Vicki L. Clark

Blessings and the touch of influential women are a part of my journey. Who knew I, this unassuming girl from Colorado, who dreamed big but focused small, would have opportunities to meet and interact with women of great character and influence from all over the country. It just brings into realization how God's plan for you is never how you envision it. 
Admiration for women outside of my mother, grandmother, and aunts began with Texas Congresswoman Barbara Jordan. When I met her, I didn't know her impact on history or women in politics. It was on a trip to Austin during my junior year in high school to visit the University Of Texas. Because Texas was still segregated, Ms. Jordan stayed with the same family I stayed with on my visit. Mesmerized, I spent most of the trip asking a thousand questions. I met Pam the same year while attending East High School. During that time, she was so shy it took some persuading to get her to join our little clique at lunchtime. Our connection was athletics and helping anyone who needed a helping hand. We worked after school at Dr. Daddio's Record Shoppe in Dahlia Shopping Center before she and I both left Denver for Los Angeles. Once out there, the thread of our relationship tattered because of philosophical differences and activities. Fortunately, we reunited years later on the set of the L Word television series, where she portrayed the sister of an out lesbian. After living in Texas, Cleo Parker's family moved around the corner from us on Emerson Street. In the summer months, neighborhood kids hung out in the garage next door to my house we converted to a pretty cool clubhouse. Mostly we would have these stage shows. I would try and sing and dance at the drop of a hat, but Cleo would have these dance steps that none of us could do, so I stuck to singing, and she became our resident choreographer. When the girls were there without the guys in the neighborhood, we talked about our dreams and ambitions. Her account of Texas made my decision to go to Cal easier. After she told me of some racial incidents that affected her family that would have never happened in Denver, I marked off any school in Texas that I previously had been interested in attending. Angela, June, and Elaine came into my life in the heart of a changing country. I met them all in San Diego. I was awestruck as I mingled among the ultra-radical women with their colorful garb at a rally. John Floyd, the LA Black Panther Party leader, was eyeing me and invited me to join the group discussion that included Angela and Ron Karenga. Minutes later, I was invited to a gathering at the Black Congress in LA that week. Excited, I buzzed through the rally, introducing myself to anyone and everyone. I spotted Elaine in conversation with guys I knew from the office in Jordan Downs. I spied on her from afar until she was finally alone. I approached her intending to get a phone number but found in conversing with her, she was serious about one of the men in the Congress. I didn't see her again until the day I went to the office in the projects to get brochures to hand out at UCLA. She taught some girls to read music as they sat at the piano given to them by a church in the neighborhood. No guys around to distract her, I began with my spiel, "My Sister! I didn't know you were a member of the Movement!" Five minutes into the conversation, it was crazy how much our backgrounds mirrored, though she'd grown up in Philadelphia. We were both only children with manipulative mothers. One of the stories that made our lives parallel was how naïve we were about acceptance by White America when we were young. She told the story of being the smartest in her class and going to a different school than others in her block. Of course, the school was predominately white, and because Elaine was smarter than most, she thought she would be accepted in their neighborhood. The truth was, no matter her academic prowess, she would not be on the same level as the white girls. The students and teachers saw her as a colored girl from North Philly. My story was similar: I ran for Vice Head Girl of Morey Middle Schools' student council and won. One of the white girls I ran against cried foul, and there was a recount. After the recount, they said I hadn't won. It was a tie, and we had to share the office. I knew I won by a huge margin…it wasn't even close. I never ran for anything again. I lost my belief in a fair democratic system and began to rebel against anything or anyone that was status quo or political. After joining the Panthers later that year, unending conversations with E, AY, and other sisters in the small apartment near the office on Florence and Broadway stabilized my commitment to the Movement. If I hadn't had the relationship with them when LAPD shot up our headquarters in 1969, I would've run back to Denver without continuing the fight to make the world better for my predecessors. In 2007, at a Panther's reunion, we talked of the discipline and lessons learned as young Black women in an organization so much a part of Black History. Amazed we were still alive, we cried over comrades lost and applauded the accomplishments made as a People. Although AY and E were excellent writers, June was the writer I admired and wanted to emulate. Her poetry was sad yet optimistic. Her essays told the world how it felt being female, black, and without a voice. We both had a time coming to grips with loving our tough disciplinarian fathers. Wanda Coleman and Michelle T. were instrumental in developing my style of writing. We met at the Watts Community Center in the '80s as part of a new spoken language writing component. Each of us contributed our voice to plays and fiction based on our lives in our writing circle. Collaborating with other women in the community, we formed LA Women's Writer's Group. It became my refuge and eventual savior after emerging from the world of cocaine-driven criminal behaviors. "I," my mother's favorite poem, was written while in the group. Gail Devers is a phenomenal woman I met when she was a student at San Diego's Sweetwater High. As Media Specialist at the Black Federation, I  interviewed her about her notoriety as an up-and-coming track star. Instead of experiencing the usual difficulty of securing the interview because of the city's cliquish African American community, she was receptive. I volunteered with families of incarcerated women, and the girls in those families expressed their desire to be involved in track and field. I picked up the girls and took them to run along the beach with Gail for almost a year. During this time, I had a casual relationship with one of the girl's mothers. When I decided to stop seeing the woman, she refused to let her daughter go to the beach to run. I asked Gail to intervene, and the mother said I could not see the young lady because she'd told her mother I'd touched her privates. There was an investigation by San Diego County Social Services. Completely shocked at the accusation, I asked everyone to help me. In my defense, Gail talked to the social worker and the child who made the accusation. Finally, it came out her mother fabricated the story to get back at me. She even threatened to send her daughter back to Alabama if she didn't say I molested her. I heard stories of false accusations, and I sometimes had questioned the validity of the incidents. But in the aftermath, I sensitized myself to other women who didn't have positive relationships with their family and friends. I didn't realize how fortunate I was to have a family who never abandoned me. My mostly heterosexual friends trusted me to mentor,  babysit and godmother their children. male and female, no matter who was in my life. God's lesson for me was never again to be disbelieving of situations others go through because I knew no one who had experienced it. Gail and her family's support and belief in my mentoring were one of my bright spots in America's Finest City. On my birthday, Maya Angelou came to California Women's Prison for Black History month, the first year I was incarcerated. Ms. Maya spoke to us as if we were free and just sitting around doing girlfriend things. Some of us were in Creative Writing and asked if she would read and critique our writings. To my surprise, she said a piece I'd written was better than good. And added  I should continue to write after I was released;  it would keep me open to change within necessary for recovery after prison. Years later, we saw each other again at a Writer's Retreat outside of San Francisco, and she called me one of her "daughters" she knew would make it out of the darkness. Audre Lorde was at the same retreat, and I told her that her writings got me through the insanity of being locked away. Fascinated, I chose her books to read for healing, we shared early mornings in the wildness of the Redwoods, talking about everything under the sun. The day she passed away in St. Croix, I wrote "No Ordinary Love" in my grief for not being as diligent in my friendship as I promised her I would be before we left the workshop. Vivian came to me as an unknown in a cancer chat room. After my recovery from melanoma in 1999, I sought outlets to help people with cancer. As a basketball player in high school, I studied coaches and players to get myself more involved in the technical aspect of the sport. By the eighties, women's sports had revolutionized to cable television, and I was able to watch college games that previously were unavailable. I idolized Pat Summit at Tennessee, but I thought Vivian Stringer was a better coach. Her teaching style was to build character and discipline before sharpening basketball skills. I was inspired by her reach inside the male-dominated college ranks. Idiotically, cancer was positive in a way I would have never imagined because of the touch I received from her.