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Large AlternateDHughes2016-12-10T00:40:36-05:00

1604, 2025

Everyone lies a few pounds about their weight …

By DHughes|2025-04-16T16:48:41-04:00April 16th, 2025|Categories: business, community, politics, social|Tags: Bullshit, Donald Trump, Georges Clemenceau, Harry, Harry Frankfurt, On Bullshit, On Truth, Princeton University|0 Comments

but this is 280 lbs of bullshit! (2 min) Bullshit is the lack of connection to a concern for the truth with indifference to how things really are ... the bullshitter by his very Read more...

1404, 2025

Is this the perfect storm for Good Ship America?

By DHughes|2025-04-14T18:24:10-04:00April 14th, 2025|Categories: business, community, politics, social, trumpwatch|Tags: Donald Trump, Edmund Fitzgerald, Meet the Press, Moby Dick, Mutiny on the Bounty, NBC News, Ray Dalio, Spanish Armada, the Anfrea Gail, The Perfect Storm, the Titanic|1 Comment

(3 min) The Perfect Storm: An extremely bad situation in which many bad things happen at the same time. Five threatening forces Billionaire Ray Dalio, founder of the hedge fund Bridgewater Associates, warned in Read more...

904, 2025

“Elbows up” ain’t gonna cut it …

By DHughes|2025-04-09T13:19:12-04:00April 9th, 2025|Categories: business, community, politics, social, trumpwatch|Tags: Canadian hockey, Canadian voter turnout, Canadian voters, Donald Trump, elbows up, Gordie Howe, Mark Carney, Rocket Richard|0 Comments

... it's the feet that matter! (3 min) Gordie Howe was a legend and "elbows up" is a catchy meme, but when it comes to fighting Captain Orange of Team USA, we need a Read more...

704, 2025

Time for your “meds” Jack, ya’ need to settle down …

By DHughes|2025-04-07T16:17:47-04:00April 7th, 2025|Categories: business, community, politics, social, trumpwatch|Tags: Blackburn, Bloomberg, Cheney, Cotton, CUCKOO'S NEST, Jack Nicholson, Lankford, Louise Fletcher, Nurse Ratched, obama, President of United States, Romney, Shapiro, Thune, Trump, Whitmer, Will Sampson|0 Comments

... the President of the United States is being admitted (3 min) We need Nurse Ratched in the White House! The 1962 book by Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and the Read more...

2803, 2025

Donny … ya’ gotta stop poking the bear

By DHughes|2025-04-07T17:32:07-04:00March 28th, 2025|Categories: business, community, politics, social, trumpwatch|Tags: 2024 US election, democracy, eligible voters, mandate, Trump, voter turnout|0 Comments

... 'cause if she rises up, you're lunch! (3 min) "Bad officials are elected by good citizens who don't vote." – George Jean Nathan In this winter of discontent American citizens might want Read more...

My personal history is the stuff they write books about. And that's what I am doing. The working title, "Chains of My Father: Marry White."

"The ghostly image of the tragic mulatto trapped between two worlds." - Barack Obama

This perspicacious line from the Prologue of Barack Obama's "Dream from My Father" wrenched my aspiration into action. I started writing, furiously. Unlike Obama's perspective, my pain had been for the opposite reason: I was not seen by whites as a "tragic mulatto," rather I lived every day of my childhood hoping whites were not "searching my eyes for some telltale sign" that I WAS mulatto. This is my story.

It's historical fiction because I cannot find enough records to substantiate all facets of the story. I've combed the genealogy, traveled to my father and grandmothers' birthplace, walked the graveyards, searched the churches and ... well, all the facts aren't there. I have written three books based on the genealogy of other families but my ancestors emerged from a journey that left too few records – slavery.

My paternal, great grandmother was a "freed slave." My grandmother, Amelia, was born to a mixed race slave named Mary (we do not know her last name) and a white, French plantation owner, the Count de Poullain, in Grenada, West Indies. Amelia was raised in the "Big House" and in adulthood, in an attempt to escape her black heritage disowned her mother, telling her, "Get out and never come back." Amelia, as a mother of twelve children, enshrined into the family commandments, "Marry white." Many did, including my father. My mother was a lovely, white, Anglo-Saxon protestant born in England. They met in Canada where my dad studied and became a doctor.

It has taken five generations for the descendants of Mary to free themselves from the stigma of their black heritage but today my children embrace it. Unfortunately, the past 250 years have been a wasteland of bigotry, racism and bullying. But, on closer look, we see not only the brutality, fear, violence, and murder but also the self-respect, dignity, love, kindness, perseverance and indomitable spirit.

As of the spring of 2025, the depth of historic perspective and the sweeping inspiration of oppressed people has created a two-volume duology of which I have only arrived at the middle of the 19th century. 1840 is the year my great grandfather was born, the beginning of Volume II, and he's pushing me to make sure our story is published by the summer of 2026.