What’s to be free? To be alive within the beat of your own heart? Lately I have been paying a closer look to artists. The designers, the rappers, the singers and those who follow the art world. Most often or not, those who find freedom in the art world face great judgement. However, they are un-phased and live life on their own terms. How do they do it?
I know an artist who loves art. So much so, she transformed her body into a living canvas of artwork. Extremely beautiful she is. Interestingly, like most of us who come from traditional families (Black or White), her parents wanted her to follow a safe and more “respectable” career path. Her parents wished she became a nurse. How many young girls have fallen to this advice? Parents and adults advocating that their daughters become nurses because there is “always a need for a nurse”. If not that, it is best to become a teacher. This spreads even into the young males. The source of this advice, for Black families, without a shadow of a doubt comes from our troubled past. The scars of Apartheid run deeper than that which meets the eye. The scars of Apartheid run skin deep.
My father loves reminding me that I should really count my blessings. For once, I turned off my arrogance and asked him why I should count my blessings. Given the fact, I am not living the life in which I dream of yet. His response was that clearly seasoned by years of living. My father replied by saying that in his day, in the whole of a section in the township, you’d find a myriad of houses but only two or three would have electricity. Those houses with electricity would belong to a school principal or a really established teacher or police officer. This is what made me realise clearly why our Black parents advocate the career path of the teacher, more than any other career path. The teacher was the noble man or woman who enjoyed luxuries only enjoyed by White people in South Africa at the time. The system was designed to keep the Black man far from the White establishments. These White establishments had all luxuries that were merely common commodities for the White man. I have heard very few white people speak of a life of destitute. This is simply becomes of how the system programmed the minds of those who lived in it.
When it comes to a “hard life”, most often or not, the White brother will tell a tale of how life was hard because back in the day Internet was slow. The Black brother will tell a tale of how life was hard because back in the day, some nights will conduct an orchestra of rumbling stomachs and stenches of hunger breaths. The definitions therefore tell us that poverty is a matter of perspective. In our perspective, poverty is shaped by a life that our parents lived and some Black people still live today.
For the modern youth, we fail to understand the perspective of poverty and a hard life from our parent and elders’ perspective. The life of a musician or artist was met with many difficulties and even to this day, many of them live a very difficult life. The past hardships in our families is so entrenched in our everyday lives that we fail to see beyond them. Even I, a Black child who grew up in luxury, still find it hard to throw out unfinished food. I say this because I found it so disturbing to throw out food when I was a waiter when down the street, there was surely a homeless man seeking food to eat. The same practice can be seen in the small differences in our habits and ways of life. It is a joke that if you a Black man, you will eat the chicken even its bone. If you a White man, you will only eat the fleshy part and discard the rest. This is a mere generalisation, for I know some White people who eat until nothing is left on their plate. However, it is something worth looking in to. As a Black man, we are so unused to luxury, like the meat that when we get it, we make a point to eat it all. The White man however is so used to luxury, like the meat that he gets; he can afford to eat a portion of it. Leaving the rest for the trashbin.
This explains why you will find yourself, as a Black child, in a class with a White child yet this White child overshadows you by his sheer presence. You later realise that while meat is only reserved for Sundays and the big portions for the adults only, the White child enjoys meat almost every day and gets that portion that your Black father gets. These subtle differences, as insignificant as they may seem, explain many of our societal issues and concerns that exist today.
These highly specialised areas of professions like those who study coral reefs and caves are populated by races other than the Black man because, in the townships, who has ever studied caves and made a living? Thus, the programming of our parents filter to us through the advices of “you still young” and “we only want the best for you”. The perspective of a hard life once lived heavily dilutes these pieces of advice.
Our freedom as the youth of today is constrained with the bars from the hardships from the years of old. To the artists and those who are living life to their own heartbeat, it takes great courage. They are the vanguards that are ushering a new world for us to live in. It is imperative we learn from our past. However, it is always imperative we begin working towards breaking the bars that continue to hold us captive. We cannot allow the ghosts of yesterday to continue to kill the dreams and aspirations of the youth of today.
Our freedom is literally in our hands. The time for our parents has passed. We are the new generation living in a new South Africa. Whatever they might say about our freedom or about the gatekeepers that hold the keys to true wealth, the fact we read stories about a Black child studying advanced quantum physics should tell us we are in a new age. Fact we read stories about a Black man who makes millions through investing or textile and is not a taxi owner or politically affiliated should tell us that we are in a new age.
The days of yesterday will continue to haunt us. However, we have to stand firm and live life to our heartbeat. Freedom is a mindset. The state of our minds is determined by our own actions. Freedom is in our hands. Like the artists and musicians who understand that their life is in their hands. Their hands produce their work. The work that gives them life. Like them, we need only but open them- and use them. Only then, will we be free