When I walked into the meeting room of the Howard University Book
Store, the first person to greet me was an energetic, Victoria
Rowell – the actress best known for her role as the feisty Drucilla,
on the daytime drama, The Young and the Restless. Rowell,
now a New York Times Bestselling author, was in the nation’s capitol
promoting her memoir: The Women Who Raised Me.
The Women Who Raised Me
tells the story of Rowell’s life as a foster child, and how the women in
her life, loved, nurtured, and guided her into the woman she is today.
The New York Times Bestseller has already garnered Rowell literary
awards to include the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary
Work: Debut Author.
Rowell spent her entire childhood in foster care; never adopted. Yet
she is gracious and thankful for the course of her life. Compassion and
an unyielding commitment propels Rowell to travel the country bringing
awareness about foster care, and just how little it takes to change the
life of a foster child. In celebrating the women from her past, in this
wonderfully written memoir, Rowell brings her story and her work with
foster children, full circle.
Ready to get the interview started, Rowell asked me to walk with her on
the campus of Howard University. Rowell’s book signing was part of the
commencement events for the Howard University graduating seniors. And
she looked forward to hearing the commencement speech. To get there on
time, we walked briskly through crowds on the sidewalk, and crossed busy
streets, as Rowell talked into the recorder. Her passion and intensity
about her childhood, and the lives of children who share her story,
shined through.
How do you rise from being a ward of the state of Maine to living the
American dream? The Women Who Raised Me captures the
essence of how a nurtured spirit can soar, no matter how life began.
The Victoria Rowell Interview
BMIA: What inspired you to write about your past and the women who
helped guide you through it?
Victoria Rowell:
Well first of all I want to say, it is May 10th, my Birthday
and we’re on the campus of Howard University in D.C., it’s also National
Train Day, and, ah…I’ve been invited on this very fun and celebratory
day…for the graduation of Howard University seniors, to have a book
signing. And I couldn’t think of a bigger and better Birthday present
than to be invited here at Howard University to sell my New York Times
Best Seller, The Women Who Raised Me. Ah…I was inspired to write
the book because the women…not only women in foster care, but my ballet
teachers, my friends, my academic teachers, my social workers, were
incredible…so many of them did such incredible work. And they never
were recognized in an award show…and they didn’t necessarily expect even
a thank you. They did it because they were truly mentors. And I wanted
America and the world to know about their work because it’s emblematic
of millions of people who are raising other people’s children in our
nation.
BMIA: Did you keep a journal as a child?
Victoria Rowell:
I kept all my letters from the women who raised me. I kept photographs…I
kept things that people gave me… Ah, I really believed in holding on to
my inheritance no matter how small or insignificant other people thought
it was it was important to me because it held the energy of those
important people in my life.
BMIA: At what point in your life did you accept the circumstances of
your childhood as more of a treasure?
Victoria Rowell:
Well, I accepted my circumstances very early on because my primary
foster mother…she was from New Bern, North Carolina originally and
migrated to Massachusetts, to Boston, Rocksberg, Massachusetts. And she
had ten children of her own…I was her second family. And she was a
senior citizen when she raised me. And she taught me…you know don’t be
a victim of your circumstances…look at it as a cornerstone of your
strength…these are the circumstances…this is what your life truly was.
She did not try to hide the truth from me. Which was the best gift…it
was a treasure…that she gave me. She presented my mother to me. I saw
how fragile and how ill she [natural mother] was and how unable she was
to be a parent of six children, all of different paternity. There was
no way that this woman had the fortitude. So Agatha [primary foster
mother] presented her to me and said this is your mother…love her…love
because of her weakness. Don’t resent her because of her weaknesses
and, ah…that was part of my inheritance.
BMIA: How do you feel about you biological mother?
Victoria Rowell:
I love her. She’s dead now. I love her. Like I love all the
other women who have gone on and the women who are still alive I
celebrate. I celebrate them posthumously as well as in life. But my
natural mother, you know I go to the root of it. She never had
prenatal care with me. She birthed me, I was healthy, she loved me.
She tried to reach back on numerous occasions with very little
resources. She always wanted to be reunited with her children but it
was just never going to happen. It was just heart-breaking for her. So
Agatha, my primary foster mother, saw how hard this woman wanted to be
reunified with her children. In those times there was no
visitation rights with parents, so Agatha set it up. It was pretty
amazing. That’s what I love from my mother Dorothy [natural mother]. I
take my daughter to her gravesite. It’s important that we pass
important things on to our children though it may not be their lives.
Like my children’s lives are much different. My daughter is 18 and
my son is 12, and their lives are obviously much different than mine,
but that doesn’t mean that I don’t tell them the history of where they
came from.
BMIA: Now let's talk about your nonprofit, the Rowell Foster Care
Positive Plan (RFCPP). Do you personally get to meet any of the
children your initiative helps?
Victoria Rowell:
Sure.
RFCPP,
was started in December of 1990/91. And, it speaks to foster and
adoptive youth who have an interest in Arts. Whether its dance, or
music, or drama...ah, we offer full scholarships in
Massachusetts…various parts of Massachusetts, and in Los Angeles. And
we do long term mentoring...meaning that we offer ten years in some
cases, ah…of classes, ah…camp exposure. And ultimately we hope to offer
financial stipends to foster children going to college. There’s a young
man who’s graduating this spring semester with an Architecture Degree.
He’s not the first collegiate, of RFCPP, so we’re proud that
starting with Fine Arts ends in a college degree…we’re very proud of our
youth.
BMIA: Do you have a fundraiser?
Victoria Rowell:
Yes, we do an annual Fund Raiser. This year Stephanie
Mills will be singing for RFCPPin Los Angeles at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Last year Patti
Austin sang for our Fund Raiser...and it’s a fabulous time…it’s a
high tea on May 18th at the Beverly Hills Hotel. But I want
to go back to something else, which is…you know I grew up, ah…absent of
my father who is African-American and it does leave a hole in a child’s
life. And I want to appeal to our fathers, especially our Black
fathers, to be around, even when things are difficult, to stay with the
family, because you’re missing an incredible opportunity to be a
parent.
We
need you [fathers]. And I’m speaking from experience. Yes, I’m a
successful woman. I’m a parent myself today, but I have never
stopped thinking of that absent father who is a ghost to me. He is in
me, I am of him, but I have never laid eyes on him. So I want our
fathers out there, our Black fathers in particular, to remember that
Black children make up the predominate population of foster care and we
are heading towards 600,000 children in foster care today.
We
have 110,000 children available for adoption--we need foster parents.
And we need our fathers to help us stay together. Maybe if my father
had stepped up when I was a baby instead of leaving me in that hospital,
ah…you know…I don’t know what it would have been…and I don’t want to
speculate. There are no coincidences and I don’t believe in
luck…everything happens for a reason. So perhaps God knew that I would
speak out on the importance of family and how badly young girls and boys
need their fathers.
There’s something missing when we miss that experience with our
fathers. So on that note, I want to thank 100 Black Men and
100 Black Women for doing all that they do around the issue of Black
parenting. And also, I wanna say thank you to the Casey Family
Program up in Seattle and the Bill Gates Foundation.
They do a fabulous Black fathers appreciation dinner which I was asked
to keynote recently on the heels of the Child Abuse Prevention
Conference. It was a beautiful evening. We need to celebrate
our Black fathers, more than we do. We always hear the negative. Just
like in foster care, we always hear the negative stories but we need to
hear the positive stories as well. There were some extraordinary men in
my life who helped raise me up, and I write about them, and I love
them. I wanted to say all that as well.
BMIA: Why is it so important for you to advocate for and bring awareness
about foster care on a national level?
Victoria Rowell: Well, I’ve been a national spokesperson for the
Annie E. Casey Foundation for the past decade. It’s very
important for me to talk about my New York Times best seller, The Women Who Raised Me, because you know I was fortunate, in
that I had social workers who cared. I had teachers that cared, I
had extended family that cared, but I also want to let people know that
it can be an enriching experience when you take care of a child.
Whether you’re a foster care parent, whether you’re a court appointed
special advocate, whether you’re a guardian at light or a volunteer
Big Brother, or Big Sister.
There are so many different ways that you can interface with these
children. Some of us aren’t equipped to be a full time foster or
adoptive parent, but everyone can volunteer to some degree. People
minimize what they have to offer--don’t do that. Let’s say all you can
do is bring pampers to a teen pregnancy home. That’s doing
something. Maybe all you can do is take a sibling group to church for a
foster grandmother. That’s a big thing. Maybe you can bring the
can goods and turkey at Thanksgiving to a family. That's big! If
you can think it, we need it. All of it is important; don’t minimize
what you have to offer.
Time spent with Rowell was special in many ways. It was her birthday;
May is Foster Child Awareness Month, and the interview was
conducted on the eve of Mother’s Day.
Women Who Raised Me
is testament to how a little love goes a long way, but a lot can change
the course of life.
The story of a remarkable woman's rise out of the
foster-care system to attain the American dream—and of the unlikely
series of women who lifted her up in marvelous and distinctive ways.
Born as a ward of the state of Maine—the child of an
unmarried Yankee blueblood mother and an unknown black father—Victoria
Rowell beat the odds. Unlike so many other children who fall through
the cracks of our overburdened foster-care system, her experience was
nothing short of miraculous, thanks to several extraordinary women who
stepped forward to love, nurture, guide, teach, and challenge her to
become the accomplished actress, philanthropist, and mother that she is
today.
Rowell spent her first weeks of life as a boarder
infant before being placed with a Caucasian foster family. Although her
stay lasted for only two years, at this critical stage Rowell was given
a foundation of love by the first of what would be an amazing array of
women, each of whom presented herself for different purposes at every
dramatic turn of Rowell's life.
In this deeply touching memoir, Rowell pays tribute
to her personal champions: the mothers, grandmothers, aunts, mentors,
teachers, and sisters who each have fascinating stories to tell. Among
them are Agatha Armstead, Rowell's longest-term foster mother, a
black Bostonian on whose rural Maine farm Rowell's fire to reach for
greatness was lit; Esther Brooks, a Paris-trained prima
ballerina, Rowell's first mentor at the Cambridge School of Ballet;
Rosa Turner, a Boston inner-city fosterer who taught Rowell lessons
of independence; Sylvia Silverman, a mother and teacher whose
home in a well-kept middle-class suburban neighborhood prepared Rowell
for her transition out of foster care and into New York City's wild
worlds of ballet and acting and adulthood.
In spite of support from individuals and agencies,
Rowell nonetheless carried the burden of loneliness and anxiety, common
to most foster children, particularly those "orphans of the living" who
are never adopted. Heroically overcoming those obstacles, Rowell also
reaches a moment when she can embrace her biological mother, Dorothy,
and, most important, accept herself.
Ultimately, The Women Who Raised Me is
a story that belongs to each of us as it shines a glowing light on the
transformational power of mentoring, love, art, and womanhood.
To
learn more about Victoria Rowell,click here to visit
her official web site.
Click here to
visit the Woman Who Raised Me web site.
Click here to
visit the Rowell Foster Children Positive Plan web site.
Buy
The Book
To
schedule interviews and speaking engagements contact Lee
McDonald, The Renaissance Group at
301-856-8273.
Paul
Woodring's Inventions
What
inspired you to write Inventions?
Race
continues to be just below the surface in all aspects of American life.
I wanted to take my experience in corporate America and express the
challenges that blacks face as they try to navigate the subtle racism
that still pervades our country, especially in the work place. I wanted
to write a novel that provides a blueprint for increasing African
American wealth, as well as encourage all to understand our different
perspectives of the American experience.
What
are the book's themes or messages?
There
are two major themes in the book. The first theme is the African
American experience in this country as it developed in the years before
the civil rights movement as well as in the 1960s and 1970s following
the height of the movement. I also wanted to pursue the experience of
African Americans in the white business world that started to open up
for some after the civil rights movement. As part of this, I wanted to
inspire young African Americans to pursue entrepreneurship as a means of
pursuing wealth, and I also wanted to give non-African Americans a look
at these experiences through the lens of the African American, a view
that most non-African Americans have not seen.
What
message would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs?
I feel
strongly that young people should pursue the best education they can
afford, pursue a profession or craft through experience in that field,
then go out on their own and build their own business. I believe this
is particularly pertinent to African Americans who need to begin to
build wealth they can pass on to subsequent generations. My view is the
best way to do this is through creating their own businesses. I also
believe that corporate careers and corporations no longer provide the
types of jobs and security that can support the American middle class.
In today's global economy, the best future is through creation of your
own business.
Are
there any takeaways as it relates to the race dialog that has been
raised by the Democratic primary?
The
democratic nomination process has opened up the dialog about race. With
a black man running for the nomination, this was inevitable. Like
Barack Obama, I believe there is still much that we can all learn about
each other. I hope my book adds to this understanding.
Inventions tells the story of a young man who, like you, became a
successful entrepreneur. Is the novel autobiographical in any sense?
You
always draw upon experiences in writing. I drew upon many of my
childhood experiences in the novel, as well as experiences of others
that I observed. Certainly, as an African American, I drew upon life
and business experiences. I also drew upon my experience in technology
and business in creating the story.
What
can you tell us about Robbie's love interests in the book?
Like
most of us, Robbie has flaws. One of Robbie's major struggles is the
battle between his rational self and his emotional self. His rational
self is responsible for his professional success and it is difficult for
him to sort through his relationship with the women in his life as he
distrusts his emotional self. The women in his life offer different
perspectives and degrees as it relates to logic and emotion. His
challenge is to determine what will make him a more complete person.
Who are
your favorite authors, and why do you admire their work?
There
are many authors I like, both fiction and non-fiction. It's hard for me
to pick one or two. My interests range from Milton, to Thomas Hardy, to
Sinclair Lewis, to contemporary authors such as James Patterson and
Richard North Patterson. In most instances, I like the structure of the
older authors, the output of James Patterson and the research reflected
in Richard North Patterson's work.
Can you
describe your writing process for our readers?
I awake
around 4:30 a.m. each day and work out. Around 6 a.m., I read the major
news of the day on the Internet. I start my writing process around 7
a.m. I usually outline my book, and then spend five to six hours
writing, then revising and refining the outline, and then continuing to
write. After the first draft, I go back and assure the plot holds
together and sometimes incorporate new passages. I don't write every
day, but when I do, I usually can crank out as much as twenty pages in a
session.
What
will your next book be about?
My
next novel is about global warming and how nature is self-correcting in
protecting itself. It is a science fiction/political drama that offers
one solution to the challenges we face in protecting our environment.
Rise and Walk!
Seven Steps to
Purposeful Living by Michael D. Teague
Q: How does your
book, Rise and Walk! address the issue of people who are
challenged to overcome their life-limiting situations –addictions,
weaknesses, growth areas, and bad habits?
A: In Rise and
Walk! my strategy is two-fold. One, it is to discuss what I call
seven principles for purposeful living. This is a step-by-step
process, meant to take men from problem to solution in any area of
their lives. The principles are the following:
•
Acknowledge your
infirmity
•
Stop making
excuses
•
Tap the Source
within
•
Powered by God,
learn to help yourself
•
Face your absent
father
•
Let your mind
and your money be of service
•
Hit the mark
My second strategy is
to provide my readers with a brief exercise at the end of each
chapter to assist them to implement each principle.
Q: For Rise and
Walk! you developed and shared seven principles for purposeful
living. How did you come upon them?
A: I developed the
seven principles by asking myself, based on the infirm man who is
healed (featured in John 5:1-15), “What process did this man have to
go through in order to go from debility to wholeness?” In addition
to this, I superimposed aspects of my own journey to wholeness, a
journey that I continue to travel upon, to really test these seven
principles.
Q: Your book is based
on a biblical passage, John 5:1-15, where Jesus helps an invalid of
38 years to rise up and walk. Do you believe men today have their
own infirmities that are non-physical, such as life-limiting
behaviors or beliefs or patterns that can destroy their lives?
A: I believe that
there are men who engage in life-limiting behaviors, beliefs and
thought-patterns that, if not addressed, definitely can undermine
and even destroy their lives. I think that all men are “under
construction,” so to speak. All of us are at varying stages of
development. There are those of us for whom the process of
construction has been delayed because of our thinking, actions, and
beliefs. I am writing Rise and Walk! for these men.
Q: I suppose as a
pastor you believe there is a connection between faith and God and
one’s inner strength to help himself. Please explain this.
A: I believe that
faith in God provides men with a few things. One, it provides us
with clear outcomes that comprise manhood. Two, desiring to live
lives pleasing to God gives us the motivation that we need to
change. Three, faith in God enables me to access divine power to
change. Finally, biblical instruction gives me the tools to
actualize my outcomes, act on my motivation, and access God’s power.
Q: What are some
examples of the destructive habits or limiting beliefs exhibited by
men that you speak of?
A: These habits and
beliefs embrace the total spectrum of life, from unhealthy eating
habits to unhealthy sexual practices, from substance abuse to poor
money management. Men may have poor relationships with spouses,
children, and extended family, to poor productivity at work. We can
engage in self-defeating thinking, in which we excuse or rationalize
away our behaviors. We can also engage in negative, destructive
thinking by convincing ourselves that we cannot change when the fact
is, we can all change if we desire to do so badly enough. We also
must change. We possess the tools to change.
Q: You admit you
don’t live a perfect life, so are you in the best position to write
about getting one’s life together?
A: I have not lived a
perfect life. However, I’m striving to grow in every area of my
life. I’ve walked the difficult road to total self-improvement –
physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. I think that this puts
me in a good position to write to men. I have road-tested these
principles. They have worked for me. I believe that they will work
for others who read this book.
Q: You had an absent
relationship with your dad. How do you advise others to move past
their pain if in a similar situation?
A: The only way to
address your pain is to face it, head on. We can’t run from it,
because it is there and will not go away. In order to face the pain
of my relationship with my father, I had to admit that I was in pain
because we had not related well. Also, I had to process the pain –
to talk about with those that I trusted, who could hear my pain.
Then, I had to work hard to resolve the issues that kept my dad and
me apart. I’m happy to say that we’re working through that.
Q: Your first of
seven principles is to acknowledge your infirmity but isn’t it
tremendously difficult to admit we have a problem and to accurately
identify who or what holds us back?
A: It is tremendously
difficult. Yet, it is the first step to be able to rise and walk!
I’ve heard it said that the worst form of deception is
self-deception. The bottom line is, we’ve got to take an inventory
of our lives and be honest with ourselves concerning the areas in
which we need to change.
Q: You also suggest
we tap the power within ourselves to heal from our wounds or
transgressions. How does one go about finding a strength they’ve
never used or don’t even know they have?
A: Rise and Walk!
is a clarion call to let men know that God has created all of us
with power, inherently. All people have the Imago Dei, the image of
God, within us. Timeless and time-tested spiritual practices, such
as prayer, meditation, and the reading of sacred literature, as well
as secular practices of
Rise and Walk! Seven
Steps to Purposeful Living counseling and therapy, can help us to
become conscious of, harness, and release the power within.
Q: Interestingly you
implore people to find help through many means, including worship,
working out, and psychotherapy. But don’t some find it difficult
seeking professional help?
A: Yes, I know it is
difficult because I found it difficult. At the same time, I think
that, when we get serious about wanting to change, we take the
restraints off as it concerns our pride and ego. We say to
ourselves, “I will do what I have to do because I don’t want to live
this way any longer!” I think it is only at this point that we
become open to professional help if seeking it was difficult in the
past.
Q: Your life-changing
book, Rise and Walk!, concludes with a wonderfully inspiring
message that men must heal themselves so they can then be in a
position to give back and help others –through family, community,
charity and on a global scale. Why don’t more people contribute to
society?
A: For those who
don’t, I think that there are several reasons. One, people may see
the problems of the world as too overwhelming to take on. Two,
people may not know how to help. Three, especially here in the
United States, many of us are stretched to the limit simply trying
to survive. Sadly, there are some, perhaps a very small number, who
are too self-absorbed to get involved.
Q: Michael, during
your time of ministering to others, do you find it painful to see
good people who could live amazing lives if they simply changed
their habits and saw things differently?
A: Yes. The fact is,
change is difficult. Change will cost you and me something.
Oftentimes, change is painful. Yet, as one who has sought to change,
the change is worth the work. Unfortunately, some people don’t want
to engage in the hard work of change. Others don’t have the tools to
change. Hopefully, Rise and Walk! will provide the
motivation and the tools that will help men change, who seek
improvement in their lives.
Q: There are tons of
self-help and faith-based healing books, out there and yet the world
still has wars, bad marriages, drug addicts, depressed masses, and
people who fall short of their abilities. Why?
A: At the end of the
day, to live in a world of peace, to make marriages work, to
overcome drug addiction and depression, and to fulfill our
potential, we must make an unyielding commitment to do so. Once we
have done that, there is an abundance of resources, in Heaven and on
earth, which we can utilize as we seek to achieve our goals.
Q: You admit to
committing many sins in your life. Confess to us what you have asked
to be forgiven for.
A: I want to define
sin as missing the mark of what God has intended for us. Having said
this, I have had to ask God to forgive me for divorcing my first
wife, because divorce does not represent God’s best for us. I have
asked God to forgive my periods of sexual activity outside of
marriage, because within Christianity, abstinence outside of
marriage is God’s standard. Finally, I have asked God to forgive me
for any pain that I have caused Tawanna, my wife, as I have
struggled to rise and walk!
Q: Do people find it
difficult to ask for and/or receive forgiveness for their
shortcomings?
A:
Yes, both are true. We find it difficult to ask for -- and to
receive -- forgiveness. In addition to this, we find it difficult to
forgive. At the risk of generalizing, I think we all struggle with
this. We struggle to ask for forgiveness because to ask for it we’ve
got to admit we’ve done something wrong. We struggle to receive it
because we, sometimes, continue to feel guilty for what we’ve done
wrong. We struggle to forgive because it feels better, at least
initially, to continue to hold a grudge.
Q: Why do you possess
a burning desire to see people grow and change?
A: I possess a
burning desire to see people, especially men, grow and change. I
love people. I am a helper of people. I feel fulfilled when I can
help people. As a man, I believe that I can help men, for I am a man
who has sought to help himself.
Q: As the spiritual
bereavement coordinator at a hospice, what lessons have you learned
from people on their deathbeds?
A: I have learned a
great deal. I’ll attempt to summarize here. I have learned that,
regardless of race, class, gender, or orientation, we all die the
same. Death is the great equalizer. Also, death, like birth, are
profoundly spiritual experiences. I don’t want to sound morbid, but
death can be a very moving experience. It can also be a horrible
experience. Lastly, seeing death on a daily basis has made me
appreciate life more and more.
Q: What do you mean
by living with God-empowered self-help?
A: By this I mean
that there are times when we cannot bring about change in our lives,
even by our own best efforts. Unfortunately, the man by the pool
could not. It is at these times that we need God’s intervention to
help us to jump-start the process of change. After that initial
push, we have to develop the capacity to continue the process of
change on our own. We can ask for God’s help as needed, but we
cannot use God as a crutch. At some point, we’ve got to learn to
“walk” on our own, realizing that God is always there.
Q: Though your book
is a work of Christian non-fiction, you also take into account that
a man’s more than simply a religious being and that the
psycho-emotional nature of man must also be addressed. Are you
saying religion is not enough for one man to grow and get his life
in order?
A: For me, as a
minister, religion comprises the starting point for change. It is my
frame of reference. At the same time, God created human beings with
the capacity to be creative and to develop additional means to bring
about growth and change, including those of psychotherapists,
counselors, and physicians. In addition to this, we must look at
human beings in their totality, as physical, psychological,
emotional, and spiritual beings. Hence, we must consider
interventions appropriate for each dimension of who we are.
Q: How can women help
men rise and walk?
A: Rise and Walk!
can serve as a gifted book, from women to men. Also, women, you
can help your husbands, sons, fathers, nephews, cousins, and friends
to rise and walk by praying that they will embark on the life-long
journey of change. Also, support, love, and be patient with us as we
walk this difficult road. When we hurt you, know that most of us are
not doing so intentionally, so forgive us. Finally, hold us
accountable to change, because stagnation is not an option. All of
us will be better because of it.
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