.:Life With a Red Head:.

So I brag about Brittany McNary all the time. She’s one of the 7 women who live at the Sidewalk. I met Britt my sophomore year of college, and consistently from then until now- I am confident that our friendship has molded me into someone better than I was, before I met her, and continues to. Brittany and I are pretty different in a lot of realms. She’s more passive, I’m more aggressive. She silently does the dishes thanklessly, and I find the culprit. She’s more liberal, I’m more conservative. She goes to the Farm Market in Oxford early on Saturday mornings, I sleep in. She eats in, I eat out. She has red hair, I have brown. She’s a brilliant and creative writer, she’s open minded, she’s a wonderful friend, and devoted student. She has her ducks in a row usually, she’s erudite. She has a similar predilection in music. I admire her. Despite the many things that make us seemingly incompatible, Jesus has made us really good friends.  We frequently have awesome unannounced conversations about things I can’t have with most people. Tonight we were talking about Jesus  and public health  and all of the disciplines that go into solving the issue now, and dreaming about how God’s Kingdom will be different.

All this is a segway into something she wrote that I wanted to post on my blog. Brittany and her fiance, Zack, are moving into the innercity. She will teach, and he will be a doctor, and they will live together in the city for the city, in the church for the church, to the fame of the name of Jesus. Here’s a bit of her writing I wanted to share:

“I am what I am and I am from Shelby and even though I’m from Shelby that small

white Midwest town where my parents and in laws still live I will live in the city in

the Cincinnati city and I will be okay I will even thrive in the city I am what I am

but I am allowed to go to new places

You can call me a white student of privilege

but I won’t claim it I am what I am and I will teach in an urban district and call the

impoverished my neighbors Ms McNary you such a white girl they will say but then

after school lets out they will pass me while walking to the grocery we will both call

Walnut Hills our home

I am what I am I’m from Shelby but I will live in Walnut Hills with Zack and

call Hemlock St our home

Our landlord tells us there might be bed bugs hiding

waiting to welcome us to the city and that we will hear gun shots at night and really

there is no room for a dining room table and the last renters grew pot and sold drugs

but I have plans to sew curtains for the windows Give the living room a rug Paint the

bedroom walls mustard yellow Fill the cupboards with mason jars because I’m from

Shelby and I can bring that small town with me to the city

I hear that white girls can’t teach in the city And I know this isn’t a movie I

promise not to become a mannequin but I can say the sun is shining if I want to Cause I

student taught in Hamilton and for four months black and white and Hispanic teenagers

called me their teacher We read about Holden Caulfield and I pointed out how lonely he

was in the midst of a crowd and all of my kids the blacks and the whites and the

Hispanics the Mr. Joe Quarterbacks and the Miss Teenage Mothers they could all

relate So I can make a home in my classroom I said I will make a home in the inner

city in my classroom Because I am who I am Red head white girl an inner city

teacher”

A.men.Brittany. Thank God for you all the time, good friend.

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