“Have you ever met Charlie Brown?” By CJ Parker

Have you ever met Charlie Brown? While I can’t confirm whether or not that is his given name, I have no reason not to believe him since that’s what he told me. Charlie Brown frequents downtown New London, sometimes on foot, sometimes on the pedals of a bike. No matter where he is headed or what he is doing he stops and we talk. I stop, too. When our paths cross the universe pauses, as our interaction becomes the most important part of my day, in that moment. I really don’t know much about him, besides how his essence radiates onto State St on a cloudy day and how his smile brings me joy. He told me he was raised in Waterford and played sports throughout his childhood. I imagine him as the only Black kid in all his classes, on all his teams, maybe even the only one in the entire town at the time, incapable of truly empathizing with what such isolation must be like. Charlie Brown keeps things light hearted though. If you’ve had the privilege of meeting him, you might know he’ll offer you a joke for a dollar. Although once he gets on a roll, you’ll get more than what you paid for. I typically don’t have my wallet with me, so I often regret to inform him I have nothing to offer at the time, but that never ends our interaction. He asks about me, my life, and compliments my energy, my passions, and encourages me to continue to be a light in this world. Which is such a needed reminder. I told him how I coach college basketball across the river in Groton, and how I truly hope he can make it to a game, somehow, someway. His eyes lit up when I told him the games are free to the public. The other day, one of my players met Charlie Brown. Well, they met “some guy who tells jokes about Charlie Brown” and while the lens in which they viewed the man who always makes my day was problematic at best, I was happy Charlie Brown was also leaving a lasting impression on other people. 

I saw a post the other day which said something along the lines of “it’s funny how life is so long and you can mess up in the first quarter and have to pay for it the remainder of your days.” A satirical comment on the unjust values in American society which rings true in an economic, criminal justice, professional, and social manner. I don’t know much about Charlie Brown but I know this applies to him. A man who presents his smile, his sense of humor, his advice, his positivity, his light to the world, and I cannot even imagine where he lays his head at night. 

Today he saw me in my ground-level downtown office window for the first time. “My man!” following a friendly knock on the glass. I looked up from my laptop to a smile in which I returned and immediately went outside, only turning back to grab my car keys in case I needed to grab some change out of my car parked closeby. Today’s mood was as somber as the fall overcast. Charlie Brown expressed ups and downs never displayed to me before. I learned about his analysis of this juncture in his life. I learned of times where he felt accepted; when he felt belonging and community in a shelter in Lower Manhattan some years ago. I learned of his challenges in leading the life he wants to live, leaving behind negative habits. I learned of his battles with retaining help for his challenges. I knew he was a clever man already, his jokes are equally funny and creative. Yet, today, as his head remained low throughout the entirety of our conversation, when eye contact was rare, I recognized just how critically analytical the thoughts in his head are. A nuanced man of an age unknown to me, with aspirations and failures, friendships and loneliness, understanding and regret.

As he rode his bike away and yelled out “all right!”, his left fist gripping the handlebars and his closed right fist raised in the air, I remained outside my office in reflection, eventually re-entering with tears. Sometime ago, Genesis Cubilette, who is one of my inspirations in this work for reasons unbeknownst to her (she changed my life as sophomores in high school, as she lived true to her values and ideas, which challenged everything I thought I knew to be true), asked me for my movement inspiration. While Malcolm X and Angela Davis and Kwame Toure and Fred Hampton are all people I idolize, among many others, it didn’t feel right in my mind or my body to use any of them as my movement inspiration. Instead, I know my inspiration to be Charlie Brown. He is a microcosm of the failures of our systems, or unfortunately, the intentions of our systems. I dislike the term microcosm to describe him because his impact is universal. I know in the world I envision, his existence wouldn’t be of pain, insecurity, homelessness, or telling jokes for a dollar. Because while he “likes telling jokes” this isn’t how he “pictured his life.” He isn’t alone. 

I do this work for all of the hopes, dreams, and goals which have been rendered infeasible by arbitrary roadblocks diminishing accessibility in a physical, mental, financial, and emotional way. I envision a community in which, during Charlie Brown’s lowest days, he can lean towards love and support, similar to when he thinks back to such positive experiences in that accepting, empowering, and joy inducing shelter in Lower Manhattan. My movement inspiration is my cousin, Richard Parker Jr., who had 43 bullets fired at him by Massachusetts police in a routine traffic stop, 7 of which struck their intended target. My movement inspiration is my sixth grade student in Norwich whose frustration grew uncontrollable after an assistant principal harassed her about wearing a hood for more than five continuous minutes, ending with her throwing a chair in the cafeteria. My movement inspiration is my grandfather Robert Parker, who was born in Mississippi, grew up in St. Louis, and moved to New London in 1939 despite Black people only being permitted to live on just three streets upon his arrival. Two of those streets no longer exist. After fleeing the 1930s South, and a fate he knew to be early death or unjust imprisonment, he claimed at the age of 99 in the year 2021 that not a damn thing has changed in this country. My movement inspiration is my 10th grade student in New London who skips class all day and feels guilty for getting in trouble and having his mom lose jobs due to having to pick him up from school again and again. My movement inspiration is Wheeler Parker, who after nearly 70 years, still works tirelessly from a Chicago suburb to ensure the world never forgets what happened to his cousin Emmett Till when they visited family in Mississippi in 1955. My movement inspiration is my best friend who just came home after a four year bid; while incarcerated every phone call, every letter, and every e-message felt more like him supporting me than the other way around. And I wouldn’t be able to breathe if I didn’t say in this moment, my movement inspiration is the entirety of Palestinian resistance whether it be journalists who sacrifice their life and the lives of their family members to create awareness of their collective struggle – activists who risk unjust military incarceration and death to ensure hope never waivers, militant resistance fighters who are labeled terrorists as all peaceful means have been exhausted over decades of apartheid and settler colonial violence, the men who excavate bodies of the living and the parts of the dead under the rubble of schools, hospitals, residential buildings, and any other structure audacious enough to exist under Israel’s violent regime, the women who are subject to unimaginable circumstances in which the one thing most important to a mother, protecting her children, is rendered impossible. And the children. The children whose bravery is immeasurable as their words challenge all of humanity to take a deep introspective dive into just how much are we willing to sacrifice for the liberation of all oppressed people. Free Palestine. Free Haiti. Free Congo. Free Sudan. Free Puerto Rico and Hawaii and Guam. Free the Hood.

“You can kill a revolutionary, but you cannot kill the revolution.” -Fred Hampton