My daughter pulled a Rosa Parks in the school bus

This hub is about my ten year old daughter Alaiyah. It is also about Mrs. Rosa Parks.

My daughter Alaiyah has quite a temper. At first I admired her strong willed spirit and how she is able to express herself without even speaking. But when I'm the target I have to put my foot down.

She's good at it especially in the mornings. One morning I knocked on her door as I'm waking her up... She goes: "Is it necessary that you knock on the door?" For less than that my mother would slap me silly. My answer? "If you'd respond to my voice I wouldn't have to bother knocking," I feel that as long as she is aware I have the upper hand, I'll survive.

Some other morning she was in the bathroom in the middle of her beauty routine (no kidding) when she stepped out real quick to her room. Her eight year old brother, who had been patiently crunching his legs holding the morning piss, went in the bathroom real quick. This girl had the bolas of having her brother get out of the bathroom, like how dare he...? I'm listening from the kitchen... quick mommy intervention. Oh my goodness! I don't know what was more unbelievable, the fact that she had him stepped out of the bathroom, or the humility of my younger son of actually conforming to her demands.

Some other time she actually accused me of ruining her beauty sleep, so you get the picture. Please include my right hand in your prayers, for all the times it trembles willing to cross her face. Oh, praise ye! That time could be coming a lot sooner than the Apocalypse and the new United States budget!

One afternoon, I went to pick her up at the school bus stop and she got in the van handling me her hair rubber band.

"What happened?" I asked her. Is difficult to get a story out of my daughter, I have to go like: "Alaiyah... talk to me..." She starts relating how this other girl from her school told her to scoot and she didn't, so the girl snatched the band from her hair.

"And what did you do, Alaiyah?"

-Nothing...

"Nothing? What do you mean nothing? What did you do after she pulled the rubber band from your hair? Did you scoot?"

-No, I did not scoot.

"Did you hit her?"

-No

"What did she do?"

-She handed me the rubber band and sat in some other place.

It is still difficult for me to picture the scene. I just could not see myself sitting down, looking at my aggressor, without leaving my place at least to get a hold of that hair. My daughter did not blink and didn't leave her place. Alaiyah's take was that "she's not the boss of me so I don't have to do what she says".

You sure don't sweetie... I felt so proud of my daughter, really. She did not start a fight, but won one.

I felt so proud of my daughter I started relating to her how her story reminded me so much that of Mrs. Rosa Parks (1913-2005) back in 1955, some time before Affirmative Action.

So she didn't know who Rosa Parks was, at least she knew who Martin Luther King Jr. was.

You can research Rosa Parks elsewhere, really... click around, especially here. I'll go as far as to relate that Mrs. Parks resembled in turn Gandhi (1869-1948) attitude in regards to rebellion, his no-violence stand, which reverend Martin Luther King Jr. followed.

It was a woman, Mrs. Parks, with this simple act who ignited the Negro Civil Rights movement. I truly hope no one in here minds the term 'negro'.

Please, Crazygata, I do not want to click around... Who in heaven was Rosa Parks and what did she do?

Since you asked so nicely, as stated before, Mrs. Parks was born in 1913, so by 1955, she was a strong 42 years of age. (I know because I'm 44 today, and yes, we still grow strong!) She lived during the segregation era of the United States southern states, which were suppose to be benefiting from the victory of former Civil War (1861-1865, but more on that in some other hub). I just wish to state right now that no side ever won the Civil War, for issues like segregation, racism and minimal wage (which is a direct descendant of slavery) are yet to be resolved and will ever be successfully addressed.

So, segregation. If negros wanted to enjoy public transportation, they had to go in the bus through the front, pay the fare, get out of the bus, and climb back in the bus through the back door. Sounds ridiculous? That's the democratic United States of America. Public bathrooms were marked as 'white' and 'colored'... of course, negro (or black) was, and still is, interpreted as a pejorative term. 'Colored' is better, like white is not a color...

Public buses had a white line in the middle of them, to indicate, separate, segregate, blacks from whites. Get the picture? If you are white, you get to pay the fare and keep walking, if you are black, you pay the fare get out of the bus and climb back through the exit door. If you are white, you seat in the first seats, before the line; if you are black you seat behind the line.

Oh, one other thing, if white persons needed your seat, you were asked to give your place up. If you didn't, the driver could call the police on you, and have you removed from the bus. No, they won't reimburse your fare.

On the first day of December 1955, Mrs. Rosa Parks got on a public bus, tired from a busy day at work. She worked at a department store in Montgomery Alabama. She sat in one of the seats designed for colored people right after the designated line.

The bus filled up, and she was asked to give up her seat. She refused. Long story short, she stated that it wasn't that she was physically tired, but "tired of giving in". She was handcuffed, sent to jail, trialed in court, and found guilty of violating Chapter 6, section 11 of the Montgomery City code.

This act of her prompted the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which lasted 382 days, described by scholars as one of the most "successful mass movements against racial segregation in history." It also enthused the election of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as leader of such movement.

So it was really a woman who ignited the Civil Rights movement in the southern states of the United States of America. Like my daughter started a movement of her own by her own wit.