Ronald

When I called the prison, I was transferred to the warden who told me that my father "expired."

That was how I found out about his death. Expired. At first, I was angry, but soon the news was met with tears of joy. Instantly, I remembered my father had come to me in a dream to say, "I am free. I can do now for you what I could not do before. I am always with you. I am only a thought and ask away." I never connected the dots from my dream until then. That was 2017. I had stopped getting letters from my father, and for several months, the letters I wrote to him were not being responded to. I later told my mother that my father had passed. This was only the second time I spoke to my mother about my father, the first was to share that I was visiting him during college. She responded, "that's very sad he had to spend his whole life in prison."

My father was incarcerated when my mother was seven months pregnant with me. I never got the full story, but he was accused of raping a white woman in the South. He was given a life sentence.

For at least three months, I marinated in my mother's shame, pain, embarrassment, anger, guilt, and fear. The womb was toxic for me—it wasn't a place of warmth or nurturing. Something about my spirit, even to this day, remembers that toxicity, and I was just ready to do everything I could to get out. At nine months pregnant, my mother didn't have enough time to get into the emergency room, and I hit the floor at birth.

My mother didn't think I was alive because I didn't cry. It was only when they picked me up that I started crying. I'm a true believer in how you come into this world can dictate how your life is orchestrated because my silence continued through my childhood. Despite being aware of an absence, I was the model martyr and never asked questions. I didn't know the questions to ask, and I also felt my mother's pain. I had heard that my father was in prison, but at six years old, I did not understand what prison was. All the stories I remember hearing were negative, "you going to be just like your father in prison!" It felt like a burden carrying his name because I am actually a Junior.

At six or seven, I met my father face-to-face for the first time. I remember the locks, being searched by guards with my mom, unlocking the gates, and my dad behind a glass wall. I looked at a man who looked just like me, but my father could not touch or hug me. I would not see him again until I was nine years old. My mother was angry. Mass incarceration not only affects those who are locked up. It especially impacts the children, wives, brothers, sisters, mothers, and fathers left in the outside world because we do every bit of time that they do behind bars. My mother never had the words for it, in her mind, my father was guilty, and she had no support.

But little Ronnie was fearless. Everything then was about discovery, newness, and the innocence of a child with no boundaries. Along the way, I learned to put up boundaries, such as men not smiling at other men or not looking other men in the eyes. I was taught that a little boy becomes a man, and a man walks like this, looks like this, and makes these kinds of decisions. I was seven or eight when I became a man. I still remember that moment when my grandmother smacked me for allegedly looking at my sister in a sexual way. My heart dropped, something clicked and was followed by a deep sadness.

I was aware I was supposed to show up in a way I didn't understand—which was confusing—but it's all generational trauma because my grandmother had 10 girls, and some had been touched. Even as a kid, she saw me as the adult she was going to protect my little sister from. And there was also my father, accused of rape. Through her lens, she was protecting my sister from the man she believed she had failed to protect her girls from, and that trauma was passed down.

As a sensitive child around all of this intergenerational pain, I had to learn to read adults. These deep wounds later became my greatest gift as I tapped into different energies that would lead to a spiritual connection with my father. While he wrote me letters every week to connect that way, I didn't get these letters until I was around ten or eleven. I also wanted to write back to him, but that was always discouraged. I reminded my mother too much of her own mistakes.

Despite the odds, my father and I created a bond. And at eighteen or nineteen years old, we were able to hug for a minute, then he sat on his side, and I sat on mine. It was weird for me—weighted and heavy—and I froze while he squeezed me. I remember the joy in his eyes though and how happy he was, but I only got to touch my father four or five times my entire life.

I later attended college in North Carolina so I could develop a relationship with him and would visit every other weekend. He knew there was so much lost time and did everything he could to fill in the gap. He told me to be mindful of the crowds I hung out with, that I could be innocent, so be wary. I learned to fear captivity, cops, and authority figures. To this day, I still check myself about who I am giving authority to. I also thought I didn't have the freedom to make mistakes, so I never smoked, and was petrified of cops and would tremble if I had an encounter with them; but that's not just my father, it's also the Black makeup of our DNA. My father did an awesome job. He did his part with what he had and poured every inch of life into me. And every time we spoke, he repeated, "I'm innocent, I'm innocent, I'm innocent. The only reason I'm behind bars is because I'm poor, and Black, and not from the South." He needed me to know he was innocent and was a good person.

My father also had his demons, as he was a captured paratrooper in the Vietnam War, which led to some psychological trauma. He was also one of the casualties of the heroin epidemic in Vietnam and came back home with a habit and a drinking problem. He felt like prison was his punishment for his drug addiction and sought atonement in becoming a born-again Christian. He often shared how his faith and journey with God helped him cope with prison. He never complained and never wanted me to see his pain. Instead, he spoke of peace, forgiveness, and concern with where I was spiritually. This gave him light in darkness. This also gave us a bridge.

Though I feel my father's presence always with me, I spent a lifetime trying to justify and figure out why I did not have my father in my life. I've tried, unsuccessfully, to get his court records. I've lived in the gap of not knowing. Now, I am bringing peace to the pieces. I just want to tell his story. I want to tell our story. I think it needs to be told. I think there are so many stories like this that exist, but the shame, the shame, the shame, the shame, the shame; when in reality, systemically, things have been set up to do exactly what they are doing.

Sometimes, my father whispers to me, “I made the sacrifice.” He made the ultimate sacrifice for my bloodline. I don't know what my ancestors behind him went through, but I have a sense that the men were locked up, but it stops here. I honor that. I am grateful for that. And now, I get to elevate my father. I get to give him a voice, a face, and a light.

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Ronald’s Interview
Written by Antoinette Cooper