This year, as a 60-turning-61 white man, I am going to highlight African Americans that have had some kind of influence in my life. Some are famous, some are friends, and others are just people. #blackhistorymonth
February 12th - Shawn
The Lanier Stage Band was mostly black; I was one of 4 or 5 white kids, and there was one Mexican-American, and one recent Vietnamese kid whose family was one of the many who made it to Houston after the fall of Saigon.
However, one of the African-American kids was different than the others. He did not really hang out with the other kids in the band. And unlike most of the others in the band, he was in the Vanguard program, like me, and was in a couple of my academic classes.
One day early in 7th grade, I heard a big commotion, and looked over, and Shawn had another kid pinned to the ground in a wrestling hold. The teacher broke it up and sent both kids to the principal, but the scuttlebutt was that you just did not mess with Shawn. He fought hard, and was not above fighting dirty. Neither kid was suspended or anything, and nothing like that happened with Shawn around me throughout junior high and high school.
I found out on a band trip later that Shawn’s father was a wealthy successful businessman. Shawn had a really great saxophone, a sweet boombox on the bus, and was always dressed impeccably.
Shawn loved teasing me, and I really don’t take teasing well at all. One day, he had been firing rubber bands at me while I was playing, and then, as we were leaving the lunch line, he laughed at my reactions to it. I lost my cool and took a swing at him (I only ever did that twice, and I am totally ashamed of both times). He ducked, laughed, and ran as I chased him out of the band hall. Once I realized how foolish I was, I stopped. The next day, I apologized for the violence, and he apologized for launching rubber bands.
And we gradually became friends. He was a voracious reader, so we talked about books. He took up bassoon at roughly the same time I took up bass clarinet, and we should sit in concert band with our burping instruments and cut up and misbehave and have a great time.
We ended up at HSPVA together, and were in the #1 jazz band our senior year. Doc Morgan would get mixed up and call him “Syd” and me “Shawn”. One time he did that to me, and I said, “Doc, I know we both went to Lanier, and we both play sax, but Shawn in the black one.” He, Shawn, and I all laughed heartily.
I lost touch with him after high school, but I will never forget Shawn for what he once did for me. At the end of 9th grade, he came up to me and presented a paper bag to me. Inside was a “Universal Method for Saxophone” book. He had had everybody in the band sign the inside front cover, and then then wrote:
“To Syd, our honorary Soul Brother”
It was one of the greatest honors I have ever received.
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