Little Walter
In an attempt to learn more about my family tree I immersed myself in the time suck also known as Ancestry.com. While there I stumbled upon a name that piqued my curiosity: George Allison, my great grandfather. Early census records revealed George as a “mulatto” and the owner of a farm. However, as the years progressed, his occupation shifted from farmer to laborer, leading me to wonder if he had faced hardships that caused him to lose his farm or if it was forcibly taken from him.
To unravel this mystery, I reached out to my cousin, affectionately known as “Peachy.” Though she didn’t have much information about George, she recalled our aunts speaking of him as an incredibly mean man. His temper was so fierce that his children fled home at the first opportunity. I wonder if the legend of our “Allison Family Temper” originated with our great grandfather George…
The mere glimpse into census records made me contemplate the hardships he must have endured. To be born into a world that instantly labels you as inferior solely based on the color of your skin. A world that dictates where you can live, where you can work, and tries to define your worth. Moreover, George was considered a “mulatto,” caught between two worlds, too light to be fully black and too dark to be considered white. Who did he identify with in such a divided society?
His anger could have been a consequence of the times he lived in, a response to a life where he was forced to settle for less due to his blackness. Undoubtedly, that anger found its way into the sanctuary of his home, affecting, his children, including my grandfather — Walter Sr. While they may have despised him, they likely absorbed everything he was, perpetuating the cycle. My grandfather, Walter Allison Sr., possibly carried forward that same temper, which then trickled down to my father, little Walter Jr., and ultimately to my brother and me.
My father, just like any child, was not born with a desire to be emotionally distant, less affectionate, or a strict disciplinarian. However, that is all he knew, and that is what he became. While he had the power to break the chain, he didn’t. It would be easy to blame him, but instead, I choose to see him as a flawed human being who, at some point in his life, had noble intentions. Unfortunately, the generational pain he carried weighed heavily on him, and ironically straying away from the patterns established by the Allison men who came before may have been seen as weakness or foreign territory.
So, on occasions like Father’s Day, I’ve made a conscious decision to shift my perspective. I aim to understand rather than condemn because, at the end of the day, we are all products of our environment. Parenting doesn’t come with a guidebook or blueprint, and for Little Walter, he simply repeated what he had experienced. Sadly, he may still have been broken and hurt from what he never received during his own upbringing.
For this Father’s Day , I choose empathy and compassion. I choose to acknowledge the limitations my father faced and the pain he carried. I choose to break the cycle, to learn from his experiences, and to strive to be a different kind of father, one who creates an environment of love, understanding, and growth. While his legacy may have been one of struggle and limitation, I aim to create a new legacy for future generations, built on forgiveness and a commitment to breaking free from the chains that have bound us for far too long.