . well it reignites trauma. What was inaudible and unanticipated has feet. It moves. It lives.

Yes.

In the end, battle-fatigued-Anaia asks her mother, is she happy now? Does she have peace, because I think Anaia’s still trying to figure out the WHAT just happened? Who is she now?

We are not our worse experience. The sins of the father were not theirs, Racine and Anaia’s to resolve, but Mama couldn’t walk. Right?

It was such a nice day too 18 years ago. The girls were eating pear slices while their mom cooked dinner and the monster, a shadow comes inside and disrupts and almost destroys their young lives. God finishes them off later.

I think about reconstructive surgery and why Anaia does not have it nor her mom. This is the present and such treatment exists. Everything is a metaphor here. What is motherloss? What does it mean to belong? What does one do with unarticulated rage?

Rage is fire.

It was such a nice day visiting with a mother they did not know they had. Perhaps she will look at Anaia’s face without pity, without horror. Perhaps. They do not hug. Racine and Anaia are no longer alone, yet they do not anticipate the poison festering in the veins of this woman in the bed before them. Is SHE God or is SHE Satan? What kind of antihero journey is this?

What a mother! She is big. She fills the room. She eats their lives. Her girls are captivated. We get the feeling that this bedridden woman knows all about them. Was she waiting for them to grow up so they could weigh her demand as adults? Did she belief at 21 they would believe they had a choice?

The cast is excellent as they switch personas– not so the twin girls; however, everyone else is a twin. “Is God Is” is a psychological thriller with twists.

Tanika Baptiste is a compelling “She.” The girls’ mother is rational the way crazy sounds reasonable when it isn’t. Anthony Rollins-Mullens plays “Man”, the villain, so well. He has a reasonable sounding voice. It is dark when he shows up and fear is in the theatre. However, Anaia ignores it. She listens to her father’s voice. It is soothing. He reaches out his hand to her. He shares his story. Anaia catches his lies. He restarts. He says what happened is God’s fault. She wouldn’t let him “hold her.”

What does that mean?

I have no empathy for God the father. He is crazy. His insanity calculated. Kill him! I think aloud. I am at home in my kitchen. I can say this.

The killing spree is quick. Like Thelma and Louise, the twin sisters drive cross-country and look for their father. He lives in the suburbs in a house on a hill. Yes, there is a manicured garden too. It’s kind of hard to believe such a person exists, but he lives without remorse. He sees nothing wrong and we have hints that the current wife might have something to fear.

Can a person start over in a new place with a rotten seed? Can a rotten seed grow a healthy life? Evil and goodness lie parallel. Suffering is present too in equal doses. The girls survived. We get a sense that they will be okay and then this letter arrives. We hear so much about Man so that when he shows up, he’s almost ethereal otherworldly. Perhaps hell is his abode?

“What we won’t do, we do for love” or so the song goes. “We do for love, what we would not do.” These girls who thought they were alone have family now. A mama and a daddy. There are more revelations in Beverly Hills which I will not spoil for you.

Family. This is big. What will Racine and Anaia do for love?

Go see the play and find out. It is a tightly sewn 90-minute drama directed by William Thomas Hodgson with an amazing cast: Tanika Baptiste, Jamella Cross, Rolanda D. Bell, Devin Cunningham, Anthony Rollins-Mullen.

The theatre is intimate, so the story sits in your lap. You walk in empty and leave staggering. Drink plenty of water before you arrive. You will need it to dose the fire it ignites.

“Is God Is” continues, Thursday-Sunday, at Oakland Theater Project through April 23. The Oakland Theater Project is in the FLAX art & design building, Downtown Oakland, 1501 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. Box Office: 510.646.1126 boxoffice@oaklandtheaterproject.org LIVESTREAM Tickets to give you a high-quality Livestream Video on Demand: April 16–23

Celebrate Coretta Scott King (b. 4/27) in a new film

IN-PERSON REGISTRATION

ZOOM REGISTRATION

Questions? Please email worldhouse@stanford.edu

Join Weekly Meetings:Office Hour (Mondays) — REGISTER
Discussion on the life and legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the freedom struggles he inspired.World House Global Network (Fridays) — REGISTER
An international network of individuals committed to the nonviolent struggle for human rights.

Tarot in Pandemic Closing Ceremony, April 15, 2023, 5:00 PM PT

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/tarot-in-pandemic-and-revolution-what-do-you-dream-for-the-future-tickets-611347927107

The program includes

Music by Guillermo Galindo

Poetry by Agneta Falk & Jahan Khalighi

Tarot reading by MK Chavez

Interactive Mandala Art by Nancy Hom with a little help by Adrian

DJ music by WAM (Woman Audio Mission)

Africa in Berkeley, Sat., April 8
Listen to a LIVELY conversation with Fely and Tosin Wed., April 5, 11 AM PT on YouTube.com/wandaspicks

Watch interview with Fely and Tosin on Wanda’s Picks Show

Circle of Peace, Saturday, April 8@ Lake Merritt in Oakland

Reparations

International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade

**https://media.un.org/en/webtv/schedule**

A-WAKE, A Virtual Memorial for Robert Henry Johnson

From the Wanda’s Picks Archives 16th Annual MAAFA Commemoration
Listen to an interview with Robert Henry Johnson in conversation with Juanita Brown, producer, “Traces of the Trade,” from 2011 and Dr. Marcus “Adeshima” Penn, physician, yoga teacher, health consultant. Robert talks about a play he has written which will have a staged reading at the African American Art and Culture Complex. He explores the stories of African ancestors along the waterways between the West Coast of Africa and the Western Hemisphere. The literal bones that floated then lie on the sands on the bottom of the oceans. These are the stories we haven’t been able to hear. Perhaps Robert now swims with those spirits?

Other Memorial Celebrations of RHJ’s Life are April 8, 12 noon-3 p.m. PT @ Zaccho Dance Theatre in San Francisco and May 27 @ The African American Art and Cultural Center. If you would like to share a photo of Robert for the Zaccho gathering please email afiya@zaccho.org

Fannie: The Music and Life of Fannie Lou Hamer @TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, March 8-April 2

Greta Oglesby stars as Fannie in TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s “Fannie: The Music and Life of Fannie Lou Hamer,” performing March 8 – April 2 at Lucie Stern Theatre.
Photo Credit: Meika Ejiasi

Watch an interview with Greta Oglesby with Wanda Sabir about this role as civil rights icon, Fannie Lou Hamer

Here is the retreat schedule (3:00 pm – 6:00 pm PT):

Introduction — Laila Narsi, LCSW, Circles of Practice Co-Coordinator, Host

3:00 pm PT – Retreat session led by CMSC Co-Founder Kristin Neff

4:00 pm PT – Retreat session led by Sydney Spears, PhD, CMSC DEIB Director

5:00 pm PT – Retreat session led by Angelike Dexter, JD

Please check World Time Buddy to confirm the time the program begins where you live.

Watch here:
If for some reason you aren’t able to log on, you can also go to the YouTube channel where the session will be live-streamed. https://www.youtube.com/centerformindfulselfcompassion

Ishmael Reed’s The Conductor @Theater for a New City (also streams live) March 9-26

https://theaterforthenewcity.net/shows/the-conductor-2023/

Tarot in Pandemic, An Interview with Adrian Arias

The inaugural show of Tarot in Pandemic and Revolution will be exhibited at CAST (Community Arts Stabilization Trust), 447 Minna Street in San Francisco and simultaneously celebrating their 10-year anniversary and Spring/Vernal Equinox 2023. (Photo credit: La Pena Cultural Center website.)

The preview will be on Thursday, March 16, 2023,

The opening events will be on Saturday, March 25, 2023

The closing event is April 15

The opening event on March 25 will kick off with Adrian’s traditional Illusion procession that will lead participants to the event space where we will have the land acknowledgement followed by a space and exhibition blessing, live music, poetry, dance performances, mural-making, tarot readings, and an Illusion Show.

Townhall at Dublin Women’s Prison on Sexual Abuse Victims of the State

November 7, 2022 By admin

Wanda’s Picks November 2022

Virtual Film Screening & Discussion@ CA Women Prisoners at the African American Center, San Francisco Main Library, Sunday, Nov. 13, 2-4 PM PT

This is the recorded discussion on the film “Belly of the Beast” and the forced sterilization of incarcerated women.

“A Brave and Startling Truth/Women Scribe the World Art” Exhibit
curated by Stephanie JT Russell, Nov. 3-Dec. 2, 2022 in @WomenWorkArt in Poughkeepsie, NY

Wanda Sabir, Artist

This is a narrative following Ms. Wanda Sabir’s “Souljourning for Truth Project 2022,” 40 days and 39 nights searching for Truth’s people. Who were her people and did they know the inheritance or legacy she left them?

Upstate New York, specifically, the Dutch African descendants and the Dutch speaking enslaved populations, didn’t leave much documentation of what it was like in this part of the country. That the enslaved people there had a different experience than that experienced by Black people in the south is documented in Truth’s Narrative, the only such record to date. Later this record would be challenged by those wanting to authenticate the details. Truth allowed herself and her story to be propagandized to support various causes: abolition, suffrage and temperance.

Sojourner Truth (1797-1883) was a womanist long before Alice Walker coined the term. She never let her audiences forget what Black women, especially the Black mother suffered. She was traumatized as a child like her peers who were separated from their parents like puppies in a litter. We see her behavior affected by this early separation when she must leave her girls and son when she leaves the plantation. Just 29 years old, we see how hard it was for her to separate herself from her abusive owner(s) once free. It was the voice inside her soul that helped her make the right choice, but she writes of her struggle to separate herself from Dumont specifically. Self-reflection is something Truth practiced. One might say she meditated. Her relationship with Jesus, her God, was both personal and specific, in that she told Jesus what she needed and received what she asked for. In her Narrative time and time again, her prayers were answered. Hers was a practical and useful faith. It yielded tangible results right away. Truth had power too; she could speak things into being.

Perhaps this was how Truth was able to trust her path and lean into the direction called. It was the same with me this summer. I had the desire to travel to New York and when I realized I could not afford to drive, a way opened. I was invited to stay in Poughkeepsie for a month May 23-June 23. My host, Iya Jo (short for Josephine) was the incarnation of my maternal grandmother, Josephine Isaac, a master chef. Iya Jo is also a master chef. I didn’t have to shop or worry about meals. For the first time in my adult life, I was taken care of. It was amazing.

When Sojourner Truth traveled, she stayed with supporters, women who believed in African freedom and the end of slavery. Some of these women even believed that Black women (Black people) were their equals. These friends served prison sentences and spent their time and money and persons in the cause of Black Liberation. They even established a utopian community in Northampton, Massachusetts. Truth lived there for 16 years (until it disbanded). The synergy and timeliness of Souljourning for Truth was arranged by the Master Planner. Juneteenth week in Ulster County opened with the display of the legal documents Truth filed and signed with an “X”. Newly discovered, these court documents also show her free person name: “Isabella Van Wagener.” Ms. Van Wagener sues the man who purchased her young son for his return. These documents had been lost. This suit was unprecedented – a Black woman in court demanding her son’s return and winning the case. Peter was illegally sold out of the state. I was able to see the document, talk to the person who discovered it in the State Archives and later meet two of Truth’s two granddaughters (6th generation). Later in Battle Creek, Michigan, where Truth lived the final 20 or so years with her daughters and son-in-law and grandchildren and where they are buried, I met a woman at the hotel where I stayed who grew up with Truth’s great-grandchildren. Barbara Allen has written two children’s books. She and her sister missed the courtroom program—However, I met the two great granddaughters a few days later on the Ulster County Truth Bus Tour.

June 15, the courtroom was open for this special occasion. Imagine, we were in the courtroom where Sojourner Truth as a young mother won this case. Visiting officials from throughout the state came to honor Truth and African American Freedom Day or Juneteenth. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many Black women and women jurists and legislators in one place. The courthouse was packed.

On the weekend tour, June 18, those lucky folks present were able to see where Truth was born, where she and her parents lived before she was sold away, plus the various locations where she was enslaved and where she stayed those early days, months . . . years of freedom. Paul O’Neill, Ulster County Commissioner of Jurors, an amateur historian and native son, narrated the tour. Just a few days earlier, he’d led us on a walking tour in Kingston from the courthouse to visit the home of the judge where Truth stayed while the proceeding was taking place.

There was no way the man who sold Peter out of state was going to win, so he settled with the court and returned the child as ordered to the care of his mother. The beautiful bright child had been harmed by the beatings (and his mother’s abandonment) and didn’t recover until he went to sea from which he never returned.

The harm suffered by this family, just one family among so many, was tragic, yet despite the horrors of slavery and poverty—Truth was not awarded damages for her son’s theft nor ever compensated for her childhood in bondage—apologies do not pay the rent, she accomplished so much. She met with two presidents and advised them on reparations for her people—neither listened. She suggested freed Black people travel west where there was less discrimination. The Great Migration proved her advice prescient. My family traveled to San Francisco from New Orleans in the second wave (1960s). I visited Washington, DC, where Truth is remembered in the Capital with a bust. She did so much and so did her daughters and grandchildren we read about in her Book of Life. Hers was a true life of service. Truth liked living in community, intentional communities, which took her to Michigan after the Northampton experiment collapsed.

Another name for Battle Creek is the Cereal Capital because at one point there were 100 brands–Kellogg a big one. One of the Kellogg brothers was a physician. He took care of Truth when she had an ulcer on her leg. Battle Creek is also the place where the Adventist church was founded. I found the history of this church and it’s involvement with the abolitionist movement interesting. Battle Creek and the larger area has so many underground railroad spaces in stores and dental offices. It was a major hub for escaping Africans. I visited the spot where her former home was located, the historical museum where her 5th Great Grandson has an exhibit tracing her life’s story and the lobbying for a State Holiday and a Monument in her honor. Both were achieved. Last year was the first anniversary of Sojourner Truth Day in the State of Michigan.

The monument, which proceeds the holiday, is huge—larger than the one in Northampton and Poughkeepsie and Port Ewen.

There were many Truth moments, whether that was seeing her doppelgänger at the Sky Walk over the Hudson seated at the foot of the monument in her honor on Pinkster weekend (June 3-6) or having Truth as Trickster (June 1) take us to the spot on Shaupaneak Ridge in Esopus, New York, where she walked into freedom with her baby daughter in October 1826 or seeing the library named in her honor at State University of New York@ New Paltz. We met two people June 1 after my early morning walk along her Freedom Trail—one woman told us about the mural at SUNY New Paltz and the other was a man from the Netherlands. He was on a bike.

Truth was bilingual—her first language Dutch. I thought her timing impeccable. Imagine sending along a man who spoke her native language. Later he went to a church where the pastor, Rev. Deborah Zuill, is credited with introducing Truth’s story back into the regional lore. He told her about our encounter. The pastor’s son and I share a birthday and he is one of the programmers for “My Kingston Kids” and knows Barbara Allen, author, activist, and Sojourner Truth’s 6th great-granddaughter. He picked Barbara and her sister up from the airport.

I stayed in a temple– candles lit daily; ancestors honored– chimes rang. During this time the strawberries were falling off the vines and other fruits and vegetables were blooming in community farms in Iya Jo’s backyard and at the Kingston YMCA Farm where youth organized Truth Day, November 26, 2021, in Ulster County.

I visited the Sojourner Truth State Park, visited the church where she probably sat in the balcony and another where her children attended with their owner once she’d left. I visited many cemeteries, among them the African Burial Ground in Kingston at Harambee. I was on the bus and traveled in sunny and rainy weather. I rode Iya Jo’s bike and walked too. Sometimes I drove or took a car– and I was lost a lot. Upstate New York is rural and vast and white. It hasn’t changed much from when Truth lived here, except, Black folks are free.

I met a lot of people and I gave everyone I met who seemed like an ally or supporter a button, “Souljourning for Truth 2022”, some folks got 2-3 buttons, additional ones: “Wombfulness Gatherings”, and “Maafa SF Bay Area.” By the time I left New York, people were calling me out and wearing my button(s)– we were starting a “Truth Movement for the liberation of Black people, especially Black womben. Truth’s reality was white in Upstate New York, but when she was in Manhattan, she was with Black people and when she retired to Battle Creek, she touched the lives of many Black people. In Michigan, it was refreshing to see so many Black people who knew her legacy.

I went on a tour at the David Ruggles Center in Northampton, Massachusetts, and saw the house where Truth wrote her book with her friends. I could imagine her seated on the porch rocking and talking and maybe smoking her pipe. I stood outside the church where Truth and other revolutionaries had meetings where all people, men and women, Black and white, had an equal vote on decisions. These were brave women and men and Truth loved them and was well-loved. It was sad that these historic properties throughout my Souljourning are owned by private persons and none of these owners are Black people. I hope this changes. Barbara Allen wants to purchase her Great-grandmother’s first sanctuary when she walked to freedom October 1826, the Isaac and Maria Van Wagener house in New Paltz, New York. We visited this home on June 18 while on the Sojourner Truth Black History Tour with the County of Ulster.

The owners were home and they showed us the place where Truth stayed with her infant Sophia and later Peter too. We touched the walls and walked on the floors and imagined her life there. But I get ahead of myself. Back in New Paltz after a long day on the road traveling from Poughkeepsie to Northampton, I went on a tour of historic homes, some built by a Black builder, a famous Civil War Veteran and master builder: Jacob Wynkoop. That same day I was a part of the Truth Tour, there was a Juneteenth in New Paltz at the Cemetery where African Americans are also buried. Mr. Wynkoop’s marker is there along with other Civil War veterans. Flowers were placed on all the plots, I think there were at least 100. Their names were read at the Libations and Prayers for African Ancestors of the Middle Passage, Juneteenth Ceremony, June 18. There were events all day and the following day, the actual Juneteenth Day, June 19, at Historic Huguenot.

In New Paltz at Historic Huguenot, we visited homes of people who owned my ancestors. As we walked into the attic, there were looms and an area set aside for the enslaved persons to sleep– in the rafters between barrels and other goods. It was probably hot and uncomfortable there while below white folks slept in beds and their children played with toys and dolls. Our tour guide shared with us a shackle, small and probably for a woman’s neck. There was also a necklace. The owner’s name, E. Hardenbergh was engraved on the shackle. He was related to Sojourner Truth’s owners who share the Hardenbergh name. This family owned her parents and all her siblings who’d been given or sold away before she was born or while she was very young, too young to remember them.

Sojourner Truth’s legacy is bigger than the material culture absent; however, that would be nice. It would have been nice to visit her final home in Battle Creek. Her final home, her first home and the places where she was enslaved are still standing and occupied by others. The home where she walked into freedom is still there. As mentioned earlier, we went into the barn and into the house where Truth slept. She speaks in her Narrative about the comfortable bed she was unable to sleep in, so she slept next to it on the floor the first night. Later or maybe the next day she slept in it and rested so well, she wondered how she would be able to convince herself to get up and go to work when resting felt so good.

Rest, Truth knew little of rest and sleep and relaxing at that time. Black women still do not rest,

not enough. The floor was the same masonry as it was 100 years prior. In town, Kingston, at the judge’s home, the fireplace stove where Truth prepared meals was the original brick and stone too. Throughout the weekend and throughout my stay, ghosts walked with us, their homes still occupied and well-cared for. For Truth, we were literally walking in this free Black womban’s footsteps.

God is certainly the master travel agent. This trip will never happen again– it was magical.

Truth sent for me and I said yes. The lessons are still unfolding. . . but the direction is clear.

This book is both a reflection and a tribute to this amazing woman’s life. When one thinks of the trauma of enslavement, her life is a case study. Truth lived a long life; she lived a life of self-determination, a life of faith. She was not perfect, and she made mistakes. Her philosophical father was a slave owner. Her first lover-rapist was that same slaveowner. Dumont. He was cruel, both he and his wife, according to Nell Painter in Sojourner Truth, A Life. Yet, Isabella Van Wagener then Sojourner Truth, managed to think beyond her circumstances which had not crippled her. How else could this Black mother sue the state for her son’s return?

The very courts that supported her capture, decided in her favor.

I think about all our ancestors, descendants of enslaved Africans and what we carry. Despite all of this pain, we have contributed immeasurably to this nation and its people. Imagine how much we could have done and could still do if we were able to face the trauma and learn more healthy life strategies.

True reparations start with this.

Not another generation needs to experience this unresolved chronic illness or trauma we are passing along to our children who live in the wombs that bore the wombs all the way back to the first womb who stepped on the ship in West Africa and womben who stepped off the ships onto this soil.

How do we honor Truth?

The QR Code is for the Souljourning for Truth Freedom Walk, June 1, 2022.

Theatre
Ain’t Too Proud – The Life and Times of the Temptations. The show is finally coming to the Bay Area. We couldn’t be more excited about this. The Broadway smash hit musical will play November 9 – December 12, 2022 at the famed Golden Gate Theatre,
1 Taylor St. San Francisco

BroadwaySF, part of the Ambassador Theatre Group announces that single, non-subscription tickets for AIN’T TOO PROUD: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE TEMPTATIONS are on sale now. AIN’T TOO PROUD will play Broadway SF’s Golden Gate Theatre (1 Taylor Street) November 9 – December 4, 2022. Tickets, ranging in price from $56 to $256, can be purchased at broadwaysf.com.

ATP features the Grammy® winning songs and Tony® winning moves, AIN’T TOO PROUD is the electrifying new musical that follows The Temptations’ extraordinary journey from the streets of Detroit to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. With their signature dance moves and unmistakable harmonies, they rose to the top of the charts creating an amazing 42 Top Ten Hits with 14 reaching number one and being voted the greatest R&B group of all time by Billboard Magazine in 2017. The rest is history — how they met, the
groundbreaking heights they hit, and how personal and political conflicts threatened to tear the group apart as the United States fell into civil unrest. This thrilling story of brotherhood, family, loyalty, and betrayal is set to the beat of the group’s treasured hits, including “My Girl,” “Just My Imagination,” “Get Ready,” “Papa Was a Rolling Stone,” and so many more.

The show is at BroadwaySF’s Orpheum Theatre (1182 Market Street, San Francisco). The Performance Schedule is November 9 – 13, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday at 7:30 PM; Thursday* Saturday; Sunday at 1:00 PM; Sunday at 7:30 PM. Check the website for other special times and dates.

Ticket Prices range from $56 to 256 and are available to purchase at broadwaysf.com.

COVID-19 Policies: All ticketholders are required to comply with BroadwaySF’s COVID-19 policies. For policy information, visit broadwaysf.com.

SF Mime Troupe on Vimeo through Nov. 6

Online video recording through November 6, 2022, 11:59 PM PT. It’s free. Back by Popular Demand! Stream for a limited time on Vimeo before the election! Free with the use of promocode “powertothepeople” although donation are heartily accepted!