Jeff Rogers in Boston: "Halfrican"
TEENAGE DIARIES
Produced by: Joe Richman
All Things Considered (NPR)
11/13/98




Robert Seigel, Host: This is NPR's All Things Considered, I'm Robert Seigel. As part of our ongoing series, Teenage Diaries, Producer Joe Richman has been giving tape recorders to teenagers to document their lives. Today we meet Jeff Rodgers. Jeff is sixteen, and lives with his family in Boston. More and more these days he finds himself thinking about race and being forced to answer the question "What are you?" This is his radio diary.

(knock, knock, knock, knock)

(door opens)

Jeff's Mother: Good morning, Jeffrey, it's time to get up. Let's go.
Jeff: (clears throat) yeah, I'm coming. (groans)

Jeff: What's going on, this is Jeff. It's 6:20. Gotta get up and go to school. Usually every morning, listen to some music. (music starts) ahhhhhhhh! Cuz I gotta get energized, like my morning coffee. I love my music. This morning, the selection is disco, Sister Sledge, "He's the greatest dancer." Yes, I do listen to disco. (sings/high pitched voice) I wonder why! (laughs) (sings/high pitched voice) he's the greatest dancer.

(music fades under)

Jeff: My name is Jeff, I'm sixteen, I live in Dorchester, which is part of Boston, I live with both my parents, my father, my mother, two brothers and a sister. My family's all together looks like an unusual bunch cuz people don't quite place us as a family right away. We look like a real motley crew. (sings-high voice ) he's the greatest dancer! I wonder why...ever seen! (sings/in a deep voice) I wonder why he's the greatest dancer! I wonder why....

(music fades under)

Jeff: Most people look at me they think I'm Puerto Rican, an it's like that's exactly what I look like, the stereotypical Puerto Rican. Like, slick back hair, long sideburns, both ears pierced. One of those thin, little pencil thin teenage mustache. But it always ends up coming up when someone says "how do you say such and such in Spanish, to me" and I say (music fades out) "I'm not Spanish" and they say "What are you?"

(at home)

Jeff: These are my Pop's old records. My fathers really into music. You know he has a lot of old records, and going through the records and tapes and CD's, that he has and you come across funny stuff like this (music begins) I was like hey. (music:"The ink is black the page is white") Three dog night. Its corny but it's cool, you know what I'm saying? Like, this is my theme song. (music: "The child is black, the child is white, the whole world looks upon the sight, a beautiful si..g...ht.....")

(music fades under)

Jeff: Usually when someone asks what I am, I say I'm halfrican. You know, my father's black, my mothers white, and when I was younger, to me that was the way it was supposed to be. Father meant black person. Mother meant white person. You know? I though, to me it was normal. Anything else was unusual, and race had no bearing on anything. To me, two Asian people could just have a black kid. It made perfect sense, when I was younger.

(music up: "To see the light....." fades out)

(at the breakfast table - sounds of coffee grinder)

Father: I'll do mine first!
Sister: I know you're hungry.
Jeff: My parents, the coffee connoisseurs that was the coffee maker, (laughs) I like to DJ on it. (revs coffee grinder)
Mother: You've gotta secure your spot right?

(sounds of the breakfast table fades under)

Jeff: It's like they always had the argument nature versus nurture. You know? Is it the way you're brought up or just the way you're born? When you're younger, you don't ponder, you know, Who am I? What, what, why am I here? you know? You're just living for the day. Having fun, watching teenage mutant ninja turtles, and eating cereal. Then, you know you hit that beautiful that that beautiful certain age, and you start to redefine yourself.

(Jeff reciting girls names fades under)

Jeff: And the biggest thing is probably the opposite sex, like I say in my case girls.

(Jeff reciting names fades up)

Jeff: Blondie...Makala....Shannon...These are little numbers that you rip on little pieces of paper. I got other pages of numbers like one's I actually took the time to write down. These are the miscellaneous ones. Liz...Mimi.....Monique....

(fades out)

Jeff: In elementary school and in middle school, to girls I was more or less undesirable. People used to make fun of me, rank on me, whatever, a lot. And, I know a lot of kids got made fun of when they were little because they were mixed but I never did. And I tell you why. Cuz I was so fat people would ignore it to (laughs) jump on the easier fat jokes. I was huge, I mean, (pause) pretty big.

Jeff: But, you know, it make me sharp tongued, sharp witted. You know, you had to develop guts living like that. And uh, it was right at the time when I hit middle school, I started getting some style, you know what I'm saying? Dressing a little better, taking care of myself, realizing that you know, you had to comb your hair, you didn't just get up and go. (laughs) Little stuff, you know, wipe the crust out your eye, and next thing you know? The girls are looking at me. And I'm glad they look at me now.


Mother: (Yells something)
Jeff: Yep, I got 'em mom! I'll be out the door, I guess I'll check you all later.

(at school - bell rings)

Jeff: The school I got to is Boston-Latin Academy in Roxbury. Right now I'm just going through the hallways. Bell just rang. Fourth Period. Lunch is about to start. I look unusual with a big microphone, walking through the hallway...

Girl: What are you doing?
Jeff: It's my job.
Girl: oh.

Jeff: When you walk into the cafeteria in school, in one corner sit all the white kids, then more in the middle sit the black kids. And then on the other side there's a little place for the outcasts. And somewhere, the Hispanic kids get scattered.

Jeff: All right now, everyone at this tables white, right?
Kid: Yeah, we white!
Jeff: Why do you think all the white people sit together?
Kid: I'm thinking about getting a race change, you know?

Jeff: I remember actually one time, the principal issued , like a little statement about that, like yeah, you guys should try to intermingle more, whatever, everyone politely ignored her. Usually I sit at one of the black tables, the black male table.

Jeff: So, you wouldn't hang, sit at a table with white folks?
Kid: Actually, I don't think I'd fit it cuz it's like a different culture.
Kid #2: Yeah.

(Rap music fades up and under)

Jeff: The only time when black kids tend to consider me not fully black, seems to be when the actual subject of race comes up. One things when you listen to rap, raps always talking about uh, there's gonna be a race war. And people kind of look at it like, what side am I gonna be on? Who will I fight for? And that kid Kamal I was talking to, he argues there's gonna be race war and he said the reason why noone told me about, was because I'm half and half. That's what he, you know, "hey, you didn't hear about it? - that's cuz you're half and half" As is if was like, yeah, he's cool but he also fraternizes with the enemy so he can't know our plan, you know, he can't be trusted.

(Rap music fades up and under)

Jeff: Seems like a whole bunch of malarkly now, but...all I'm saying is like I'm never really, really, really, really, really fully in. It's almost like uh, hmmmm, everyone on a sports team, they've all been on the Celtics their whole life. But me, I've been on the Celtics for years but I got traded from the Clippers. So if I was gonna say, yeah the clippers isn't a bad organization. They'd say "yeah - your just saying that cuz you were once on the Clippers." You never know, when it comes to the race issue, I could just be a traitor. You know?

(Rap music fades up and out)

Jeff: It's funny, a lot of people, a lot of black people have no interaction with white people, no white friends. A lot of white people the same. I actually have a black person and a white person that live in my house. Interact constantly. Chose, you know, chose each other over anyone else on the whole earth, in the whole universe, and it's illustrated to me everyday, you know

(dinner at home)

Child: (yells) Please!!
Mother: Shhh! Bow you're head.
Father: (begins to pray) ....for all of us to come together as a family, and enjoy each others company...thank you for all the blessings that you've given us. and....

(prayer fades under)

Jeff: These days, you know, my parents are kind of affluent but there was a time, when they were really dirt poor. They lived in the projects. They lived in Columbia Point. Probably the oldest and biggest projects in Boston.

Child: Amen!
Mother: Pass our plates around...
Jeff: I'll do mine first!

(laughter - dinner sounds fade under)

Jeff: As my father tells, and I've never heard my mother disagree, him being black, my father walked up to my mother one day, he walked up and said " Are you racist?" And she said, you know, as is cool for white people to say then and now " Oh, no, no, no, no not at all, not, racist? Me? No Never." And he said "Well, I am." and walked away. According to him that's the first thing he ever said to her. You know, he was just being a smart guy. Just like he is now, and she was just playing the straight woman, just like she does now.

(dinner table sounds fade out)

Father: You never know, what you're gonna like or who you're gonna end up with. When I got to your mother, the color really had nothing to do with it. I liked her. She was all over me like a warm blanket. I couldn't do anything about it, and I succumbed and you guys are here, so.

Mother: (laughs) Thank you.

Jeff: I mean back then would you say it was more, trying think how to put this, was that more the execption or the rule? You know what I mean? Down south the 1960's it was against the law for black people and white people to get married. Or be together....

Father: What happend, what happened was when your mother and I realized that she was pregnant, and that we had been playing with fire and we got burnt. I went over, I told my mother. My mother took it better than I thought, and then we had to tell other people. And they were just thinking of the baby, up, give your brother up. Big time.

Mother: They didn't approve of it. All the notions that they had maybe, that we weren't gonna stay together, that it wasn't going to work, that we were going to have a terrible life. That uh, we were gonna end up on welfare forever. You know...all of those notions, and It didn't pan out.

Father: It, it, it's so funny, when I think back now. My father's father, he loved your mother and she could just talk to him she'd say "hi grandpa" and he'd just beam from ear to ear. You know. Without a doubt, he'd always introduce "this is my granddaughter, this is my granddaughter," and people would look, people would look, you know...he didn't care. But you can't see in that picture up there but my grandmother was a beautiful, beautiful woman, and she was, you know, she's the image of your mother. Somewhere a long the line, ah, one of the slaves or something, was impregnated, but somewhere along the line, there's some white blood. In almost all of our families, but, I think in grandma.

But, if you told grandma that she was white, and we used to do that just to tease her sometimes (laughs) She used to get upset about it, say "I'm not white, I'm not white," you know. One of the things that I'm kind of envious of - of you guys, is that when you're with your mother, you can look like you're white, when you're with your father you can look like you're black. (laughs) badda bing....badda boom. That's it, you can do whatever you want. You can be whatever you want, as Mr. T used to say, "I pity the fool that don't understand it." (laughs) And that's one of the things we try to teach you guys.....(voice fades out)

Jeff: Talking with my parents has been kind of unusual, you know, we talked way longer we planned, in fact, we talked for something to two hours

Father: (laughs - fades out)

(piano begins....Stevie Wonders "Ribbon in the Sky" fades under)

Jeff: Yeah, One day, my father was listening to Stevie Wonder. And I heard da dun doon da dun doon, da dun doon da dun doon. That's one of the first songs I really tried to learn how to play on piano.

(Jeff on piano begins - the same refrain)

(The Stevie Wonder version follows and fades up and under)

Jeff: It does kinda make you want to reminisce. It's a dope song that way, it makes you think about stuff. I'm sixteen years old, almost seventeen, and being black and white, kinda makes sure I was always set apart. You know a little but different, always, always a little, you know, off-beat. In life, I'm beginning to think there's only two type of people, there's the types of people that see the sneakers that everyone has and rush out to get he new style. And there's the type of people that see the sneakers that everyone has, and rush out to get something so that they can be so different, and so outstanding, and I think I'm the latter. I love to be a little bit different. I'm gonna stop my little speech right here, I think I've said enough, so until then, peace out.

(Music Fades up)

Robert Seigel, Host: That story was reported and narrated by sixteen year old Jeff Rodgers and produced by Joe Richman.

(Music Fades up and out)



© 1996, Joe Richman