skin & bones: a novel

by Renée Watson

Every day I understand more and more that I am the harvest of my ancestors. Me, a Black woman with one of the top librarian positions in one of the whitest cities in the country. This country, a place where it was once illegal to teach people like me how to read.

In the 1900s Oregon got a nickname: the Mississippi of the West. Fourteen thousand Ku Klux Klansmen made the Pacific Northwest their home. Nine thousand of the Klansmen lived in Portland.

all I can think about is what it felt like to have lunch with Aspen, Meredith, and Allie, how they sat there and basically admitted—in my presence—that of all the cares and worries to have in life, their greatest fear is having a body that looks like mine.

It was White men who voted to ban slavery in Oregon. And at the same time, they voted to make it illegal for any new Black folks to take up residence in Oregon. Making it clear they didn’t mind Black folks living free. They just didn’t want that liberated Blackness next door to them.

They existed. They were here. Surviving, somehow. Somehow, surviving.

My love for you isn’t what I’m unsure of. I am deciding if you deserve it. I love you. I love me too. And I need to do what’s best for my heart. It might be that I still choose you. But most important, it has to be that I choose me.

I am afraid that the worst parts of me is all I’ve given her.

None of us survive childhood unscathed. When Aaliyah looks back on these days, yes, she might remember these painful moments, but I believe she’ll remember all the days you showed up for her, that you kept loving her, that you kept on persevering for her—for yourself. The best way you knew how. If you believe you’re passing down your shortcomings and burdens to her, doesn’t that mean she’s inheriting the best parts of you too? She’ll have to decide what to let go of, what to keep.

What would life be like for you if you saw every single moment, every word, every deed, as a seed? What would your harvest be?