Titus Pittman decided to attend the meeting after all. He didn’t live in this neighborhood any more but he owned three fourplexes there and he wanted to hear what these community organizers had to say and how it might affect his income properties. So he sat in the middle of the crowd at the Martin Luther King Center and watched as a cast of characters, black and white, milled around and talked to each other on the stage. Finally a young man, a white towheaded youth, went up, grabbed the microphone, tapped it to confirm it was working, cleared his throat, and spoke up.
“Ladies and gentlemen let’s begin now. My name is Sven Lief and I’m from the.” Mr. Pittman did not catch the name of the organization that Mr. Lief said he was from only that it was a non profit tax exempt corporation which he proudly made a point of and therefore a tax deduction when one gave them a donation, which he encouraged them all to do of course. Mr. Lief then introduced each of the local people sitting in a row behind him who acknowledged themselves by nodding their heads and the audience acknowledging them in return by clapping after each one was introduced.
Tytus Pittman elbowed the old man next to him, a man that he didn’t know, and said to him, “What the hell is this organization doing here by sending a Swede to talk to us.”
The old man whispered back jokingly, “Well you know what they say, us negroes we’s just Swedes turned inside out.” The man chuckled slightly to himself. Mr. Pittman did not appreciate this lame attempt at humor. He had never heard that one before in all his sixty six years of existence and didn’t appreciate hearing it now even if it was from a fellow black man.
So he responded with his usual. “They? Who’s they? Tell me who they is. I don’t know who the ‘they’ are that you’re talking about.” It annoyed him to no end whenever someone said, ‘they say.’ He always countered with his ‘Who’s they speech?’ “Give me some names, phone numbers and addresses of these ‘they’ people so that I can contact them,” he always said knowing that inquiry usually killed the conversation on the spot and put the speaker in his place which was the intended result of course.
And it worked here as the man in the chair next to him shut up, turned away from him, and pretended to be paying attention to the speaker.
Mr. Lief droned on and on, promising how his organization can unite this underprivileged neighborhood, bring them all together for a better life, and give them a meaningful voice in community affairs. But he spoke in the same old general generic dull boring terms, nothing new, nothing specific as far as Mr.Pittman was concerned. Mr.Pittman had heard all this before for years and now hearing it from some white young man he’d never seen before was to him just plain too much to bear. As far as Mr.Pittman was concerned his young man was just one more community organizer come to town to preach to them and tell them what to do. Like he would know never having lived here. And even though Mr.Pittman wasn’t buying any of this, he knew that the local folk here were. They always did.
“And another thing we can do,” Mr. Lieff rattled on, “is get some of these rentals properties owned by the slumlords fixed up and become livable for families, so that they aren’t a haven for drug addicts and drug dealers.”
Mr. Pittman immediately came to attention with that accusation. Good thing I showed up after all he said to himself as he rocketed up from his seat.
“Hold on there a minute young fellow,” he hollered. “Who you calling a slumlord?” His anger was palpable. Tytus Pittman had retired from the federal government as a civil engineer. He had worked hard all his life and had saved up and invested in properties here in the neighborhood. They represented a substantial part of his retirement income and his retirement time as well. In fact it seemed now that all of his time was spent keeping up his units and dealing with tenant problems. And he wasn’t going to sit here and take any of this bull lying down. He wasn’t going to be called a slumlord for he worked hard to keep his places up and presentable.
The youth was taken back by Mr.Pitman’s outburst, not expecting anything like that. Actually the naive youth had not been expecting any resistance, of any kind, from anyone. He thought everyone would be glad to see them and welcome them with open arms and go along with whatever he said.
Behind him sat the Reverend Malcolm Wright from the local Baptist Church. He sensed the youth’s awkwardness in dealing with the situation and rose from his chair, went up to him, took the microphone from him and came to his rescue.
“We don’t mean you Ty. We know you keep up your properties.”
Tytus Pittman hated Reverend Wright with a vengeance. He called him a thug behind his back, and ‘Reverend Alright’ to his face. Reverend, hell no, he was some former gang banger from Chicago who suddenly got religion and came here downstate to preach to them. He was just another outsider who had no business here at all as far as Mr.Pittman was concerned. In fact he and the reverend had tangled a few times already about church policy. Mr. Pittman had grown up here in the neighborhood and though he had moved away he remained a lifelong member of the church in which Reverend Wright now preached. That they were not friends went without saying.
“But you could be a little more diplomatic with your tenants, Ty,” Reverend Wright added. “And be more considerate of immigrants and their ways. Mr. Lief’s organization can help you with things like that.”
It had become personal again. The Reverend had hinted at the problems Mr.Pittman had with the Nigerians that he had recently evicted.
“Look here Reverend,” Mr. Pittman shouted with the emphasis on ‘Reverend.’ “I did that all legal through my attorney. I followed the law.” He had kicked out the Nigerian family because of their cooking. He didn’t know what they cooked, some food they ate in Nigeria, but it reeked something awful and had a terrible obnoxious nauseating aroma that filled the entire building. The other tenants constantly complained about the smell and asked him to do something about it. Furthermore the fifty pound open sacks of rice they left on their patio drew mice. Some of his good tenants even threatened to move if he didn’t correct these things. So he gave the Nigerians proper notice when the lease was up but they didn’t get out. He got a lawyer. Eventually they were gone after it cost him a few hundred dollars in attorney fees and court costs which he knew he would never recover from them even though the judge had awarded him fees and costs in the judgment per the lease.
“Well,” countered Reverend Wright, “that doesn’t change the fact that they were immigrants and we as Americans should try to help them, make them feel at home here. Make them welcome here.”
“Our organization encourages helping immigrants,” added Mr. Lief. “After all that’s what America is all about. Welcoming newcomers. Helping the downtrodden.”
Mr. Pittman was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. He knew he couldn’t win this kind of a b.s. hokum argument. He originally tried to help this family but it just didn’t work out. Try to help people he thought and they hate you for it.
Then as if on cue one from Reverend Wright, one of the church’s deacons, one of Reverend Wright’s flunkies as far as Mr.Pittman was concerned, stood up and asked him. “And why did you kick out that young white gal and her baby awhile back, a single mom on food stamps and all. Tell me why’d you do that Ty?”
Mr. Pittman had tried to help that person too but when she didn’t pay rent for three months, she had to go. She had cost him more money in lost rent and attorney fees and court costs too.
Mr. Pittman kept silent. This was none of their business anyway. But these community organizers had done their homework. They knew how to counter punch him when he spoke up. They were ready for him. After all, Ty Pittman had a reputation for speaking his mind.
“These are the things we can help you with Mr. Pittman,” continued Mr. Lief. “One of our goals is to organize a diverse community here. That’s what America’s all about too, diversity you know.”
That did it. That diversity nonsense that is. That pushed Mr. Pittman over the edge. The dam burst. He had had enough. “Bull! It‘s obvious that your goals here are to tell us what to do. Take over our community, run our lives. You already got your people taking folks to the store, handing them pamphlets with calorie counts, nutrition value etc. etc. on them. Telling them what to buy, what not to buy. What to eat. Like they’re too dumb to feed themselves and their families. Telling them to come to you if they have landlord problems and you’ll take care of everything for them.
Telling them that you’ll put those blankety blank slumlords in their place.” Mr. Pittman stopped to catch his breath. Then continued.
“You’re always thinking you’re doing good by trying to help people. Hell nobody helped my folks when they lived in this neighborhood and raised us four kids in a two bedroom tar papered run down shack of a house we all lived in. But now there’s grants to bring foreigners here. Grants for housing, food stamps, free medical care etc.etc. Grants for everybody for everything. Hell we never had any assistance of any kind when I was growing up. Didn’t need any. We took care of ourselves. We pulled our own weight. No one helped us and we don’t need any community organizers to help us now either. We already got township, county, city, state, and federal laws regulating and organizing us enough. Telling us what we can and can’t do. We don’t need any more organizing. We’ve been organized to death.”
Mr. Lief interrupted him. “If I could explain please.”
“I don’t need any explanation young man,” countered Mr.Pittman. “The explanation is simple. Your organization gets a government grant to operate doesn’t it? But it’s just us taxpayers funding you anyway through our stupid politicians. Enough is enough for God’s sake. It’s time all this nonsense stopped. It’s got the point of ridiculousness. You can take your traveling circus show, pack it up your you know what, and leave as far as I’m concerned.”
And with that said and with a stiff upper lip Mr. Pittman sat proudly and defiantly back down in his chair. His back ramrod straight. His head erect, arms folded. His chin stuck out. His shoulders squared away. A few in the audience started to clap their approval but went quiet when Reverend Wright stood up and glared down at them.
“Mr. Pittman,” spoke up the Lief youth. “A lot of good can come out of our organization. Give us a chance. Don’t forget the President was a community organizer for us in Chicago and got a lot done there.” The youth said all this hoping that the popularity of the President would resonate with the audience.
“Oh yeah,” said Mr.Pittman. “Those neighborhoods he ‘organized’ I bet they are gardens of Eden now. I bet you’d want to raise your family there. And oh yeah, don’t forget about that other great Chicago community organizer, Al Capone.”
A few chortles burst forth and then quickly fizzled out as Reverend Wright took the microphone back from Mr.Lief. His former gangsta demeanor came through loud and clear and intimidated the audience into silence. But not Mr.Pittman as he was on a roll and not to be stopped.
“We didn’t ask you here did we? You just decided to show up on your own and force yourself upon us,” and here he paused, thought about what he was going to say next, smiled, and then continued, “cause we’s all jess poor underprivileged black folks ain’ts we?” He said all this in his best ‘darkie’ accented voice letting Mr.Lief know he didn’t appreciate his condescending attitude.
“Tell me,” he continued, “how many white communities have you organized? I’ll bet the farm it’s none. You’re always trying to help us poor underprivileged black folks. Why aren’t you trying to help white folks? Aren’t they underprivileged enough for you? Answer me that.”
Reverend Wright shouted out, “Ty that’s quite enough. If you’re not going to behave and be respectful we’re going to have to ask you to leave.”
“Oh now you’re trying to ‘organize’ my right to free speech. Trying to bully me into keeping quiet huh.”
“Ty if you don’t behave, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.” .
“What you gonna do? Call the police on me?”
Reverend Wright nodded to a man in the back of the room, a big man, a big muscular linebacker type of man. The man took his cue and started his robotic zombie-like lumbering walk toward Mr. Pittman.
Mr. Tytus Pittman saw the handwriting on the wall, or rather the machine coming at him, and started for the door. The muscular man ground to a halt. Mr.Pittman had left the building.
He knew he couldn’t fight these community organizers. Knew that they would keep on pushing their agenda to ensure their jobs. To insure their weekly paycheck from the federal government subsidy. Knew that they wouldn’t stop until they got what they wanted. They always did. And that the ironic part as far as he was concerned was that a lot of people here would actually believe them and be convinced that their organization was necessary, was doing some good, and welcome them with open arms. After all this had been going on for years now. Nothing changed.
“Too bad I wasn’t born white,” Tytus Pittman mumbled to himself as he slammed his car door shut and started the engine. “Then I wouldn’t be needing any community organizing.”
Author is a retired attorney originally from Illinois now living in Texas who started writing in his retirement years for something to do. He has had a number of stories published in online magazines and anthologies. His legal fiction westerns and short stories are published by Two Gun Publishing, his twenty first century fairy tales by the Scarlet Leaf Review, and his crime spoof Blowed Up Good, Real Good by Nat 1 Publishing.