The Girl Who Fell from the Sky by Heidi Durrow

Reading this book is like remembering the past through a dream-like fog. It's hazy, yet crystal clear at the same time. You know that something bad has happened to Danish mother Nella and her children, but you don't know exactly what. You know that Nella's daughter Rachel, is a survivor; but you don't know how or why. You know that Nella's husband is black, that her children are biracial, but you don't know exactly how that fact impacts her family. The story slowly trickles out in a series of flashbacks, rotating perspectives between Rachel, Nella, a young boy who named himself "Brick", and Nella's boss, a black woman named Laronne.  Rachel remembers her mother, remembers her Danish heritage, but is living with her black grandmother. She is made fun of at school for being blue-eyed and too light-skinned (not black enough.) She is also called by some derogatory terms that white society uses for people of color. We watch Rachel grow from child to teenager, struggling to make sense of her history and her identity.

Image via GoodReads

Heidi Durrow really captures the voices of her characters. Rachel's voice as a child is marked by shorter sentences and has a child-like quality that evolves as she gets older. Nella's voice is recognizably one of a non-native English speaker. Grandma's voice is undeniably African-American. By the end of the book, Rachel's voice is a definite mixture of it all--the Danish and the African-American--and as a reader, you want another chapter, another book, so you can watch her as she strengthens that mixed voice.

Books like this aren't easy to read. I was fascinated both by the story of Rachel, who searches for a place to fit in, but also by the story of her mother.  Nella learns some hard lessons about being the white mother of biracial children in America, and her voice really spoke to me. Her character voices concerns that are not easy to talk about due to our society's difficulty with the subject of race. At one point in the book, Nella finds out that her daughter knows what it means to be black:

 "She knows the word. She is black. I know she is not a word. If she is a word then she doesn't have me."

Here's the thing: I can relate to Nella's feelings. I don't know how to talk about those feelings very well, but here it goes:

As an educated white mother of biracial children, I spend a lot of time thinking of ways to help my children love their brown-ness. We talk about African-American culture and history. They've always had books with brown children in them, and played with brown dolls. They attend school in a building where white people are the minority. Most of their friends look like them. My husband and I are honest with them about what society is like and how they might be treated. But in all of that discussion and appreciation of their brown-ness, I sometimes feel like they are losing me. They are my children. I carried them in my womb, nursed them all until they were toddlers, and I hold them close to me each and every day. 

Adults in our world (both brown and white) seem to see them as only one color. Brown people all offer the same advice, "Prepare them for this world where they will only be seen as brown. They need to learn to defend themselves; they need to learn to be strong." They say, "Look at our president--he is biracial, but our society treats him as black! Of course he calls himself black." They remind me of history, "For generations, our society has adhered to the 'one-drop rule' and your kids need to be ready for that."

I hear all of that, but here I am. Their mother. White. I want them to be ready for whatever the world throws at them, but I also want them to know that they come not only from their father--they come from me. They carry my blood and the blood of my ancestors. There is more to them than their brown-ness. There is also German, Lithuanian, English, and Irish a blood in them. I want them to embrace it all--everything that is in their history, their genetics, their heritage. And I do not say this because of any sense of white privilege...I say this because I feel there should be some kind of "Mother Privilege." I believe this: if you have grown a human being in your body, and you have given your heart, mind, soul over to one purpose--making that human being grow up happy and healthy--why should they be asked to deny you as their blood? Why should they allow society to take away the fact that you are their mother...that you are white...that half of them is white?

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I want to thank Heidi Durrow for writing this book, for her work on Mixed Chicks Chat and with the Mixed Roots Festival. Hearing Nella's voice, listening to the podcast, and reading about the Festival shows me that there is a group of people willing to call themselves Mixed, willing to honor all of themselves and all of their heritage. I hope my children can follow their courageous example.