Live boldly...

...and let the world catch up

View this email online Fam, this week – well, the voting rights bill died in the Senate, Russia might be coming for Ukraine, and scientists are now saying that the volcanic eruption in Tonga “appears to dwarf the largest nuclear detonations ever conducted.” All that as the omicron surge continues. Then, on top of everything else, we bid farewell to some legends.  And though this week we lost some people who we’re going to miss badly, we’re using this newsletter to look back on their beautiful lives and smile. IN THE NEWS ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images Lusia Harris, who died on Tuesday, is being remembered as “the only woman to be officially drafted by the NBA.” But Harris’s life and accomplishments as a basketball legend actually don’t have much to do with the NBA at all. Harris was one of eleven kids, born to sharecroppers in Minter City, Miss., in 1955. As a 6’3” high schooler, classmates would sometimes call her “long and tall, and that’s all.” But, as you can guess, that wasn’t all.  After high school, Harris started college at Delta State University. (She had originally been headed to an HBCU, but pivoted to Delta State because they had a women’s basketball team.) As the only Black member of the team, she led the Lady Statesmen – yes, that’s their real name – to three back-to-back upset national championships. That, my friends, is how you get the nickname “Queen of Basketball.” Harris also represented the U.S. in the first Olympic women’s basketball game, where she scored the first basket.  When her college career wrapped up, Harris was asked to try out for the NBA’s New Orleans Jazz. She turned down that offer (and called it a publicity stunt) to raise four kids with her high school sweetheart. And with that, her basketball career was largely over – as she reflected later in life, there was no WNBA at that time – no clear next step for women athletes. But even in that short time, Harris had made history. After her career as a player was over, she went back and read much of the press that had come out about her. She still holds Delta State’s record in points and rebounds. Her entry in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame says she was “one of the greatest centers ever to play women’s basketball.” Looking back at her own career, Harris remarked “Wow. Very impressive.” Yeah, we’re impressed, too.   Then, there was Andre Leon Talley, the icon of the fashion world, who died earlier this week at 73. In a remembrance, NPR’s Neda Ulaby wrote, “You couldn't miss André Leon Talley. Six foot six. Bedecked in splendid capes and caftans, classic bespoke suits, fur coats and record-album-sized sunglasses.” Let the image sink in, folks. Talley grew up in North Carolina in the 1950s. He’s talked about reading copies of Vogue – the magazine where he would famously become creative director –  as a child at the local public library. But his fashion inspiration was much broader: Code Switch’s Karen Grigsby Bates talked to him about the fact that his mother “kept an immaculate house, and she insisted that Andre, whom she doted on, be immaculate, too. He says his first understanding of style came from his family and his church. Everyone dressed beautifully.” Talley was often the only Black person in those upper echelons of the fashion world, but he was consistently pushing for more. He encouraged Anna Wintour to put Beyonce and Rihanna on the cover of Vogue, and he wrote the magazine’s first profile of Michelle Obama. And throughout it all, he refused to apologize for or diminish who he was: “It goes back to when people can’t figure out who you are and are afraid of you – and as you boldly, with confidence, show you you are to the world, certain people just have the fear of seeing someone tall and Black suddenly come on the surface.” We will miss your boldness, Mr. Talley. (If you want to hear more about his life, we have a special bonus episode of the pod all that just dropped this morning.) Finally, as we were editing this newsletter, we learned that Thich Nhat Hanh passed away on Friday. Nhat Hanh was a Buddhist monk, peace activist, and writer from Vietnam. (He was my first introduction to the practice of mindfulness when I was in high school, when I read Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life. That’s how I found myself eating a clementine and paying attention to every single step: how the peel felt and smelled, the weight of each segment in my hand, that first burst of juice in my mouth.)  And though the idea of mindfulness sometimes gets reduced to being about stress reduction or living in the moment, Nhat Hanh’s practices were borne out of a much more fundamental need. “Engaged Buddhism,” the concept that he developed, was a way to help people survive ongoing trauma during the war in Vietnam. It was meant as a way to help people engage in mindfulness while being able to attend to the great need around them, with the ideals of peace and connectedness at the center. We thank Nhat Hanh for his relentless dedication to peace, which he cultivated over the 95 years of his life.   Newsletter continues after sponsor message ON THE POD Destiny O. Birdsong, Meredith Talusan and Torey Alford. We use words related to color to describe different racial categories all the time — Black, white, brown. But how much of race and identity actually has to do with the color of your skin? What if what appears to be "whiteness" is only skin deep?  This week, Code Switch fellow Kamna Shastri brings us stories from people of color with albinism whose experiences challenge what many people think they know about race. Listen Here READ / WATCH / LISTEN Kumari Devarajan, producer: “I've been listening to NBC's Southlake, a podcast suggestion from one of our listeners. The hosts tell the story of a Texas school district that went from trying to diversify and make students feel more welcome, to all out war over curriculum about race and the Black Lives Matter movement. The tape is incredible (if horrifying.) One Black student recorded her principal telling her she was too pretty to let a white student who said the N-word in front of her ‘take her joy.’ Yikes.” Leah Donnella, supervising editor: “I just finished The Chosen and the Beautiful, by Nghi Vo. It’s a retelling of The Great Gatsby from the perspective of Jordan Baker, who, in this version, is a queer Vietnamese American woman who was adopted (in very questionable circumstances) into a wealthy white family. This book hits many of the same notes as the original — it luxuriates in descriptions of parties so lavish they become fantastical, and it unpacks what it really means for someone to try to change their identity. But it also explores elements of the story that the first book either understated or ignored: the corruption and ruthlessness that was able to secure such extravagant wealth, the social and political circumstances that shaped the U.S. (and particularly the lives of immigrants) in the 1920s, and the ways that social outsiders created spaces and communities where they could truly be themselves, if only for an evening.” Well, there you have it. As you head into this next week, why not break out your record album-sized sunglasses? Because really, if you didn’t make a splash, did you ever even get in the water? Words to think about. Peace out, scouts. Written by Kumari Devarajan and edited by Leah Donnella Listen to your local NPR station. Visit NPR.org to hear live radio from WBEZ (edit station). Subscribe to Code Switch+. Your support helps make our show possible and unlocks access to our sponsor-free episodes. What do you think of today's email? 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