My Mama and Summing Up the Ancestors

My mama...she was so beautiful. On January 26, 2013 she will have been gone for 8 years. How I loved her so. I was her only daughter. 

It has taken me a long while to mourn her and I finally feel as if I have truly made a deep shift of her having left this earth. My grieving has been intense for I was not only grieving her, I have been grieving my father, my husband, and the fact that my two children, my sons are now flying their own wings in this life. I am sure they are figuring out what they are all about...as they are so far away from me.

I sprouted wings while she was alive, but I never was far and she and I were so very close. I felt the need to be by her. She was of great comfort and full of wisdom when I needed it. She was a beautiful and loving grandmother. 

Yet, now...Maria is all on her own, truly now 
discovering her own wings.

Well, what does all of this have to do with summing up the ancestors you may be asking? I shall share...

The other night I was watching "La Amistad." If you have not seen this movie, I highly recommend it. There are Mende slaves that were captured off the East Coast of what encompossed the North and the South of the United States at that time and they are imprisoned. They had successfully overtaken the ship and left two men alive to get them back to Africa.

At this time, in the North and the South of what would become, the United States one could only buy a slave that had already been on a plantation, for example from Cuba. The case was successfully tried and won in the two lower courts by an unknown yet successful attorney at law. Because it was an election year the President at that time Martin Van Buren was persuaded to take the case to the highest court in the land, the Supreme Court. John Quincy Adams was at last willing to take on the case. 

Cinque, the leader of the captured slaves, is stunning, all feel now that all is lost and they will be hanged. Cinque felt differently for he expressed to the former President Adams that he will summon his ancestors and they must come to help. It their duty and they are the reason that he is alive.

Watching this movie again was a huge turning point for me in my current life. I have been summing up my ancestors in Mexico for I have traveled their three times since everyone has left. Twice to the land of my mother's ancestors. I even buried some of my parent's ashes there. 

On my grandmother's side I have Otomi Indian blood. I also come from a very strong line of revolutionaries, Don Miguel Hidalgo, the most famous person in Mexican history, for he led the independence against Spain. He was humble, brave, a priest, and desired all to be free. My grandmother's father fought in the revolution which began in 1910.

I feel that now my mother and my ancestors have been with me as I have struggled with my grief and the redefining of who is Maria.

They shall continue to be with me. I come from strong stock, and for this I am very grateful, and very proud. So tomorrow do not only honor my beautiful mother, I honor as well, my amazing ancestors who have, and continue to help me shape my spirit, heart, and soul. I thank you mama and all those before me in my beloved Mexico...

"

I thank all of my beloved readers for your reading of my writings. You are with me in my heart...

I do highly suggest the movie "La Amistad."

Musical Selection: "Vuele Libre Paloma" by Mana.

http://youtu.be/2RdGZ0puskQ

The lead singer of Mana wrote this song after his mother passed away.

Love and peace to all...Maria Juarez Beam (Boheme)

Honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr

Today here in the United States we honored a great man, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. His actual birthday is January 15, 1929. His assassination happened on April 4, 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee, USA. He was just 39 years old. Dr. King had given a speech the night before he was shot at the World Head Quarters of the Church of God in Christ in Memphis, Tennessee, USA. He was there to make a speech on behalf of the sanitation workers of Memphis. At the bottom of this post there is the link for the speech in its entirety. 

I am going to write some of my personal thoughts before you get to the speech. I was privileged to have been born in 1960 in the San Francisco Bay Area. Although I was only seven when Dr. King was killed. He, and the Civil Rights Movement are with me so vividly. The San Francisco Bay area has always been a great place of impetus for change. I lived very near Oakland, CA, USA and the fruition of the Black Panthers and the Black Power Movement. 

I always remember my parents always talking talking so fondly of Dr. King and of his wife, Correta. My mother and my father were great teachers in regard to not seeing the skin color of a person, only simply the person. I was blessed by this. 

We would sit around our television and watch Dr. King's heart throbbing speeches.

The speech that he gave at the Church of God in Christ was so powerful, I feel much of it came straight from his soul that it could only bring one to tears. I was at the age of seven. 

You can imagine our sadness and shock upon hearing he had been shot on the balcony of his humble hotel at 6:01, April 4, 1968. The very next evening. I think we simply could not speak. We cried, but words were left inside, perhaps due to to the pure shock. Yet, the beauty is that this man lived, breathed, and walked the earth with great courage and humbleness. We as a world were given a gift with his presence upon our planet.

I am going to put an excerpt from the speech. Towards the very end of his speech there is a part of him that seems to know that something was going to happen to him for he states, "I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!..."


Without further ado, here is the last half of Dr. Martin Luther King's last speech. Reading this half in it's entirety you will learn much. The end is purely beautiful...

..."You know, several years ago, I was in New York City autographing the first book that I had written. And while sitting there autographing books, a demented black woman came up. The only question I heard from her was, "Are you Martin Luther King?" And I was looking down writing, and I said, "Yes." And the next minute I felt something beating on my chest. Before I knew it I had been stabbed by this demented woman. I was rushed to Harlem Hospital. It was a dark Saturday afternoon. And that blade had gone through, and the X-rays revealed that the tip of the blade was on the edge of my aorta, the main artery. And once that's punctured, your drowned in your own blood -- that's the end of you.

It came out in the New York Times the next morning, that if I had merely sneezed, I would have died. Well, about four days later, they allowed me, after the operation, after my chest had been opened, and the blade had been taken out, to move around in the wheel chair in the hospital. They allowed me to read some of the mail that came in, and from all over the states and the world, kind letters came in. I read a few, but one of them I will never forget. I had received one from the President and the Vice-President. I've forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit and a letter from the Governor of New York, but I've forgotten what that letter said. But there was another letter that came from a little girl, a young girl who was a student at the White Plains High School. And I looked at that letter, and I'll never forget it. It said simply,

Dear Dr. King,

I am a ninth-grade student at the White Plains High School."

And she said,

While it should not matter, I would like to mention that I'm a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune, and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze.

And I want to say tonight -- I want to say tonight that I too am happy that I didn't sneeze. Because if I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1960, when students all over the South started sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were sitting in, they were really standing up for the best in the American dream, and taking the whole nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1961, when we decided to take a ride for freedom and ended segregation in inter-state travel.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1962, when Negroes in Albany, Georgia, decided to straighten their backs up. And whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent.

If I had sneezed -- If I had sneezed I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation, and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have had a chance later that year, in August, to try to tell America about a dream that I had had.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been down in Selma, Alabama, to see the great Movement there.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been in Memphis to see a community rally around those brothers and sisters who are suffering.

I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze.

And they were telling me --. Now, it doesn't matter, now. It really doesn't matter what happens now. I left Atlanta this morning, and as we got started on the plane, there were six of us. The pilot said over the public address system, "We are sorry for the delay, but we have Dr. Martin Luther King on the plane. And to be sure that all of the bags were checked, and to be sure that nothing would be wrong with on the plane, we had to check out everything carefully. And we've had the plane protected and guarded all night."

And then I got into Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers?

Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.

And I don't mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

And so I'm happy, tonight.

I'm not worried about anything.

I'm not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!"

Thank you to: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkivebeentothemountaintop.htm 

There is so much more that one could write about this great man that it would take up a full blog.

Just a bit more Civil Rights history:
Dr. King was a Nobel Peace Prize winner


The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was signed by President Lydon B. Johnson

President Harry Truman integrates African American into the military in 1948.

Rosa Parks refuses to give up her bus seat near the front in 1955.

There was the African American Civil Rights Movement from 1896-1954

And The African American Civil Rights Movement from 1955-1968

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Martin Luther King, Jr. 

I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.
Martin Luther King, Jr. 


Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.
Martin Luther King, Jr. 
Quotes thanks to:
 http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/martin_luther_king_jr.html#kajDOieMAo2KTAti.99


Musical Selection: "Martin Luther King Jr. Song" Theresa Orlando





It is wonderful...enjoy.

Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Martin_Luther_King,_Jr.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_Civil_Rights_Movement_(1955%E2%80%9368)

Thank you all so very much for reading and honoring Dr. King today. All  my love, Maria Juarez Beam (Boheme)

A Friendship is Golden...

...just as the golden moon that glistened in the sky of tonight. 

Today, I had the blessing and privilege of spending possibly the last hours with a dear friend of my heart. His respirator was removed today, although, he was breathing on his own, and I, nor his family know how long this will continue. Yet, the one fact we do know, is that he is "brain dead."

I love this man with all of my heart and soul and his beloved family. Although, I had not seen him in over a year, nonetheless, he remained with me and within me. Sometimes, we do not realize how much a person is within us until the shadow of death is upon the doorstep.

Our lives become consumed with work, family, health issues, the business of our modern lifestyle, or simply, we haven't reached out. For many it is not for lack of loving or caring...it is perhaps, just lack of remembering that remembering friendships, no matter what has passed between you in the past or what is going on in our present, that our dear and deep friendships are precious...vital. They are so, not only for our friends, but for ourselves as well.

Friends feed our soul, feed our lives. Friends can keep us from being a slave to the current technology and from some mindless television. There is nothing more golden than family and FRIENDS who truly are family within this whole realm of life. I believe with all of my quivering being that our Universal Creator intended this...connection, love, family, and our beloved friends. If you can reach out to a friend you have not spoken with in a while, please do. I know, I am going to begin to make this a priority, for I have not been reaching out to many. Today, as I kissed my golden friend goodbye, I made this promise in my heart...reaching out.

All my love dear readers and friends. 

Maria Juarez Boheme Beam

Musical Selection: "You've Got a Friend" by James Taylor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WJ1cf3nrLE

Thank you for reading...I dedicate this post and song to my dear friend Brian.