Southern Rites Page #7

and my boyfriend's like... wakes up a lot,

"What's wrong with

you?" I'm like, "Nothing.

I'm just having nightmares

again. Just go back to sleep."

And he'll be like, "Just accept it

and, you know, maybe you won't

have the nightmares anymore."

I said, "It's kind of hard to

accept it after you done accepted

what happened and you're

still having the nightmares."

I said, "Whenever you see something

like that, you just can't forget it.

It's going to stick with you for a while."

He said, "But it's been two years."

And I can't let it go.

I can't. I try to let it go

and I can't let it go.

I mean, I'm sorry for his family

and I really am,

but I can't let it go. I mean,

I have a necklace he gave me

the same night that he died

and I won't let nobody touch it.

I mean, I've wore it every

day for the last year.

Whenever it happened, I wore it every day.

And then all of a sudden,

I just stopped wearing it.

But I'd take it everywhere with

me. I don't leave it nowhere.

I don't go nowhere without it.

Everywhere I go, I take that necklace.

It's just... it's... it's like the

only piece of him that I have left.

My dad, I'm happy he's home.

Man, as soon as he got home, he called me.

I looked like a kid on Christmas morning.

I haven't talked to him in over a year, so,

I'm glad he's home but I just...

I wish he didn't have to go

through what he went through.

My dad's never showed any

kind of anger towards anyone.

I mean, he wouldn't hurt a fly.

He's just a big old teddy bear.

He might look like he's

mean, but he's a teddy bear.

You couldn't meet anybody

softer than my dad.

My father was disowned for 20 years

by his family because of

the fact that I am biracial.

But if he would have been black, he

wouldn't have been home like he is now.

I really believe that.

He wouldn't have been.

Laub:
Norman, have you seen Danielle yet?

Neesmith:
Mm-mmm.

Laub:
How come?

That's something else you...

if you turn your back on your kids,

then I think you're a pretty

sorry fellow. I don't...

I don't care what they do,

you got to be there for them

because if you ain't, nobody will.

No matter what they do.

You don't have to condone

them in their wrong doings,

but you got to be there

for them when they do wrong.

Danielle:
I can't stay

in the house no more.

I guess it's because of what happened

in it, but I can't stay there.

For the first time, I'm glad

I can't go home and stay.

I really am.

And I love home.

It's somewhere I've always

wanted to go back to,

but I'm glad I can't stay in the house.

I really am.

Ooh, touchy subject, touchy subject.

I'm good. I'm so good. Hold on.

But the first year, it was

the hardest year for me.

-

- Second year, it was a little easier

but I made it through it.

Everybody's making it

through it, I suppose.

But that's all we can do.

We can just live it one day at a

time and got to move on from it.

But it's just the simple

fact that somebody was taken.

Somebody's dad was taken

and somebody's son was taken.

And like everybody says, "You're

not supposed to bury your child."

And...

that's one of my biggest fears now.

Because, I mean, I can only imagine how

that feeling felt for his family.

Because I have a little girl

and I don't want to have to sit there

and have bury her when she's only like 21,

22, I would hate to have to do that.

So I understand what they feel about that,

but I couldn't even imagine

what they was really feeling.

But I understand how they feel but...

it's something that I wouldn't

ever want to have to go through.

And I feel bad for them

and I'm sorry, but...

if it couldn't ever happen and if

I could take it all back, I would.

I really would because it was childish.

It was stupid.

I should have been...

stepped up and, you know,

stopped everything before

it even got to where it got.

But I didn't. And the fact that I didn't,

like I said, that's what makes

me feel like all of it's my fault

because I didn't do anything about it.

I didn't try to stop

it. I went along with it.

And it's...

I'm learning to deal with it.

Calvin:
Can't tell you what

happened. All I can tell you,

I was winning the election.

All of a sudden, I lost the election.

I can't tell you exactly what happened.

I can tell you

undoubtedly a lot of people lied to me.

Undoubtedly things didn't go

the way I thought they would go.

After... after all that,

he only lost by a hundred votes

and we can't find out where

those hundred votes came from.

We can't find out where it come from.

Asked for a recount, they

couldn't give him one.

They couldn't give him a recount

because he didn't have

a reason for a recount.

That's reason enough.

"I think I got cheated."

You know? But they did something,

I just don't know what they did, you know?

Calvin:
Can't be experience.

That's out of the question

when I had 30 years, this guy had none.

Keyke:
Which would you choose?

Like, why would you want a

man that has zero experience,

has never did this before in his life,

to run our county? Like, why?

That's retarded. That's dumb.

So...

That broke my heart.

It took me a little while to get over it.

I cried. I let my family down.

I let some good citizens down.

They just broke a lot of us hearts.

Like I said, it took

me a while to get over.

This is South Georgia.

That's all I can tell

you, it's South Georgia.

People ain't ready for a black

sheriff in Montgomery County.

I've been told that in my face.

Which they didn't use the word black.

"Don't want a n*gger for a sheriff.

There ain't no n*gger going to be

a sheriff in Montgomery County."

And it's been proven.

Papa. Papa.

Papa, what... what... what's these?

Keyke:
It's more white people than black.

They like... they love my daddy.

But what white person want a black

person telling them what to do?

So...

Well, that's my theory

and I'm sticking to it.

They don't want a black

man to have power over them.

They don't want a black man

to make more money than them.

So...

(speaking indistinctly)

Keyke:
That was the final

straw. I mean, that was it.

That was the final. That

was the end, you know?

I've learned to bite my tongue.

You know, as a black child,

you learn to bite your tongue.

You're going to be called this,

you're going to be called that.

But you can't act on ignorance, you know?

You can't be ignorant

because they're ignorant.

You can't be that way. But

that was just it for me.

Like, why should I be silent of stupidity?

I shouldn't have to. And I'm not.

I had to do what I thought or I think

that's best for me and my child,

which is get away from here.

I know there's something better than this

out there for me and my child.

I don't want her to see

the things that I've seen.

And, no, I haven't seen the things

that Mom and Daddy have seen,

but I've seen enough.

This was enough for me.

So I just couldn't... I can't come back.

Even before the actual election date,

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