I Will Not Fear
Page 15
As I approached and mounted the steps to the stage, my feet hurt. I should never have worn brand-new shoes on this special day. The nine of us were lined up, filing to our seats behind President Clinton. We took our seats, and the beautiful music began. Thoughts raced through my head at the speed of light: I can’t believe I’m here in the White House, enjoying a reception in my honor, and receiving this country’s highest medal for bravery. For all of these many years, I had wondered if what I did back in 1957 by integrating Little Rock’s all-white Central High School against all odds was wrong. It tore the social fabric of the community where I lived and divided us all into warring factions. It was a life-threatening fiasco that changed my life focus.
There in the Gold Room, I stood in a place that few Americans have stood. Fewer than three hundred Americans have received this noble honor, and yet within the hour I would be holding it in my hand. That was when it dawned on me that it was God’s way of saying, “Melba, this extraordinary award is because you kept your faith, followed My directions, and completed My assignment in a manner that I hoped you would. You learned from My pilgrim, Dr. King, that your painful labor was not for yourself but for a generation not yet born.”
The enthusiastic applause of the crowd pulled me back to reality. I settled into my seat and listened to the president begin his speech of gratitude to us Little Rock Nine for contributing to a historic and significant change in education.
My mind drifted back to the day I first heard I had been nominated for this honor. During the fortieth anniversary celebration of the Little Rock integration in 1997, we heard about a bill presented to Congress for us to receive a medal. Representative Ben Thompson of Mississippi and Arkansas Senator Dale Bumpers had introduced it. We laughed because the article said Congress had to agree to vote it through. How likely was that?
The official call came in September. It was 1:30 in the afternoon. I was seated at my desk, writing an article for a magazine and watching the clock so I could go to school to pick up my twins. The routine was set in stone; I would pick them up, go to McDonald’s for a Happy Meal, spend twenty minutes at the playground, weather permitting, and come home for our study time and an enjoyable evening.
The voice on the phone said, “Congratulations, Mrs. Beals. Do you know that Congress has voted yes on a bill to award you with the Congressional Gold Medal? What are you going to do to celebrate?”
“I’m going to McDonald’s for a Happy Meal,” I answered, sincerely thinking someone was teasing me.
“Would you give us your address? We want to come over and interview you?”
“The Congressional Gold Medal?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Sorry, I have to pick up my twins from school. If Congress agrees on something, it will be a great blessing. Call back when that happens,” I said. I quickly went over to the encyclopedia to check on what the Congressional Gold Medal was. It seems that since the American Revolution, Congress has commissioned gold medals as its highest expression of national appreciation for distinguished achievements and contributions by individuals and institutions. When I read this, I nearly fainted. It is very special. Indeed, God had smiled on us even to have a bill presented, whether we actually received the medal or not.
“I’ll never get that,” I said as I scurried to meet my babies. “They are kidding. I can’t be late to pick up my boys.” Then my phone started ringing. I must have answered twenty calls before I went out the door.
When we returned home after our regular routine, the phone continued ringing off the hook with people asking for interviews, meetings, comments, and pictures.
I began to realize what that incredible medal meant. However, I put it in the back of my mind as the boys and I went about our daily routine. At one point, a reporter from a local television station came to the front door. One of the twins answered, and the reporter said, “Hi, I’m here to interview your mother.”
My son said, “My mother, Melba, what for? She’s just my mom. You must have the wrong house,” and slammed the door.
Until that moment, I had been able to raise my children somewhat out of the limelight. I had deliberately avoided radio, newspapers, and television attention. I had made it a point not to let people know who I was because of its danger, and I was not looking for publicity for me or my children. There had always been threats looming overhead for our participation in Little Rock.
Now the cat was out of the bag. I was known to everyone. The next day, there were news vans in front of the house and parked in the driveway. None of my neighbors could miss this big event. I, on the other hand, was determined not to make a spectacle of myself and not to live in the spotlight with my kids.
As the days rolled on, we received further indications that it was not only possible but also probable that we would receive this award. In early October, a representative of the White House called and requested I submit names and social security numbers of the people I wanted to accompany me to the Gold Medal award ceremony. However, the reality of what was happening to me did not become clear until I was on a plane with my adopted mother, Kay McCabe, my sons, my daughter, and several friends landing at the Washington airport, preparing to go to the White House for the ceremony.
Now as I sat there and heard the president calling out names to hand each one of us the award, I was hypnotized by the enormity of the moment, the people there with me, the beautiful Gold Room, the White House photographer taking pictures, and the elegance of the ceremony. President Clinton called my name, handed me a small, open, green velvet box, and kissed my cheek. I whispered, “Thank You, God.” Not for the incredible medal I held in my hand but for confirmation that faith, hope, forgiveness, and gratitude are God’s keys to the grace that brought me to this place. Thank You, Lord, for confirming that I followed Your directions—I am on the right journey.
God speaks directly to us in many ways. And He confirms in many ways that we heard His direction and followed His requests.
Epilogue
On a beautiful Sunday afternoon in May, Mother’s Day 2015, I sat staring off into the distance, feeling amazed and very grateful to be in such a welcoming and joyous environment. I was finally free of the hospital where I had been held prisoner by my ailing back for more than three months. In the background, I heard country rock music being played by the relatives of the famed rock group Grateful Dead. We sat in a restaurant and performance center called Terrapin Crossroads. It is a cozy place with music, the aroma of familiar food, and a milieu that reminds me of my Southern heritage.
Tears brimmed my eyes, and my heart felt as though I had been born again. I was surrounded by my twin sons and daughter, now adults, and family friends, who brought flowers and hugs and kisses to celebrate my rebirth.
Even though I was still in a wheelchair and still deep in a tediously long healing process, I was in awe of the power of God’s blessings. At times over the past two years of pain, prayers, and rehabilitation, I wondered whether I would ever live to experience this enraptured scene. The voice inside whispered, Be patient, it’s happening—although you can neither see nor feel it, you’re healing. Wait on the Lord, in His time.
A sudden event had sucked me into a vortex of doctors, X-rays, powerful anesthetics, nurses, tiny dreary rooms, strange noisy beds, and white walls—a tunnel filled with loneliness. All that while, the taste of medicine permeated my mouth, and the punctured skin on my arms and legs ached. Above all else, I had lived through a reality fogged by endless drugs that seldom worked to rid me of the indescribable pain that plagued me day and night.
Two major spine surgeries within sixteen days became another opportunity for me to practice the dependence on faith in God stored up over my many years. Three operations in two years allowed me to replenish faith whittled down by loneliness and hospital rooms amid strangers. It was also a jolting opportunity for me to learn new and huge life lessons in relationships, patience, and humility, and in the power of silence, unconditional love, personal eq
uality, and courage.
The long hospital stays were an unanticipated surprise! Like Grandma said, “Big surprises are special lessons from God—tests to see if you’re paying attention—if you are listening to His instructions. Surprises are opportunities to renew your faith-building process.”
This faith-building surprise began early in 2014. I had retired from my post as a university professor clutching my bucket list, with plans to take Tai Chi and piano lessons, have lunch with colleagues, shop with longtime sister/friends, spend long days writing fiction, read the great philosophers, increase my church activities, meditate, and maybe even earn another doctorate.
Within five months after retirement, during a regular visit to my orthopedist for a checkup, the surprise began. In a brief chat, I admitted I had fallen on my back and was now plagued by needle pricks all over my bottom. Immediately, he directed me to report to the University of California at San Francisco Hospital Spine Unit for X-rays. I would later learn that the pricks indicated urgent signals from my spine that it needed attention. I was stunned when, following the X-rays, I was hustled over to see a surgeon. Right away, he asked what I was doing that afternoon and urged me to have a spine operation immediately. Through tears of astonishment, I protested. He insisted that if I didn’t comply immediately, I would be incontinent and confined to a wheelchair within six months.
Following six hours of surgery, I awakened in the Intensive Care Unit—feeling barely alive. I lay in shock, like a zombie, barely functioning. Over the next several days, I became exhausted of bedpans, tubes in my neck, and soup through straws. I was elated a few days later when the nurses unhooked me and allowed me to sit on a real toilet.
Ten days later, I was taken by ambulance to another hospital for rehabilitation. It was such joy to breathe the fresh air outside that hospital. The room in the new facility had a large window with a great view of San Francisco’s rooftops. I felt joyous at discovering the world was still there and that I could walk forty feet with help. Five days later, just as I anticipated doing the four-minute mile, the doctor announced that my back was not healing well and that it must be infected. I was stunned and endured a bumpy, jolting ambulance ride back to UCSF Hospital for a second surgery.
Following two operations, I found myself having to get used to the metal structure in my back that resembled scaffolding, including cement, nails, and screws. During this period, I was compelled to draw on everything I knew about faith in God in order to survive. I had no choice but to surrender to His plan for me.
Music from a steel guitar brought me back to the restaurant and the present. The laughter around the table took over. I whispered, “Thank You, God. Grandma, you were so right.” I am grateful for her ever-present advice to develop faith in God. Without that faith, I would not have made it. I would have given in to the voice that whispered—over and over again—What are you doing here? This will never end, the voice that made me feel alone and standing still and wondering if God would take my hand.
During rehab, holding on to my faith while struggling to maintain my sanity was the most difficult task I had ever encountered. I kept telling myself to be patient. Surely God would not bring me all this way—through my triumphs—to drop me now. I prayed so hard as I marked my calendar day by day—yearning to be free.
Now at last I was free of the hospital and laughing and talking loudly to be heard over the wonderful music. Grandma was right. God kept His promise to me, in His own time. Every time.
Faith in God is always borne out in the rewards we receive. Often the wait is unimaginable, and we cannot envision the depth and breadth of the outcome, but we have no choice but to wait on the Lord.
Melba Pattillo Beals is a recipient of this country’s highest honor, the Congressional Gold Medal, for her role, as a fifteen-year-old, in the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. A retired university professor with a doctorate in International Multicultural Education, she is a former KQED television broadcaster, NBC television news reporter, ABC radio talk show host, and writer for various magazines, including Family Circle and People. Beals’s Warriors Don’t Cry has been in print for more than twenty years, has sold more than one million copies, and was the winner of the American Library Association Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and the American Booksellers’ Association Award. She lives in San Francisco and is the mother of three adult children.
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