More Celebration for Juanita Harrison
Image via NYPL
Every generation has those who have the mandate of experiencing the promise land before anyone .
They get a prized experience of partaking in the fruits of a life not yet available to the rest of us; they get to preview the goodness that will be available, should we live to see it. There are such pioneers whose job is to taste and see sweetness of life while the rest of their generation fights the good fight.
Why do such forerunners exist? So that those assigned to the throes of the struggle can have a vivid picture of what they’re fighting for. Surveying the promised land before others can might sound like an easy task, but it comes with the task of a good memory, willingness to feel everything, fearlessness, and the ability to compile a book on one’s findings. Anyone intending to be a pioneer must first be willing to be an author. Harrison completed her assignment as a forerunner for us. She didn’t evade her calling as a Black woman by going “on vacation” for 8 years, she fulfilled it by leaving a book.
She traveled the world while most black women couldn’t travel the American South. Yet she wasn’t predestined to be a civil rights freedom fighter—we had those. She was cut of a different cloth to have a different experience that illustrated an alternate ending for our future generations. We needed Juanita right where she was: experiencing the better life abroad (kimono shopping in Japan, wandering Paris, sleeping along Copenhagen’s canals, attending plays in Spain, learning about funeral rituals in Egypt...), and documenting her findings. Of course there were probably more eloquent or well learned teastained women travelers but they probably weren’t willing to write a book. Sometimes it isnt about your literacy, but your will.
Selfish sojourners travel time and space, leaving no artefact for the next generation. Those who journey soulfully leave a book if not a library of their words to prophecy, instruct, inspire, and provoke those who might not be born yet.
Which are you?
(Images are pages of Juanita Harrison’s book, “My Great Wide Beautiful World” via Archive.org—yes it’s FREE)
