Black Family Table Talk
Black Family Table Talk
S5:E10 | A Plea to Our Sons from a Mother Who Cares
On this episode of Black Family Table Talk, Tony and Toni sit down with Lt. Col. Alice Faye Taylor (Retired). She's the author of A Plea to Our Sons from a Mother Who Cares and shares her story of being born to a teen mom, becoming a Black female officer in the military, and how she now uses her life to make a difference in our community.
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Well, Welcome to Black Family Table Talk. I just read your extensive background. I am so impressed. You said you're 75 years old. You are Lieutenant Colonel in the army? I mean, that must have been a time period. I can't imagine 28 years.. Welcome to Season Five to Black Family Table Talk. We are your host, Tony and Toni. Our hope is that we create a safe place to sit down to discuss ways to build a strong black family.
Toni Henson:Whether it's parenting, relationship building, health, finances, or advocacy. Black Family Table Talk is the voice for black families. This season is brought to you by ABTF travels. Join us for an epic adventure of a lifetime as we host an official delegation of artists and art enthusiast in Ghana, West Africa. Please refer to our products page, BlackFamilyTableTalk.com forward slash products for more information.
Tony:Welcome to Black Family Table Talk. I just read your extensive background. I am so impressed. You said you're 75 years old. You are Lieutenant Colonel in the army? I mean, that must have been a time period. I can't imagine 28 years.
Alice Faye:It was really 34. I made a career on and I asked one of the girls of the day, shall I get it changed? and she said, Well, you really do need to change but it's in my book, 28. And I did 34 in the military. So I'm changing my book later.
Tony:I know, we're going to talk about your book today. But I really want to know about your experience in the military, at that time period. And I know your husband wrote a book, you know, growing up in the South. I mean, I know you got some stories. I know you got some stories.
Alice Faye:I have and I have another one to tell you about my sister and I and that's going to be in the upcoming book, plus my nutrition and health book. And there's so much I want to do it at this time in life and I just don't know how God allow me to do it.
Tony:Are you 75 years young. You're still doing it!
Alice Faye:Would you want me to start talking?
Tony:I want to know what it was like being in the military. You are an officer.
Alice Faye:Well, I tell you what, since you want to know about the military. I've always had a real desire to be an airline stewardess. That's what I had really intentions of doing. And in doing my high school. Let me see my high school. I want to be a nurse. Well, after I was a nurse, I said, Well, I want to fly. You know, I want to be an airline stewardess. And I actually applied for stewardship and I was turned down, like three times. So at that time, you know, being black in the 60s-70s that wasn't a good time for us. When I finished nursing school, I said that I really wasn't thinking at all. I never really thought about military. I was working and one of the LPNs and I've been an RN, and she said to me, Ms. Alice, have you ever considered maybe being a member of the National Guard? And I said, No, I never have. She said my husband John, they're looking for nurses. I said, they are? She finally gave me his number. So he called me and I went out to the armory, called Rick's army at the time right here on the interstate 630. And I went in and talked to him, and he said, we'd love to help you. And he said, you'd be a nurse in Army Nurse Core and you would drill twice, once a month, two weeks a year, you'd have to leave your job and go out of town for practice, for training. And I said, Oh, that sound interesting, what I would do? So he told me what I would do, he said, you'll be working with the soldiers, mostly doing medical screening, immunizations, and just keeping up with the soldiers. I said, Oh all that sound fun. So I took him up on it and I was wearing this big afro, and I went out, I never would forget, he said, you could come out. At the time, it was only he, Coronel Allbritton and Coronel Las, it was two in there, two Caucasian, one white, female and one male. And he says, I want you to come out and you can be commissioned and sworn into the military. And we went out like on a Wednesday during the week, and he said, just come out and we'll swear for you. I said Okay, so I will look perpetrate as him with a big afro on and it was another young nurse. We both went together. We both were sworn in, and I don't even have a picture of us being sworn in that day with that afro on. Then I got rid of a basic Officers Training. Oh, this was this was something. This basic officer training, I had never flown before, never been on an airplane and this was in 1971. Can you imagine, 1972 is when I actually went into training. Never flown and I had to go to Fort Sam Houston to the officers training, basic officer training for the AMC. But I got on a plane, I had my little white three piece, fast little black blouse that was you know, bell bottom pants, you know, looking good and feeling good, got on the plane that morning at 6:30. Go into Houston. Fort Sam Houston. I thought, well, they routed me, they had all everything stamped. And I went to Alabama, you know, where the enlisted females go. We sit down there. I got there 6:00-7:00 in the evening and I
left that morning 6:30 AM. All there travel all the time there, got there, I said, I'm in the wrong place. I'm supposed to go on to Texas. I am an officer. I'm a second lieutenant. I'm a second lieutenant Mr. The orders are wrong, something is wrong. So he had to get in touch with the National Guard back in Arkansas, somehow know that somebody had sent all the paperwork. I don't know who did it this day. Then I had to get on a plane. Go from there to Texas, our ride at 12 midnight that night. Just, in essence, this is my life. It's just been my life but things just happen. It's just my life. So now I just kind of accept it when things happen I know it's a challenge, and I got to go through. That is, Oh I got to go through and I got to persevere. And that's what I've done all my life. So I got there and I get there with my luggage and everything. And I'm just don't know where I'm going. Going to the BOQ. They dropped me off at the airport. There's somebody from the base, picked me up in the base. Took me there, David I got this. So it was a young black officer, young black male. And he took me to where I was supposed to go, showed me everything, and then the next morning I got up and went in and checked in. Checked in and that was the beginning of my basic training, which was about six weeks. I was there at Fort Sam. And what went through a rigorous training, which I never had before. Like the terrains, you know, getting out. This was the most devastating one. It was devastating, but it was fulfilling, we had to go out and find our way out of the terrain. It was a group of us, a group of nurses, all those nurses, you know, we didn't know nothing about the military, all those basic. We'd go out there and it was about five or six of less time in different areas, and we have to go out and find our way back. So it was the other group that we were the last one getting in, but we found a way back. And then I'm not a real drinker, so I never been drinking before. So I met this young lady from Paducah, Kentucky, I'd never forget, from Kentucky. She's a Caucasian nurse, and all of us young, you know, coming in for training, and she and I we went out one night we went to a party with somewhere and they were drinking a Kentucky bourbon. The 100 proof or something and I was Yeah, Oh yeah. And so I was drinking it because it tastes good. Tastes good. And then they say we were supposed to be going through our arm of all things where you have to mess up for attack. We suppose be doing that the next morning. The next morning, they didn't see Alice Faye at that time now. It was me, and the other girl, we were sacked out.
Toni Henson:My gosh.
Alice Faye:We didn't do anything, we didn't call, we didn't think about it. And I've never, ever experienced anything like that in my life. Because I've always been accountable, you know, on duty, on time, dressed. So we had to go in, it was counsel, and I just had to be honest. I was just, I got messed up, I made a mistake. I really did. Because I'm not a drinker. So that went on my record, still on my record where I was. After that's the worst thing I ever had on my record. It is, oftentimes unable to get to tell people this. It was really something but everything else I did, well, made it through training, and made it back home. Then I came back then we had a ceremony for all of us making it through basic training, and a big ceremony. And everybody's really excited about us, my family and me being in the military and just really interested in my job. Well, go to my job, being an RN and you know, they don't want you to take an off. Miss Casey, the short and with white hair. I said, Well, Miss Casey, I thought you had to be off two weeks for the summer and you're training in a military. She's like, well, we just we've never done that before. And I looked at her and I said, Well, in this case, there's a time when things has to change. You may just have to change. It's just a rule that if you work for the state, you have a job. And it's an obligation that it has to be. So that's all I can say. She looked at me, she strudded off and everything, but I still was off. It's a state, you'd require that GPR for two weeks. So I got through that, went through that and worked Saturdays. We did immunization, we went to the field, we had field training, we learned to set up tents, we learned to cross the terrain, get to live out in the dark, and the mosquitoes and the net. In another experience, another great experience I had I was in Oklahoma City when I was there, serving. Now let me go back to Arkansas because when I was a little raw, no, let me go to Oklahoma City. But I was in Oklahoma City. I was up the highest ranking officer on a field training exercise we had, we were out two weeks, and it was hot. It was like the temperature was getting up to like 104. Well, you know, the heat index there, it's that hot, it's really hot. The heat index, whenever it gets up that hot, like 100-204, you got to bring your troops in. So I had to make the decision. I was the officer that was in charge of all these white men, all these men been in the military. And that didn't go very well at all. So I had to make a decision to bring the troops in. But you know, some of the sergeants and all some of us decided they didn't want to bring me in. I said, well you will, they will come in because I was in command. That didn't go well, I don't tell that out too often. All the guys, the millet, the soldiers really respected me because I made decisions based upon professional wisdom, knowledge, and skills. I took care of them. I did what I had to do to in order for them to have a safe environment. And I made that decision. So when I got back, my Chief Nurse said, Well Alice, I hear some of the things happen out there. I said yes. So we had a quite an experience out there. And I knew he being a man, I knew they had talked about me, but I didn't care. And I said, Yes, so we had a wonderful time. It got pretty hot so I had pulled the troops in. He said, Yeah, I heard about that. And I said, yes so we came in we didn't have any cash. I had a few head heat and He dangerous he strokes up starting IVs. And, you know, doing all this stuff to try to keep them alive and keep them safe. So we made it through that. So that was an experience. Another the experience I had in.... wow, I had thought about all these experiences.
Tony:Oh, that's quite all right. I mean, you were the Second Lieutenant in the National Guard. That's outstanding. That's amazing. Toni, I don't know if you have any questions.
Toni Henson:I do, I wanna interject. I think that there is such a powerful resilience that you have. It seems like the women of your time had a confidence that carry them through those times the 60s in the 70s. What would you tell your younger self? What would you say to young people today to help us get through these times, because you went through different cold times being African American, and also a female, but yet you were able to carry yourself with dignity, and, and respect and get through all of the harsh treatment that I know, you experience.
Alice Faye:The main thing that I have in myself, and I would like to be able to instill into each individual. And that's what I'm doing right now. With my young men, even the babies, the little boys 3/4/5 is to, if you have a vision, and a desire to do anything is possible, no matter what it is. And oftentimes, what you desire to do, doesn't fit someone else idea about you, of what they expect you to do, what they see you to do, or what they really want you to do, that really matter. What you have to be able to do is sit back and take a sincere look at yourself within yourself to feel what is that passion, what drives you, what motivates you, what excites you, what was encouraging to you, and you have to be able to be ready to take the chances a step out, you have to be able to know that you can't be fearful. And I think oftentimes people are so fearful of the unknown, fearful things may happen that never happen. And they get they stop in your tracks. I had to do this with my daughter. And making her decision when she finished high school. My husband saw her to be the best lawyer there ever was. Because she's smart, she's witty, she's creative. She's fairy, her mind, God just really blessed her to be just oh so smart. I can't believe it, the way she is, but, but she's always been very creative. And she'd been more artsy into the art field. The ADA, dancing, singing, music, instructions, through songs, writing and so forth. So she finished college and I said, Amber, whatever you do, you make a decision because she got accepted to law school in New York and all this stuff, she had at green eyes. As I stood up in the kitchen, microwaving. This is a time in your life, where you're at a crossroad. And as a decision about what you do in life, is based upon what you do as now, I know your father, he may see you as being a lawyer. But if that's not what you want to do, and Amber, you know your passion, as you know what you've been doing since she was three years old. Teaching her phonics when she was three years, three years old, you know, helping her teacher in preschool. I said, you know what you like, you know what you love, you know your drive. You need to follow your dreams. And with that, she made a decision to go into theater. So I just tell the young man, I said, no matter what you want to do, you can do it.
Toni Henson:Yeah, you definitely have a passion for young males, African American males. Where did this come from? And tell us about the book that you wrote.
Alice Faye:I guess it really came from growing up. I grew up in the South, my grandparents raised us and I was the oldest, have one brother and it was three girls. So I saw not only how things affected him, and I guess I could feel it being the oldest and being that mother wick in me. How he transitioned from the teenage years growing up, how he went through when we lost our parents, our mother, and father was an alcoholic. And they watched my grandpa living on a farm. And he going to work from sun up to sun down, six days a week. I saw all that. I saw how we had to ride a school bus being segregated and discrimination, and all this stuff, can't use this bathroom and all that. I looked at all this stuff, and and I hit up a heart, I have a hard time because they have so much to overcome and to go through. And it doesn't stop, when they get up a certain age, and if you don't stop it, they get educated, they don't stop it, they have millions of trillions of dollars, it never stops. So I just have that passion for me to be everything I can to encourage them to just go a little further, just go a little further, and never give up. never stop trying. That has to be hard. When you go out, walk out your door and go down the street, that you could be murdered just because of the color your skin. So I have that passion for them. And that's not that I don't care for the female. But we black women are so strong, you know, God just put it in us to, to induce us to stand up into to overcome everything that has been a guest us over the year. And we're still doing it. I told my husband I said, as early as I'm asking the Lord to fix this thing but the only thing that the Lord can do, the two people can't fix it in the White House, they don't know how to fix it, they don't have a heart to fix one thing, they don't have a heart, it's not in their heart. They don't know how they don't really care. And as it's gonna take black women's to come for, we're gonna have to stand up, and we're gonna have to fight this down. And one day, people can look around and see that's our own our own hope, he's a baby. You know, usually students say that as the whale. That's just what I feel. The point has happened in the last couple of years. So I have that desire, and I want to continue to do what I'm doing to, to just be up to be there for.
Tony:Can you give us some of the examples that you put in place to help the young man?
Alice Faye:One thing , I have worked with the youth, I work with the youth and my church. And I've been we've been setting up programs that when they come in, they know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are people of importance. They're not just another child, another student, just somebody involved. What I try to do when I go, I actually have conversation with them. They know mama Alice, they know it, everybody in my church call me miss Alice, because I know that at times when they can't talk to anyone. But I feel that God is going to be doing more a group, I had a Zoom meeting with them, nine men that I have on my book when I head out. And it was just I got them on Zoom for all them to meet each other and it was just really, it was awesome. It was just beautiful. And doing that meeting. And after that meeting God show me that this was just the beginning in I don't know what. I don't know what's going to happen. But I'm an open vessel, I did to one thing that was very instrumental and it really turned out real well. My barber who went to see him and he was very interested. And so one day I just came home and made sandwiches and took him to his place. And that was so big, they were so overwhelmed with what I did for his dad. So it the things that a person can do just the simple things to make a difference.
Toni Henson:Definitely. I agree. Tell us about your book and what is it about?
Alice Faye:A plea to axons from a mother who cares? And it's really about just what I've been saying is instilling in them the idea that they're created for purpose, God and make no mistake when they were born, even if like me being born to a 16 year old mother, but out of that God already knew that I will be a person that loves people and that's what it created in me. So I want them to know that we mothers out here, we support them, we love them in spite of all the in differences that they may have, or in spite of everything that they go through, even during a drug time and drug banging and gang banging, in all the times that they grow, the things that they do. I never look at them like they're less than anything that God created. And they can achieve anything that they have within their heart to do. Never give up.
Toni Henson:I think there's such an opportunity here. I think sometimes we can become so overwhelmed with all the problems that we face. As people of African descent in in this country that we don't know that there's a little thing you can do, right? Like one person can make such a huge difference reminded me of a time when I was growing up. And I went to church by myself because it was never popular. Always a little awkward and really skinny kid, which I got up and I went to Sunday school. And I remember the boys with teasing me. And I was about 13. So when you're 13, you want attention, but you don't want the boys to tease you. And I felt bad about myself. And I remember one, kind man, I'll never forget him as long as I live. He walked up to the boys and he told them to be nice to me, and had the boys apologize to me. And I just remembered that one person, I probably would have never gone to that church again. Had he not said that. And I just I just remember how wonderful it was and how I felt like, wow, this is a place where I belong. I know you're making a huge difference in the lives of those we don't have to be their parents. It takes a village.
Alice Faye:That's right, it takes a large village.
Toni Henson:How can people find your book?
Alice Faye:Well, they can get it through Book Baby and also it's on Amazon. So many several people said that they got it through that. I have my Facebook page, you're gonna find Alice Taylor. People like you, I was just thinking the other day is that God is just so wonderful. Put people in your life that's really needed. We want to be a vessel for him to be used. All we have to do is just be open and willing to receive what He sends to us. A lot of time busy is just an excuse. And I don't use the word busy is an excuse, and opportunities when they come. You need to be able to latch on to them. Because like one of the guys in my booth said, oftentimes those opportunities are uncomfortable.
Tony:Thank you, Miss Alice, it's been wonderful talking to you. I just want to give you a big hug. You know, if I ever meet you, I'm still fascinated from your story. I know your husband wrote a book Growing up in the South.
Alice Faye:He's a Vietnam veteran. So he served, he came near death, he can't quite get as much I want to do. This things that I want to do to propel him but he had a stroke in 2012. And he has some deficit from that. However, he is able to care for himself. Personal Care, and we talk and we where we are now.
Toni Henson:While you are using your life, you are a perfect example of someone who's using their life. I think as long as we're breathing and we're able, we're supposed to be serving. So I just want to thank you for being that example, for your service to our country. You and your husband service to our country and now your sustain service and our community. And I know you're touching a lot of lives.
Alice Faye:I really appreciate it. I appreciate you all for doing what you're doing.
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