Strongholds. Vanessa Davis Griggs
I heard the original song, I couldn’t believe my ears. That was so tight! Soon afterward, Uncle Tank and I became good buddies.
That’s when he told me he thought I was a bit out of balance, reading all those “smart books” all the time and “living on the computer.” He believed every young boy needed other “book-learning,” especially in my case, not having my father around to teach me men stuff. I needed to expand my “reading repertoire” was the way he put it.
That’s when he pulled out a magazine, flipped the pages so I could see it was chock full of pictures, and gently laid it down before me like it was a mint condition Michael Jordan rookie card or something.
My first reaction was that I was too old for a picture book and that he really didn’t understand boys my age at all.
“Uncle Tank, I don’t know if you realize this, but I am thirteen now. For sure, I’m too old to be reading picture books.”
“See what I mean, boy? Most boys your age would have picked up on just seeing the cover that this is no children’s book. That there is a pure, double-D, Grade-A, certified woman right there on that cover. I guarantee you won’t find these here pictures in no children’s book.” He turned several pages and began to grin. “Here.” He handed it to me. “Take this and try studying somethin’ other than all that boring stuff you done got brainwashed to. And if you find you like what you see, I’ve got plenty more where this one come from stashed away. Plen-ty. You just let your good ole Uncle Tank know, and Uncle Tank will take care of you. You can believe that.”
“I don’t know about this,” I said.
“Boy, do you want to grow up and be a real man, or do you want to grow up and be with a man? This book is like a test. If you’re straight, we’ll find out by how you react. Consider this my gift to you. Just don’t let your mama know or see it. Women don’t seem to understand or share our appreciation for God’s human art in full, living color.”
And that was how it all began, where the seed was planted and my addiction to pornography took root. And like most addictions, it has only progressed over the years.
Now here I am married to Marcella, a wonderful, smart, beautiful woman, with a baby girl on the way, and I still find myself sneaking—late at night after my real, live, can-actually-be-touched wife is asleep—to look at porn. That’s crazy. I have my own stash of magazines, videos, and DVDs galore, conveniently squirreled away. And the very thing Uncle Tank claimed a huge waste of my time—the computer—as it turns out, actually gives me the greatest access (via the Internet) to unlimited sites. There is categorically no shortage of porn lurking in cyberspace.
The thing that disturbs me is the amount of deceptive e-mail sent to people who really aren’t interested in viewing pornographic sites, a good many of them being sent to innocent children. Children who, like me, could later become hooked. After all, it wasn’t that long ago when I myself had only been a naive boy, minding my own business.
Now look at me. As a grown man, I can’t seem to stop myself from practically gawking at naked women whose certain sexual acts I have no place or business looking upon. Marcella deserves better from me. Our new baby, due in about five months, deserves better. Although honestly, some of the books Marcella and her friends have been reading lately (called erotic fiction) seem to simply be just a more acceptable version of my own stronghold. Much of it is, from what I’ve seen and heard, clearly porn in words—sexual pictures created through the power of language.
And as Pastor Landris just said in a recent sermon, “Imagination is imagination. All images—real or imagined—are equally real when it comes to your brain.”
True, Pastor. They’re all images. And some of them just need to be pulled down.
Dr. Xavier Holden
I can’t believe I actually stood and walked up to the front like this. I’m the one who is usually helping others to get their lives together. I’m the one people look to for answers, although in truth, I merely pose the questions that help draw out the answers.
“Dr. Holden, I desperately need your help.” “Dr. Holden, it’s urgent that I talk to you today. Please, can’t you just work me in?” Who would think a psychologist would be on call the way I appear to be? I’ve even had to go to various emergency rooms to see about a few of my patients in the middle of the night.
When I began my practice, Avis and I had just gotten engaged. Avis is my sweetheart. I remember the day I first knew I liked her. We were in the school yard.
“Ouch!” Avis yelled as she turned around and glared at me. “Boy, why did you pull my hair?”
“Who you calling a boy?”
“If you pull my hair again, I’m going to do more than call you a boy,” she said.
“Oh, so I’m supposed to be scared of you?” I asked.
“You’d better be.”
“And who are you supposed to be?”
She put one hand on her hip, which truthfully already had some nice curves going on, cocked her head to one side, and turned up her nose at me. “Avis Denise Miller!”
I smiled. “Avis? What kind of a name is Avis?”
“You pull my hair again, and you’re gonna find out what kind of a name is Avis. ’Cause I’m gonna run you down and roll right over you.” She turned and walked away.
I didn’t know it at the time, but I fell in love at the age of ten, right then and there next to the seesaw. It took Avis another five years (she was thirteen by then, two years younger than me) to come to her senses and realize she hopelessly loved me, too. Some folks claim I merely “wore the poor girl down.” The truth is, she felt the electricity the day I yanked that luscious, long, black, springy plait of hers.
I know what it’s like to grow up doing without. So does Avis. We both knew education was the golden key to our escaping the great state of poverty. I always knew I wanted to be some type of doctor, but the thought of being on call 24/7 didn’t appeal to me. I realized I had a knack for talking to people, but an even greater gift when it came to listening, analyzing, and giving direction to folks regardless of their age, race, religious background, or gender.
People think they’re helping by trying to tell others what they should do. But I learned early in life, if you give people time to talk and to listen to what’s inside of them already, they will, for the most part, discover the answers they seek. The problem I find with us black folk is: we consider it a sign of weakness to go talk to a professional when it comes to psychological things, like being depressed. Church folks in particular considered it weak faith if a person had to seek help from a “head doctor” or a “shrink” as they were called back in my day. It’s changing some, but we still have a long way to go.
I look at what I do as being an extension of ministry. Some people can talk to their pastors about everything. Some people are fortunate enough to have a really good friend they feel comfortable enough sharing intimate details about their lives with in order for them to heal. Lately, however, it seems my practice has exploded because of the mega churches that are springing up. Folks are finding it increasingly more difficult to get an appointment to talk with their pastors without a three- to six-month wait.
“Look, Dr. Holden,” one of my patients—a tall, heavyset woman with short, cropped hair—said. “First off, I don’t really believe in head doctors or shrinks.”
“We’re not head doctors or shrinks.”
“You know what I mean. You people do like to mill around in folks’ heads trying to fix problems, real or imagined.”
“Okay. So you don’t believe in head doctors or shrinks.”
“Anyhow, I didn’t really want to come, but I called my pastor’s office so I could talk with him about an urgent matter, and he’s booked up for the next five months. They have others on staff you can talk to, but I don’t want one of