The Sin of Nostalgia

Looking back at the past can obscure its sins.

My Dad, who died in 2015, once told me a story that I’ve shared a couple of times on the interwebs about what life was like when he was young.

In 1953, Dad moved from his native Louisiana to Michigan to start work in the auto plants. He ended up working at Buick in Flint, Michigan until he retired in 1992. Back in the 50s, he would occasionally head back home to see his mother. My aunt, his sister would make her wonderful fried chicken for him to eat during his trip. On the way back, his mother would do the same thing. Did they do this because it was being spendthrift? No. The reason they did this is because in 1950s America it wasn’t so easy for a black man to stop and eat a restaurant, especially in the South.

When Dad was tired he pulled over and rested until a cop told him to move along. Again, it was impossible for a black man in the 1950s to get a room in a hotel.

By the time I came around in 1969, things were changing. That was even more so when Mom, Dad, and I drove from Michigan to Louisiana in the 1970s. We could eat in restaurants. We stopped and stayed in hotels. But for Dad, the change wasn’t easy. My mother would tell the story where we stopped one morning for breakfast in Vicksburg, Mississippi. Dad didn’t want to go into the restaurant…