Jackson Free Press v18n23 - In the Spirit of Medgar Evers

JAC K S O N VOL 18 NO. 23 // JULY 8 - 21, 2020 // SUBSCRIBE FREE FOR BREAKING NEWS AT JFPDAILY.COM

FREE PRESS MAGAZINE REPORTING TRUTH TO POWER IN MISSISSIPPI SINCE 2002

FREE

Casting Blame for Mississippi’s Growing Pandemic Judin, pp 6-8

Foot Print’s COVID Response Lucas, p 17

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contents

JACKSONIAN

July 8 - 21, 2020 Vol. 18 No. 23

ON THE COVER portrait of Medgar Evers

by Brad Heckman

4 Editor’s Note 6 Talks

9 Misdemeanor Fatality

M

ississippi College Admissions Counselor Hannah Richards gleefully claims Mississippi, specifically the Jackson metro, as her home—despite spending her entire childhood in Chattanooga, Tenn., before moving to Mississippi to attend MC.

“For anybody who is from or has moved to Mississippi, it kind of gets in your blood, and you realize the people you meet and the experiences you have become a part of you,” she says.

After graduating in 2016 with a bachelor’s degree in political science, Richards moved to Washington, D.C., working on-and-off on the Hill for a year before the Magnolia State began to beckon.

She returned to MC to pursue a master’s degree in professional and corporate communication, which she will finish this December.

“I knew I wanted to live in Jackson and be part of the people who believe in Jackson, and work to find ways to talk about how great it is and make it better,” Richards says.

As an advocate for the capital city, Richards thinks it’s up to Jackson residents to be individual evangelists for the things that they love about the metro.

“We don’t have the Yellowstones of western states, and we don’t have the New York Cities of northern states, but we have heart, and we have people, and we have just really impressive ways

12 op/ed 14 Cover Story 17 Food

Hannah Richards of connecting,” she says. “There’s so much more of a ‘we’re in this together’ mentality.”

As an admissions counselor, Richards recruits incoming students from Texas, Georgia and northern Louisiana, and in the upcoming year she will work to recruit people throughout the quadcounty area, from Vicksburg to Gluckstadt.

“My job is different every day, but the goal of my job is to just talk to people about how … there is an entire office of people (at MC) whose whole job is to fight for you,” she says. “The students we recruit aren’t just numbers or potential income. The students we recruit are pieces of the puzzle that makes MC what it is.”

Richards loves hosting people and cooking for them when it’s safe to entertain: “One way I try to connect with my community is just bringing people in my home—finding the people who haven’t found their community yet and bringing them into mine.”

A member of Redeemer Church in Jackson, Richards volunteers with the children’s ministry. She also likes to travel and promote the city she loves.

“I want people to know that Jackson’s worth the risk. Being a citizen of Jackson and getting involved sometimes doesn’t always feel like it pays off, but it does, whether you see it or not,” she says.

—Jenna Gibson

18 ‘Endangered Orphans’ Ridgeland-based gaming studio Certified Studios prepares to release a second edition of the board game that launched its career.

19 Music 19 Events

21 Gamer’s Top 10 Leader of the local HeroClix community, Frezale Smith, lists his top 10 favorite local businesses in the metro.

22 Puzzle 22 Sorensen 23 astro 24 Classifieds

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

courtesy Hannah Richards

Harvey Hill’s family renews legal efforts against Madison County after an autopsy report calls his death in custody a homicide.

3

editor’s note

by Donna Ladd, Editor-in-Chief

G

ov. Tate Reeves is spinning. He is grasping at any straw he thinks can divert attention away from his abysmal leadership during the COVID-19 crisis in Mississippi. His choices are more focused on Trump-approved politics than on safety risks that the JFP has warned about every step of the way.

We told you from the beginning of COVID-19 that Reeves was waiting too long to shut down commerce and that his tardiness would prevent a real flattening of the curve in our state. That, in turn, would leave our health-care system weakened and in reactive mode and, to hear the experts tell it, cause a more severe second wave—if the first one ever finished. Which it didn’t.

We knew this from listening to experts, even if their truths were inconvenient and meant we would have to sacrifice pleasures like dining out, getting a new tat-

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

I think Reeves’ base wants to live.

4

too or haircut, or going to parties or bars until this pandemic had actually subsided.

Then, Reeves finally signed an executive order two days after he quietly proclaimed the appalling Confederate Heritage Month on April 1. But the order was confusing and clearly superseded at least some of the patchwork of efforts mayors were attempting around Mississippi to fill the leadership void Reeves had left gaping.

We reported that mess of an order, and Reeves’ deputies set out to discredit Nick Judin’s reporting on it—which, let’s be honest, was simply based on reading and comprehending the entire order and pointing out its conflicts. They even directed some vicious and false tweets at me for supposedly putting Nick up to … good reporting.

But even that order and later ones to clarify it contained weasley safety precautions, especially about masks. Plus, Reeves quickly played politics over declaring gun stores and religious gatherings “essential,” and joined into attacks on Black churches, such as in Greenville, that tried to save people’s lives by not allowing groups to gather, even as the State knew Black Mississippians were being hit disproportionately. (Media had to demand virus race details for weeks before we got them, finally confirming who readers had told us were hit hardest.)

Religious gatherings, including in South Korea, have been treacherous hotspots for COVID-19. Had Reeves come across as forceful and passionate about masks and avoiding all group gatherings as he did about protecting the constitutional rights and desires of gun enthusiasts; the demands of churches to physically open during a pandemic; his self-congratulation on conservative radio for using the pandemic to interrupt abortion rights; and for reinforcing the right to not wear a mask—we might not be where we are now.

If Reeves had been at least as adamant about the need to wear masks, including mandating them, it is clear that this pandemic wouldn’t be so out of control here.

Smarter and less partisan choices in other states and nations showed faster recoveries—while Mississippi has only gotten worse. We’re still in the first, growing wave.

Reeves’ logic, of course, was designed to appeal to his key voters in Mississippi, who don’t even include all Republicans. He thinks his base wants the Mississippi flag to remain and loves seeing safety masks weaponized into political wedge issues, even during a pandemic where a bipartisan reckoning of racist symbols is underway.

I think his base wants to live, loves granny and needs leadership to help them.

There was and is a national campaign underway to divide Americans along partisan lines during the pandemic, convincing some that COVID-19 safety needs like masks and distancing were part of some liberal hoax to make them give up their rights not to infect others and be killed themselves. Reeves plays along at our peril.

Of course, in April, he was pandering to the “Reopen Mississippi” protesters who rejected masks to get back at liberals, taking

AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, Pool

Tate Reeves Needs to Stop Making Excuses, Start Leading

Gov. Tate Reeves signs the bill to remove the state flag. House Speaker Philip Gunn and Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, both now infected with COVID-19, stand behind him. Dr. Thomas Dobbs now says Mississippi needs mask mandates.

its cues from all the false advice and minimization of the virus (you know, it’s just like the flu) Trump and his FOX buddies were throwing out. They protested outside the Governor’s Mansion, with most demonstrators defiantly not wearing masks and calling the whole thing a hoax—but he’s not trying to blame those protesters now.

Now, of course, Reeves is trying to scapegoat “liberal media” for reporting only that people got infected at Memorial Day BBQs (after he re-opened Mississippi) and not his new shtick that Black Lives Matter protests in Mississippi worsened COVID19, despite research to the contrary.

Let’s be clear: No media ever said only big BBQs caused the spread, although they surely helped due to his weak statewide safety regulations. And media, from local to national, reported dangers of BLM protests—a major reason the vast majority of

contributors

Kayode Crown

Sherry Lucas

Nick Judin

City Reporter Kayode Crown recently came to Mississippi from Nigeria where he earned a post-graduate diploma in Journalism and was a journalist for 10 years. He likes rock music and has fallen in love with the beautiful landscapes in Jackson. He wrote about Medgar Evers.

Freelance writer Sherry Lucas is an arts junkie, wordsmith and incurable home cook who likes playing with fire as long as it’s contained and regulated by her Bosch stove. She wrote the food story on Foot Print Farms.

State reporter Nick Judin grew up in Jackson and graduated from the University of Mississippi. He is covering this year’s legislative session. Try not to run him over when you see him crossing State Street. He wrote about Mississippi’s varying leadership in response to COVID-19.

those protesters wore masks for hours in the sun while demanding that white Americans stop treating Black lives as disposable.

This is all desperate hand-waving on Reeves’ part, and it won’t work. We’ve watched and heard from Mississippians of every political stripe who get it. That is, a worldwide pandemic is not a partisan game and shouldn’t be treated like one. It is past time for real leaders to work to save every life possible through making difficult decisions, wearing the damn masks in public and, yes, mandating the wisest safety precautions, as Dr. Dobbs now wants to happen. Good leaders call on others to be responsible and, no, not everyone will like you for it.

That’s OK. It’s part of leadership.

Reeves, though, is a follower, showing no propensity to lead, and the times are leaving him behind.

Regardless of your politics, most agree that if there’s anything government ought to embrace at a minimum, it’s doing everything possible to keep people alive during a dangerous contagion event.

Real leaders know nothing—business, economy, schools, health care—will continue to work if we don’t put aside selfishness and political division and wallop the damn curve together. This is a time when government, and good leaders, will act at their smartest and most compassionate.

The governor has failed the leadership test royally to date, and blaming media, protesters and whomever else will not change that. Reeves must shelve politics, put on his big-boy drawers and lead this state to safety.

That’s it. That’s the job. Own it.

More: jacksonfreepress.com/COVID19.

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“[F]ar too many people have not taken this deadly virus seriously.”

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@JXNFREEPRESS

@JACKSONFREEPRESS

— Mayor Chokwe A. Lumumba while mandating that Jacksonians wear masks, June 30, 2020

@JXNFREEPRESS

ce eren rev

COVID-19 In Mississippi: Lacking Leadership, Buy-In or Both?

by Nick Judin

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

6

SHELTER IN PLACE

NUMBER OF TESTS

70,000

SAFER AT HOME

April 3 - April 27

April 27 - June 1

SAFE RETURN June 1 - Present

14

60,000

12

50,000

10

40,000

8

30,000

6

20,000

4

10,000

2

0

PERCENT TESTS POSITIVE - ONLY APPLIES TO BLACK LINE

J

ackson Mayor Chokwe A. Lumumba stood in the gardens outside City Hall in early-summer oppressive heat with a simple message. “I will play the bad guy,” he warned. “I will be the one that people are upset with.”

It was June 30, 10 days into summer and five days after the Mississippi State Department of Health reported 1,092 new cases of coronavirus disease in a single day.

It was also during a span of time in Jackson when state legislators, including Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and House Speaker Philip Gunn, R-Clinton, were likely contracting the virus during the extended legislative session amid long meetings and ceremonies with limited social distancing and mask-wearing to retire the Mississippi state flag and complete 2020 legislation.

The week to come would leave Mississippi with the highest per-capita increase of the coronavirus in the nation, NPR’s analytics now show.

The mayor, flanked by health-care professionals from across Jackson, announced a mandatory mask order on June 30—a tentative, moderated attempt at real enforcement with one of the internationally recognized solutions to the problem of COVID-19. Cognizant of the ideological rage such a mandate would draw, Lumumba pleaded with the public.

“If you disagree with my politics, if you disagree with any stance of anyone who’s telling you to wear a mask—by all means, wear a mask and live to disagree with me another day,” Lumumba said.

The grand debate over a protective mask, played out on social media from the local level to the halls of the White House itself, is representative of the state of the pandemic in America. Soaring unemployment has left most states unwilling to consider the kinds of broad shutdowns that followed the virus’ initial scouring of the nation to help flatten the curve.

But now, as COVID-19 has spiked in Mississippi and across the nation, and without an abatement many wrongly thought the summer heat would bring, even non-

0 April 4 - 18

April 19 - May 2

May 3 - 16

May 17 - 30

June 1 - 13

June 14 - 27

Mississippi - Testing Volumes and Positives April - June 2020 Total test volume

Positive tests

Percent Positive SOURCE: MSDH

State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs points to a rising positive test percentage as a key indicator that COVID-19 is getting worse in Mississippi. On July 7, he said Mississippi needs a mask mandate, whether local or statewide.

restrictive actions like face coverings have morphed into the realm of the political.

“Mask-wearing has become a totem, a secular religious symbol,” Republican strategist Alex Castellanos told The Washington Post on June 30. “Christians wear crosses, Muslims wear a hijab, and members of the Church of Secular Science bow to the Gods of Data by wearing a mask as their symbol, demonstrating that they are the elite; smarter, more rational, and morally superior to everyone else.”

His words reflect the vitriol over maskwearing that have erupted in public spaces, town halls and social media across the nation.

“That actually goes to the very top— to the president of the United States,”

Tupelo Mayor Jason Shelton said in an interview with the Jackson Free Press.

“He’s politicized COVID-19. He’s not engaged in rational or consistent leadership. … The White House put out guidelines for responding to COVID-19. ... They were really on point. Somebody did a great job writing them. And then you see the president himself go on TV and ask people not to follow those guidelines.”

A Lack of ‘Buy-in’ What is not a matter of public debate, however, is that the COVID-19 crisis is worsening in Mississippi, from a spate of newly infected legislators to sharp spikes in those contracting the virus across the

state. This is a sobering increase that came since Gov. Tate Reeves almost completely reopened the state, down to tattoo shops, and allowed crowds of up to 50 to gather outside without social distancing. In general, state guidelines suggest 6-feet distancing and masks rather than mandating them.

In recent weeks, every single metric intended to warn of increased COVID-19 spread has peaked, and then peaked again.

New cases, long “plateaued” at between 300 to 400 daily cases, spiked to over 1,000, then settled around more than 600 a day.

Four of the last seven days have shown an increase closer to 900 a day.

COVID-19 hospitalizations climbed to numbers never before seen, accom-

COVID-19 conference on July 1, described the problem as a lack of “buy-in” from local communities and populations, a phrase that has gained currency at the top levels of state leadership as positive tests continue to rise.

“There is no doubt that when we look county to county, and we instituted specific restrictions at the county level, that it worked. We made progress,” Reeves said.

The governor added that “the only way it’s going to work is if we have buy-in from our elected leaders, our business leaders and our constituents.”

Shelton rejected that line of reasoning entirely, pointing instead to a lack of leadership from the top that would help more people understand that the need to wear masks is urgent. “There’s a lack of political will from the governor. There’s no lack of buy-in from local leaders,” the Tupelo mayor said. “There’s certainly no lack of buy-in from the medical community. The healthcare community is universal in requesting the masking policy.”

Representing “community buy-in” statistically is impossible. But it is possible to examine the timeline of state mandates and compare them to the best metric for courtsy MSDH

COVID-19 cases by date of illness onset through July 5, 2020.

Nick Judin

panied by reports of rapidly filling ICUs in key hospitals around the state. And the state’s positive test rate, a number that resists all attempts to explain rising numbers with a widespread testing regime, spiked and rose above even its previous heights from April, when testing was restricted to those extremely likely to be infected.

State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs told the Jackson Free Press in a June 23 interview that the boundaries of the state’s restrictions were the cooperation of its residents. “(The guidelines) would be a lot more strict if (they) were likely to be successful. We’re trying to find a medium where it can be beneficial, but also livable— but folks are not even following that,” Dobbs said, visibly frustrated.

In that same interview, Dobbs painted a terrifying image of the upcoming fall and winter, in which rampant COVID-19 hospitalizations meeting the onset of the flu season threatened the integrity of the state’s entire health-care system. Days later, after MSDH reported the state’s first four-figure coronavirus spike, he suggested such a collapse may only be weeks away.

Dobbs, and later Reeves, at his press

Jackson Mayor Chokwe A. Lumumba is willing to “play the bad guy,” as he put it, issuing new restrictions for mask usage and threatening business closures for those who do not comply with the social-distancing orders.

viral spread: case positive rate. Increased testing numbers do not affect the percentage of positive tests.

Mississippi’s “Shelter in Place” period, which Reeves started on April 3 lasting until April 27, showed the first signs of a reduction in the positive case rate, the “flattening curve” that health experts stressed early in the days of the pandemic, even as much of the public called for the governor to lock down the state. The benefits of the “Shelter at Home” period—and the “Safer at Home” period that followed—are relatively clear. A heavy increase in testing showed a decreased positive case rate, reaching its nadir in late May.

But the end of the “Safer at Home” period—which began April 27 and ended on June 1, and the beginning of the “Safe Return” order, which continues today, shows the marked increase in case positive rate that accompanies the massive swaths of new cases. June’s “Safe Return” has been anything but safe—an essentially complete reopening that has bent the curve back upward, imperiled the health-care system and

Six Ways to Beat Jackson’s July Heat Find a tree in your backyard and bask in the shade.

Freeze an arrangement of your favorite fruit juices in an ice tray to make a rainbow-like selection of refreshing popsicles.

Self-quarantine inside your airconditioned home.

Set up an elaborate but safe water-based obstacle course for your family and hold a casual competition. Winner gets an extra dessert!

Sit in front of your AC and read every book in sight.

Stitch up masks in every color for all your friends.

Break out the old box fan and have a “Best Robot Voice” contest while enjoying the simulated breeze.

the best-laid plans of municipal leadership, who were limited by how far they could go with safety mandates due to the governor’s executive orders.

Oxford’s Double-Bind

The messages about how it has handled the coronavirus crisis are mixed from the State of Mississippi. On Sunday, July 5, a Reeves tweet blamed recent large protests in Mississippi—the Black Lives Matters events—for a spike in COVID-19 transmission and taking a swipe at “liberal media” at the same time.

The next day, Reeves walked back those comments on Twitter, suggesting that he was referring to “national” media ignoring the impact of protests. He explained his theory at a press event held in the afternoon.

“There are those in the national media who would have you believe that (protests) had absolutely no impact on the rising number of cases. I would submit to you that common sense says otherwise,” Reeves said July 6.

For Mississippi, at least, Dr. Dobbs has previously said that the evidence had not “revealed any specific links to protests.”

The June 6 Black Lives Matter protest in Jackson drew thousands, but was dramatically different from early May protests to reopen the state: photos and video from June’s protest show that nearly everyone participating was wearing a mask.

Repeatedly, Dobbs has acknowledged to the Jackson Free Press that transmission can still happen in smaller groups without masks or social distancing, although Reeves is allowing groups up to 100 to gather outdoors. But Dobbs has also insisted that larger gatherings of individumore COVID-19, p 8

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

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COVID-19, frOm page 7 Oxford is in a double-bind. The state of the virus in Mississippi does not depend on the actions of Oxford. But a fall without college sports and an active, present University of Mississippi community would be devastating to the town economically.

Nor does Lafayette County have perfect knowledge of the spread in their own county. COVID-19-positive residents from out of state are reported back in their home counties and state, not in Lafayette.

That means students can return for parties and fraternity events, infecting, being infected and spreading the virus back to their home communities, as well as getting sick in Oxford, further taxing its health-care system. That could be a serious crisis if and when students return for the fall.

Tannehill called non-compliant residents a “small minority” in Oxford. But she acknowledged that stronger restrictions were necessary, and expressed approval for Lumumba’s plan that threatened businesses like restaurants with temporary closures if they were found to be noncompliant,

COVID-19 Cases, Hospitalizations, and Deaths in MS 800

600

400

200

0 March 1

March 16

April 1

COVID-19 Confirmed Hospitalizations

April 16

May 1

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COVID-19 Cases 5 Day Moving Average

June 1

June 16

July 1

COVID-19 Related Deaths

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

source: MsDH

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Nick JuDiN

als ignoring restrictions, groups of college students especially, have caused a significant portion of the current spike.

On Tuesday, July 7, at an MSDH press event, Dobbs encouraged “every community, every city, every county to look at enacting a mask ordinance,” to better protect residents, acknowledging that it is his position to advocate for mask-wearing at whatever level possible, including a statewide order, which Reeves has yet to enact.

The rising curve and increasing hospitalizations threaten current plans to reopen the state’s schools and colleges in the fall.

No city understands the economic threat those plans falling through would present more than Oxford. That city, the home of the University of Mississippi, not only has a citywide mask order, but it has been in place since April 25.

In a June 30 interview, Oxford Mayor Robyn Tannehill said three medical advisers guided her decisions. “From the very beginning, they said the best way to curb that is for everyone to wear a mask,” she said.

Both House Speaker Philip Gunn (left) and Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann (right) have tested positive for COVID-19, acquired during the legislative session.

promising to raise the issue soon.

The next day, at the Oxford Board of Aldermen meeting, Emergency Management Director Jimmy Allgood presented a preliminary plan for just such an order. The board has since rolled back the city’s opening to phase 1, limiting gatherings beyond the statewide order to 20 people if social distancing is possible and 10 if not. But Tannehill also cast the tiebreaker vote to allow restaurants to stay open past 10 p.m.

‘The Best Trump He Could Be’ At his June 20 press briefing, Lumumba chided the people of Jackson for their lack of initiative. “As we contemplated the steps forward, we identified that far too many of our residents have been taking a lackadaisical approach to wearing facial coverings ... far too many people have not taken this deadly virus seriously. And so we stand here with you, not in an effort to over govern, but in an effort to protect our residents to the best of our ability,” he said.

When it came to community buy-in, Lumumba said the increased restrictions were an attempt to find a balanced solution

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to the spreading problem. “We’re not trying to abuse people for their sincere failure or forgetfulness, but we are trying to negotiate how we collectively take a more responsible approach to this issue,” the mayor said.

For Mayor Shelton in Tupelo, it’s the governor who lacks buy-in.

“In his defense, he didn’t campaign on being an effective leader or a progressive leader. He campaigned on being the best Trump he could be,” the Tupelo mayor said about Reeves.

Earlier, Reeves announced that both he and his family had tested negative for COVID-19. On July, he tweeted a photo of a note his daughter had left on the doorknob to her room: “Put a mask to come in until we get test back.”

“Official order on my youngest daughter’s bedroom door!” the governor tweeted about his child’s mandate. As of press time, that order went further than he has been willing to go with safety precautions for the State of Mississippi.

Email state reporter Nick Judin at nick@ jacksonfreepress.com. Read full COVID-19 coverage at jacksonfreepress.com/covid19.

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POLICING

Autopsy: Death of Harvey Hill in Madison County Detention Center Ruled Homicide

T

COURTESY COCHRAN FIRM

he death of 36-year-old Harvey Hill on May 6, 2018, in the Madison County Detention Center was a homicide, the Mississippi State Medical Examiner’s Office has determined.

His family’s lawyers, The Cochran Firm, last month obtained the autopsy report performed two days after his death. It revealed that he died from multiple blunt trauma.

In February 2019, the Jackson Free Press reported that Hill was sitting on a former employer’s front porch in May 2018 and refused to leave after the former employer asked him to leave and then called the police when he refused.

Madison County police then arrested Hill for trespassing, a misdemeanor, and sent him to the Madison County Detention Center.

The Jackson Free Press obtained the autopsy report signed June 19 by Chief Medical Examiner Mark LeVaughn, which included a reference to the video of what happened that day when he sustained injuries in prison custody, leading to his death. The family says in a lawsuit that the video shows Madison County detention officers handcuffing, kicking and pepper-spraying Hill for not giving them “proper deference.”

The autopsy concluded that no intoxicating substances or pre-existing health condition contributed to his death, but revealed findings of “abrasions

MOST VIRAL STORIES AT JFP.MS: 1. “State Health Officer Warns in Interview: Prepare For Overwhelmed Hospitals by Fall” by Nick Judin 2. “Readers’ Designs for New Mississippi Flag #MSFlagDIY” 3. “Lumumba Threatens To Shut Down Businesses If COVID-19 Infection Rate Spikes” by Kayode Crown 4. “Gov. Reeves Vetoes Jackson Water Bill, More Paving, Mask Requirement Ahead” by Kayode Crown 5. “Mississippi Adds 1,092 New COVID19 Cases In Single Day” by Julian Mills, Nick Judin

Harvey Hill died a day after he was detained in the Madison County Detention Center for loitering in 2018. Based on the autopsy, the Mississippi State Examiner’s Office has ruled his death a homicide.

on chest and base of left neck; contusions of upper right chest, scalp and left neck; hematoma in (the) left side of the neck; gastrointestinal contusions; liver laceration and contusion of the tongue.”

“The hematoma in the left side of the neck resulted in severe swelling throughout the soft tissue of the left side of the neck,” LeVaughn said in the report. “Within this anatomic region of

the neck is the left vagus nerve. This nerve originates from the brain and innervates multiple organs throughout the body including the heart.

Overstimulation of this nerve by direct, blunt injury and or direct pressure due to a hematoma can result in reflex slowing of the heartbeat by (a) mechanism of bradyarrhythmia, conduction block and ultimately cardiac arrest.”

The family, on June, 23, 2020, filed an amended violation-of-civil-rights case against Madison County, Sheriff Randy Tucker, detention officers, and medical personnel at the detention center, with details made available to Jackson Free Press. They said that “Master Sergeant James Ingram, Officer James Bufford, and Officer Terrence Evans brutally beat, tortured and bound Mr. Hill, then placed him in an observation cell and left him to die,” while other prison guards did not restrain them.

Revealing details of what supposedly led to his death, the lawsuit claimed that during mealtime at around noon the next day after his arrest on May 5, an altercation occurred involving Hill, where correctional officers assaulted and kicked him six or more times while on the ground.

The lawsuit alleges that nurse Alise White who works for Quality Correctional Health Care and is a party to the lawsuit, reportedly “failed to assess and diagnose Mr. Hill’s medical condition” of “excited delirium syndrome,” but returned him to a holding cell.

“Instead of giving Mr. Hill a sedative to calm him and reduce his heart rate so that she could obtain his vital signs and protect against a fatal arrhythmia or heart attack, Nurse White simply ordered that Mr. Hill be returned to his cell,” the lawsuit claimed.

Jail workers reportedly laid Hill face down and handcuffed in a cell and then left him for 46 minutes without assistance, and he subsequently was found unresponsive.

“The paramedics were not called in a timely fashion and did not arrive until almost an hour after Mr. Hill collapsed.

In addition, there was no defibrillator to assist in Mr. Hill’s treatment. Later, Mr. Hill was taken to the Merit Health Central Hospital in Jackson, Mississippi, where he was officially pronounced dead,” says the court filing, which represents only one side of a legal argument.

Email story tips to city/county reporter Kayode Crown at kayode@jacksonfreepress. com. You can follow him on Twitter at @kayodecrown.

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

by Kayode Crown

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July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

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11

CLAY B. MORRIS

J

ames Baldwin said “the story of the in America is the story of America. It is not a pretty story.” This ugly, brutal, and festering story is the truth that Black Americans are born into and that Black Americans wake up to every day. This is the story of how a cotton gin was tied around Emmett Till’s neck.

The story of Breonna Taylor being shot eight times in her sleep. The story of Korey Wise’s psychological abuse for 11 and a half years due to a crime he didn’t commit.

For many Americans who are not Black, May 25, 2020, the day that George Floyd was murdered, was their first time fully hearing this story. Yet, many Black children have been told this story with the same routine and rhythm of a bedtime story. Because for these children, for myself and my Black peers, this is our story.

A story that has been written for us by the grandparents of our peers, the parents of our peers, and our peers via their daily actions and proximity to the conundrum of whiteness.

It is not just the scent of burned grass underneath crosses in the yards of Black homes, or the slithering of whips upon Black backs that has written this story.

Because alongside these purposeful terrors and centuries of curated violence against souls who had no choice but to be Black are daily decisions that come along with being

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

It is not just the scent of burned grass underneath crosses in the yards of Black homes.

12

white and engaging with anyone, or anything, perceived to be “other” than white.

Who do you sit with in class? Who do you “not see” in the lines of your groceries and malls? Who do your parents deride at home? Who did your parents vote for?

Whose hair, tone and intellect do you find so different from your expectation that you feel the need to validate this curiosity with a verbal exclamation of “You’re so articulate,” “Can I touch your hair,” “What do your parents do?”

AllAn WArren

Blackness and Whiteness: To Whom the Story of America Concerns

Editor-in-Chief and CEO Donna Ladd Publisher & President Todd Stauffer Associate Publisher Kimberly Griffin Creative Director Kristin Brenemen REPORTERS AND WRITERS City Reporter Kayode Crown State Reporter Nick Judin State Intern Julian Mills Contributing Writers Dustin Cardon, Bryan Flynn, Alex Forbes, Jenna Gibson, Tunga Otis Torsheta Jackson, Mike McDonald, Anne B. Mckee, EDITORS AND OPERATIONS Deputy Editor Nate Schumann JFPDaily.com Editor Dustin Cardon Executive Assistant Azia Wiggins Consulting Editor JoAnne Prichard Morris ART AND PHOTOGRAPHY Senior Designer Zilpha Young Contributing Photographers Seyma Bayram, Acacia Clark, Nick Judin, Imani Khayyam, Ashton Pittman, Brandon Smith

Writer James Baldwin said “the story of the negro in America is the story of America. It is not a pretty story.” To Clay Morris of Jackson, a sophomore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, America’s story has always not been “pretty” for Black Americans but is only just becoming so for white Americans.

Who do you feel most comfortable with? Who are you?

These questions could audit the inner workings of one’s whiteness, but they are far from the diagnostic needed to make nonBlack people understand how the thesis of America’s story dictates everyone’s lives. In that thesis, the world exists in two spheres: one of whiteness, and its flawlessly flawed inability to understand itself as the catalyst for society’s injustice; and one of Blackness, an idea constructed to absorb the injustices.

Without this thesis, and the bisecting of everyone and everything as Black, white or adjacent, the order of the world for nonBlack people would dissolve. Those who actually know the story realize, however, that the existing order is not order: It is chaos. And it is chaos defined by whiteness’ contradicting ability to blind itself from the fact that it is, first, a distortion of the psyche as Toni Morrison said, and second, only seen as order for those who are white.

This is because the story of those stuck in the bedlam of the racialized world is also the story of those who created the bedlam.

The logical question then is how, if Blackness versus whiteness is so different, can the American story be the same for us all? But that question is only for someone with a specific amount of cognitive dissonance and the ability to step outside their identity, which those who are not white, not Black, do not have.

America’s story, the Black story, has no degrees of separation from the white story because they are constantly reinforcing one another. What then should be done with America’s story?

There must be, unfortunately for some, a new addition to the story’s thesis, a purposeful plot reconstruction that involves destruction of whiteness and its grip. Most likely white people, even those who are “allies” according to their social media, will not like the story’s new path because it will erase the life they are comfortable with.

But it is the only path that will let George Floyd breathe. It is the only path that America, the world, can take. It is the path that should have written the story.

The most important sentences in this new portion of America’s story must come from the white people, who are unwilling to let go of the order of the world they know as peaceful.

They must recognize that their world, their whiteness, while made tangible by systems, is a lie. That the portions of the story they have contributed to are based in a fiction that can no longer be beneficial to them if progress is to be the thematic turn in America’s story.

No one can truly predict where this influx of concern over America’s story will take its citizens. But it can be comfortably assumed that if whiteness is not quarantined as a virus, America’s story will continue to write itself as it is now: ruinous.

Mississippian Clay B. Morris is a rising sophomore at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill studying political science and journalism. Morris is also a contributing reporter for the Mississippi Free Press and a Youth Media Project alum.

This column does not necessarily reflect the views of the JFP.

ONLINE & DIGITAL SERVICES Digital Web Developer Ryan Jones Web Editor Dustin Cardon Social Media Assistant Robin Johnson Web Designer Montroe Headd Let’s Talk Jackson Editor Kourtney Moncure SALES AND MARKETING (601-362-6121 x11) Marketing Writer Andrea Dilworth Marketing Consultant Mary Kozielski Advertising Designer Zilpha Young Events Assistant Leslyn Smith DISTRIBUTION Distribution Coordinator Ken Steere Distribution Team Yvonne Champion, Ruby Parks, Eddie Williams TALK TO US: Letters letters@jacksonfreepress.com Editorial editor@jacksonfreepress.com Queries submissions@jacksonfreepress.com Listings events@jacksonfreepress.com Advertising ads@jacksonfreepress.com Publisher todd@jacksonfreepress.com News tips news@jacksonfreepress.com Jackson Free Press 125 South Congress Street, Suite 1324 Jackson, Mississippi 39201 Editorial and Sales (601) 362-6121 Fax (601) 510-9019 Daily updates at jacksonfreepress.com The Jackson Free Press is the city’s award-winning, locally owned news magazine, reaching more than 35,000 readers per issue via more than 600 distribution locations in the Jackson metro area—and an average of over 35,000 visitors per week at www. jacksonfreepress.com. The Jackson Free Press is free for pick-up by readers; one copy per person, please.

First-class subscriptions are available to “gold level” and higher members of the JFP VIP Club (jfp.ms/ vip). The views expressed in this magazine and at jacksonfreepress.com are not necessarily those of the publisher or management of Jackson Free Press Inc. © Copyright 2020 Jackson Free Press Inc.

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YOU DON’T COME HERE.

YOU BELONG HERE.

At Millsaps College, you’ll find a campus community waiting to welcome you.

Nearly 90 percent of students live on our beautiful 100-acre campus, so your move to college won’t be like leaving home – it will be like moving to a new one. Life on campus is never boring when you and your friends gather in the mornings at ecoGrounds Coffee Shop, visit in the Bowl after lunch, exercise in the afternoons in the Hall Activities Center or hang out in the evenings at Reuben’s.

Be a Major. Apply now. millsaps.edu/apply

Write stories that matter for the publications readers love to read.

Email and convince us that you have the drive and creativity to join the team.

Better yet, include some kickass story ideas. Send to: nate@jacksonfreepress.com

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The Jackson Free Press is seeking hard-working freelance writers who strive for excellence in every piece. Work with editors who will inspire and teach you to tell sparkling stories.

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courtesy FBI.gov

Former Mississippi NAACP Field Secretary Medgar Evers, would have been 95 on July 2, 2020, but died before his 38th birthday after a white-supremacist sniper shot him at his Jackson home.

In the Spirit of Medgar:

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

State Flag Came Down the Week Slain Hero Would’ve Turned 95

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s a young girl growing up in Jackson, Miss., in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Reena Evers-Everette, the second child and only daughter of the iconic civil-rights activist Medgar Evers, had all the opportunity in the world to hate white people.

Before the assassination of her father in 1963, which made him a black-freedom martyr nearly five years before Martin Luther King Jr.’s murder, someone threw a Molotov cocktail at the Evers’ house. It went under the car.

by Kayode Crown

Evers’ wife, Myrlie, was able to get the bomb from underneath the car with the help of a neighbor before it did any damage. When her father came back late that night, he hugged Reena to say good night, and she asked him, “Do all white people hate us?”

The answer he gave her that night marked who she is now.

“He called me Sunshine (his nickname for her), and he said, ‘There is good and bad in every race; always look for the good.’ So that has stuck to me,” EversEverette said.

Although her mother took the

children out of Mississippi after her father’s murder, Evers-Everette returned to Mississippi in 2012. She is now the executive director of The Medgar and Myrlie Evers Institute in Jackson, set up to extend both of her parents’ legacies. She is also a fellow with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Community Leadership Network, a multiracial group working together to face and heal racial division and inequities.

‘Divisive Flag’ Comes Down

When the signature of Gov. Tate Reeves put an end to the 126-year reign of the former Mississippi flag with the

Confederate emblem on June 30, it was two days before what would have been the 95th birthday of Medgar Evers.

That his daughter was at the signing ceremony—she wore a black mask with “EVERS” in white lettering—would surely make him proud, having lost his life to an assassin’s bullet in 1963 in his fight for racial justice in Mississippi.

“He, along with so many ancestors who have been in the fight to eradicate injustices, was on such a high heavenly cloud of joy, even though it was not within their lifetime on earth. I felt the support in the spirit of my father that day,” Evers-

Sitting in the front row, Reena EversEverette felt joy as Gov. Tate Reeves signed the bill to retire the 126-yearold Confederate flag on June 30.

who voted for or against the renaming.

Two years prior to the overdue justice, the Medgar Evers Statue Fund Inc.

Medgar Evers was assassinated in this carport of this house at 2332 Margaret Walker Alexander Drive where he lived with his family. Now it’s a national monument. His killer was finally convicted almost 31 years later.

put up a $55,000 statue in Jackson in Evers’ honor on June 28, 1992, dedicated to “everyone who believed in peace, love and non-violence” with a call to “keep the torch burning.” Jet magazine noted the cost in its July 11, 1992, reporting on the unveiling.

This reporter went to the Medgar Evers Boulevard Library, Jackson, to see the statue of the hero on June 25, but it was hard to find. The dark color of the statue blended with the dark green leaves on trees around the beautifully kept and serene boulevard just blocks from the home where he died.

In October 2011, the Jackson Free Press reported the decision of the Jackson City Council to change the name of the city’s airport to Jackson-Medgar Wiley Evers International Airport, in recognition of the significant role he played in the history of the state as a civil-rights pioneer.

From Decatur to Activism

John Spann is a history graduate of Mississippi State University and has been working at the Two Mississippi Museums since its opening in 2017. He is one of the curators of education programming. With dreadlocks and wearing a black T-shirt and white shorts, he waxed eloquently as he took this reporter, who visited the Civil Rights Museum to find out more about Medgar Evers, down memory lane.

On July 29, a day before the new legislation rejecting the state’s flag passed overwhelmingly, Spann emphasized not just Medgar Evers’ death but the activism that led to it and continued afterward.

Spann said Smith Robertson Museum and Cultural Center in Jackson—in the location of Jackson’s first elementary school for Black children, built in 1894— has an exhibit on his early life in Decatur.

“It talked about how he grew up with his mother (Jesse) and father (James) and other siblings and cousins, their humble beginnings, what he learned from his father, being a man, how it was growing up in the rural south,” Spann said. “He

wanted to follow his brother Charles into war, and he lied on his application because he was not old enough. He was not 18.”

Medgar Evers saw action in Liege and Antwerp in Belgium; and Normandy, Le Harve and Cherbourg in France.

Spann said that going to War World II was pivotal in Evers’ evolution into a foremost civil-rights activist in the state.

The racist and near-violent opposition he experienced as he wanted to register to vote at age 21 made things personal for him.

“He and his brother Charles wanted to go and register to vote in Decatur, and they were met with white men with guns,” the historian explained. “They actually left, and they have a plan to come back with their guns. But before any violence happened, they realized that it wasn’t going to be a good outcome for anyone.”

Medgar Evers met his wife, Myrlie, at Alcorn College (now Alcorn State University), as a student in the historically Black college. They moved to Mound Bayou in the Mississippi Delta, a historically African American town founded in the late 1800s.

There he worked for a Black entrepreneur, Dr. Theodore Howard, who was also an activist, mentor and funder of freedom fighters like Medgar Evers.

Makings of a Civil Rights Hero

Dr. T.R.M. Howard hired Evers to sell Magnolia Mutual Life Insurance Company policies. Medgar visited plantations in the Delta near Clarksdale to sell life and hospitalization policies and collect premiums including from Black people in the Delta, some of them plantation workers. “With Dr. Howard’s full backing, he promoted civil rights on these visits,” Professors David T. Beito and Linda Royster Beito wrote about Evers in The Hill.

After the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, which legally overturned school segregation—although the state refused to integrate schools until early 1970 after violent resistance—Howard encouraged Medgar to apply to enroll at more MEDGAR p 16

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

courtesy Reena Evers-Everette

The Home of a Hero

When Medgar Wiley Evers died 57 years ago, it was just 20 days shy of his 38th birthday, and he left three children— James, Reena and Darrell—as well as his wife, Myrlie, behind.

Though born in Decatur, Miss., a town in Newton County with a population fewer than 2,000, Evers lived at the end of his life at 2332 Margaret Walker Alexander Drive in Jackson.

This reporter went to his home and saw the words commemorating the classification of the house as a national historic landmark by the United States Department of Interior, National Park Service in 2016.

“This home possesses national significance as the home of Medgar and Myrlie Evers, both important in the Civil Rights Movement,” the placard said. “As field secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Medgar Evers was at the forefront of every major civil-rights event, in Mississippi from 1955 until his assassination in 1963.”

A bill signed into law in March 2020 added the home to the list of national monuments. “Historians say the killing of Evers was one of the catalysts for the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964,” The Guardian reported about the designation.

Visitors can view exhibits about Evers’ life, death and work, as well as family photographs and memorabilia.

Tougaloo College Archivist Tony Bounds led tourists from Barnard

College in New York on a tour of the home, as an April 2019 blog post at mssemester.wordpress.com described. He told them that Evers and his family lived in threat of terror and that the roof of the house was made of gravel to protect from “Molotov cocktails,” handmade bombs white supremacists often used then to terrorize Black people.

The family did their best not to be predictable in their movements, changing the route to and from the house, not even having a specific grocery day.

Other security measures included having the children sleep on mattresses on the floor, Bounds told the visitors, “so they could roll off in the event that the house was shot at or bombed.” They also turned off the porch light so no one would see Evers exiting the car, and did not get out of the vehicle on the left side.

But Beckwith did see him that night, as one of the Barnard visitors blogged. “(As) Bounds traced the steps of Medgar Evers that night, and the flight of the bullet, I thought about the notion of a house literally designed to protect a black family from violence,” the blogger noted.

“The irony (is) that when Evers was shot, Mrs. Evers was inside watching JFK give a speech on civil rights on TV, that the shirts he was grabbing from the trunk read ‘Jim Crow Must Go.’”

Beckwith was finally convicted 31 years after he assassinated Evers under his carport, in 1994.The same year, the U.S. Congress voted to rename the main post office in Jackson after Evers.

It was a voice vote without recording

Kayode Crown

Everette said of the bill-signing ceremony.

Her father was a tireless fighter for civil rights. He was a World War II veteran who returned to become an activist who worked to overturn segregation at the University of Mississippi and expand voting rights for African Americans.

Evers died June 12, 1963, as he returned from a National Association for the Advancement of Colored People meeting; he was its first field secretary in Mississippi.

A white Ku Klux Klansman and Citizens Council member, Byron De La Beckwith, shot him with an Enfield 30.06 sniper rifle as he hid in honeysuckle bushes nearby.

The fallen fighter left behind not only a loving family, but a legacy of courage in the face of severe opposition.

“Medgar was going outside of Mississippi, raising money and talking to people (about) how it was here,” Minnie Watson, the long-term curator of the Medgar Evers Home Museum, told history.com. “So the change was coming, and those who were against what was happening could see it.

And people were saying, ‘Medgar Evers, your days are numbered,’ because he had rallied the young people, and he was making people aware of what your rights are for being the citizens of this county.”

15

In the Spirit of Medgar, from page 15 ful man who always insisted that violence is not the way.

“Perhaps the greatest tribute can be found in changes noted in Mississippi Black History Makers: ‘Ten years after Medgar’s death the national office of the NAACP reported that Mississippi had 145 black elected officials and that blacks were enrolled in each of the state’s public and private institutions of higher learning,” the UM site said.

However, Mississippi voters have not elected a Black person to statewide office since the Reconstruction era ended, followed by the white-run State of Mississippi enacting a variety of laws to keep Black people from voting and progressing

“There is good and bad in every race; always look for the good.”

— Medgar Evers to Daughter Reena Kayode Crown

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

John Spann, curator of education and programming for the Two Mississippi Museums, admires Medgar Evers’ pioneering role, courage and devotion to the course of civil rights. Evers’ work brought change long past his death, he said.

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Meredith enroll. “His boycott of Jackson merchants in the early 1960s attracted national attention, and his efforts to have James Meredith admitted to the University of Mississippi in 1962 brought muchneeded federal help for which he had been soliciting,” the UM site states.

The piece referred to Evers as a peace-

economically, as well as requiring segregation by law.

Spann said Evers’ NAACP work included the integration of schools, boycotting businesses that want Black dollars but don’t want to treat Black people fairly, and fighting for voting rights. He credits Evers for creating NAACP youth councils to get

Kayode Crown

the University of Mississippi School of Law in 1954 in Oxford. “But the administrators found a pretext to turn him down,” the professors wrote.

Instead, James Meredith would become the first Black man to successfully enroll at that university on Oct. 1, 1962, after violent riots of white supremacists left two people dead.

The same university now sings Evers’ praise on its website for his work as the first NAACP field secretary in Mississippi, attracting the kinds of attention that ultimately led to this death by investigating violent crimes committed against Black Mississippians and trying to prevent them. UM also praises Evers for helping

young people more involved in NAACP efforts and also giving them a way to use their voices.

“With the youth council, he organized the boycott of Capitol Street (in Jackson). A major business area, it was pretty much for white only, most of it. But Black people could shop in some stores, but they were not treated humanely,” Spann said.

“If you went into a dress shop or clothing shop, and you wanted to try clothes on, they would probably tell you you could not try on clothes, or you were followed around the store,” Spann said.

“But if you paid your money and you came back and said, ‘it does not fit, I want to give it back,’ you could not give it back because you were Black.”

Spann said white Mississippi wanted to silence Evers “because he was trying to unify, the same way that Martin Luther King was trying to unify. He was not just for Black people; he was for all people, particularly the state of Mississippi.”

Mississippi Civil Rights Museum visitors can watch a video about Evers’ life, how he got into the movement, his civil-rights work and his assassination. The rifle used to assassinate him is on display as well.

‘Love and Opportunity’

People can still tour the old NAACP office on Lynch Street where people had tried to intimidate Evers. “You can see a bullet hole from a gunshot by somebody driving along the street,” he said. “People drove through, saw the office, and shot into it. That was a regular day then. He knew that his life was in danger.”

Evers even had a dummy office to increase the odds against his assassination.

In admiration, Spann said Evers knew every day that his life was on the line.

“But he still put his shoes on, put on his socks, walked out the door, and put his life on the line for civil rights, knowing that he had kids,” Spann said. “He had a lot to lose, a wife and children he loved dearly. But he saw the evolution of the state of Mississippi as a bigger issue. He exposed all the bad things that the repressive southern regime wanted to hide, so he had a target on his back.”

After attending the ceremony where Gov. Reeves signed the bill to rest the Confederate-tainted flag, Reena Evers-Everette said Mississippi was taking a long-needed step by retiring the flag that waved over the state that terrorized her father. “That Confederate symbol is not who Mississippi is now. It’s not what it was in 1894

The Medgar Evers Statue stands besides the Medgar Evers Library on Medgar Evers Boulevard blocks from his home in Jackson where a white supremacist killed him in 1963.

either, inclusive of all Mississippians,” she told the Associated Press. “But now we’re going to a place of total inclusion and unity with our hearts along with our thoughts and in our actions.”

Evers’ daughter, who watched her father’s assassination, told the Jackson Free Press that she wants him to be remembered as “a strong person of faith, a loyal, loving and dedicated father, a civic servant who did not want to be living in a state or nation that is built on hate.”

“But,” she added, “he wanted to build it on love and opportunity for all.

That includes education, economic security and, mostly, equality for all.”

Email story tips to city/county reporter Kayode Crown at kayode@jacksonfreepress. com. You can also follow him on Twitter at @kayodecrown.

FOOD&DRINK

Foot Print Farms: Feeding Folks Safely

by Sherry Lucas SHERRY LUCAS

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COVID-19: Our hours are unchanged. We are sanitizing and have social distancing plans in place.

Foot Print Farms founder Cindy Ayers-Elliott maximizes partnerships and farm practices to feed the community in safe and healthful ways.

more food we could give out.”

The pandemic paused the farm’s agritourism component, a venture “really rolling” beforehand with its first Airbnb, Annie Mae’s Cottage, and celebrity farm visits and exposure from the likes of TV chef/cookbook author Carla Hall and comedian Kevin Hart.

Other plans slowed, but proceeded.

Foot Print Farms’ statewide pilot program with insulin-maker Novo Nordisk is now a best-practices model, working with health clinics to use healthy food as medicine in diabetes and hypertension prevention.

“They’re documenting, too, how this is scalable. … It can be done in any part of the country now, any part of the world,” Ayers-Elliott says. That funding will be plowed back into the farm, for a new building to expand cooling space and packing.

Next, the farm will focus on turning food waste to food use. The pandemic exposed many to food shortages for the first time. Ayers-Elliott envisions steps that involve processing and commercial kitchens that take the unsellable “not-so-pretty stuff, and actually do something with it,” she says. Target outlets include “corner stores, mom-and-pops, (and) these stores they call food swamps where they have no veggies.”

She continues, “This is the next economic, healthy, job-creating opportunity for the community. … There’s no reason why we, especially here in Mississippi, can’t have self-sufficiency for some of the foods we eat. Right here.”

To learn more about Foot Print Farms or place an order, visit footprintfarmsms.com.

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www.easykale.com

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anning and paperwork make for many a late night for Cindy AyersElliott, Foot Print Farms’ founder.

But the daily business of growing and getting fresh vegetables to folks who need it continues, COVID-19 or not, and she rises to the challenge.

Pushed by the pandemic to start online orders, the west Jackson specialty crops farm found an avenue that works. “We came up with Drive-Up/Pick-Up,” AyersElliott says. People can pre-order produce through the farm’s website and pick up their goods at the farm on Fridays.

“You come in, give your name, make the circle, head back out, and we drop it in their trunks,” she says. The method puts her home’s circular driveway to good use while maintaining social-distancing procedures and other safety practices.

Foot Print Farms has also kept its presence at the Mississippi Farmers Market.

“Social distancing, we still try to do that,” Ayers-Elliott says, with their reconfigured stand making it so that customers do not touch the food. With a row of tables and food displayed behind workers, shoppers ask for items, and Foot Print Farms packs it for them.

The farm has helped fill family food needs through the Jackson Community COVID Response and JPS Community Partnership, and now delivers food to schools in Leland and Hollandale through the Farm to School program.

“We’re growing the food, but we donated at least 30% of our costs to the project, so … the more money they raised, the

921 East Fortification Street (601) 983-5287 www.katswine.com/tasting-team @KatsWine

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Arts & Games

Dice Rolls and Tokens and Cards, Oh My!

by Nate Schumann

W

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

courtesy Jesse Labbé

hether your idea of a fun Saturday night en- “At the end of the day, it’s a very fluid process, at least and recruit new teammates to accomplish the main mistails braving an expedition through Antarctic here,” Coffey says. “When you are one of the few people sion: saving the players’ souls from a wall of thorny vines. tundra or gallivanting through a land of fantasti- actually coming up with the idea, illustrating the idea, de- In “Dungeons, Dudes, Dames, Danger, Dice and cal beasts to collect bounties with your adven- signing the idea, I don’t have to go to another department Dragons!,” better known as “D6,” participants role-play as turing party, Certifiable Studios, a board-game-centric art and ask, ‘How big should these minis be?’ It’s literally, ‘How characters who are themselves playing a fantasy role-playing studio in Jackson, has you covered. big do you want them to be?’ because you are the one creat- game. The adventuring party works together to fight mon Co-owners Jesse Labbé and Rick Moore founded ing it. So there’s a little more freedom that adds a little more sters and collect bounties. With 100 optional campaign Certifiable Studios about five years ago after the former had flexibility in the design process.” scenarios listed in the rulebook, the game is designed for developed a board game that he wanted to replayability. bring to the next level and presented it to Certifiable Studios’ loyal following Moore, who suggested they start a gaming has formed both a strong online and lostudio themselves. cal community. Backers created a Discord

“I’ve been into games forever, and I’ve server where fans discuss the games or help been an illustrator for longer,” Labbé says. “I budding fans learn more about the studio’s think I picked up on games because it was a products. way to interact with my illustrations. Most Pre-COVID, Certifiable would host of the time, you draw something, and you’re open game nights on the first Friday of evjust stuck looking at it. This was a way to ery month at their Ridgeland headquarters, take the characters I was drawing to another which would typically pull in 40 to 50 peosetting where I can now control them in a ple who gather to play games and mingle. gaming environment.”

Labbé praised the local community,

Marketing expert Opie Cooper joined many of whom would voluntarily bring in Labbé and Moore, who also serves as the snacks like baked goods or pizza for everyCEO of advertising agency Mad Genius, one else or welcome new participants. and the trio set off to work. Shortly after “We had one girl come in by herself ward, Certifiable launched its first game, like, ‘Is this the game night thing?’ And “Endangered Orphans of Condyle Cove,” then everybody (begins enthusiastically saya whimsical survival game where players ing), ‘We have room over here. Come over avoid being captured by the Boogeyman, here,’” Labbé says. “Everybody just opened and the game received more than $300,000 their arms up, and she picked a table, and in backing through Kickstarter. that’s just the kind of community we have

“(‘Endangered Orphans’) just blew Certifiable Studios in Ridgeland produces multifaceted board games that here. Everybody is very, ‘Come on, we have everybody away and developed the com- feature original art and a variety of mechanics. Backers both local and from room for you.’” munity that we have since become known around the world have established an open online community so that people

First Friday game nights have been who are interested in the creative studio’s products can learn more. for,” says Brent Hearn, the company’s postponed for the time being because of the wordsmith. “A lot of companies create great pandemic, but Certifiable looks forward to products and do a good job with their campaigns, but they Certifiable Studios’ team also includes “half-man, half- being able to host again in the future. don’t necessarily engage to the level that we showed was internet” communications manager Cory Drake, residen- The studio also connects with fans through Twitch possible with that campaign. And that community has just tial videography wiz Nate Hamblin, visual master Dante videos, wherein staff members play-test various board grown since then.”

Johnson and do-all-know-all intern Charles Woods. Labbé games, and through its YouTube channel, although video

During the game’s launch, Labbé invited Anthony also operates and voices “the officially most annoying mem- frequency has decreased due to COVID-19.

Coffey, whom he had met while attending art school in ber of the staff,” Myles “Key” Keyston III, a puppet mascot Presently, Certifiable Studios is working on “EndanDallas, to join Certifiable Studios. The two had previously who appears in many of the studio’s promotional videos. gered Orphans in the House of Rath,” a second edition of worked together on a graphic novel series titled, “Berona’s Since “Endangered Orphans of Condyle Cove,” Cer- the original game that started it all. Announced in March, War,” and Coffey accepted the position and moved to the tifiable Studios has successfully produced four more games: “House of Rath” is the first game that Certifiable is publishJackson area in early 2017.

“Who Goes There?,” “Stuffed,” “D6” and “Who Goes ing that was originally submitted as a completed game by

A jack-of-all-trades, Coffey serves as an illustrator, There? 2.0.” The games use combinations of dice, tokens, someone outside of the studio. designer and sculptor. Among many other creative respon- cards, miniatures, character sheets and other game pieces “This guy brought us a packaged, boxed game. It sibilities, he uses the 3D printer in his office to fine-tune and mechanics. wasn’t this produced thing. He did it all by himself, but it game-piece prototypes based on printouts from China be- “Who Goes There?” and “2.0” are based on John W. was done. He presented it to us, we checked it out, and we fore they are sent to the factory. Coffey and Labbé illustrate Campbell’s novella of the same name. The science-fiction moved on with it,” Labbé says. the majority of characters within Certifiable’s properties. games follow the premises of the original work’s plot, “We have people who give us ideas, but if it’s too much

The initial ideas for Certifiable’s published games wherein researchers travel to Antarctica and discover an work on our end, we don’t have time for that. But if they thus far have come from Labbé, who records them in his alien entity that attempts to infect the players. Players select bring it, and it’s something they’re proud of—they’ve had notebook and then translates them onto concept paper so a character and work collaboratively to escape both the fro- their friends test it and really like it—there’s no reason if we that he and Coffey can world-build and develop the game’s zen terrain and The Thing. like it that we’re not going to do it.” mechanics and “turn it into something much bigger and “Stuffed” is a multiplayer game featuring anthropo- To learn more about Certifiable Studios, visit better,” Labbé says. morphized animals that involves rolling dice to earn coins certifiablestudios.com or find them on Facebook and Twitter.

18

MUSIC

Family, Life’s Most Powerful Siren Song

by Richard Coupe

Dawn Dixon offers both voice and piano lessons through Music Plus Studios and Mississippi Music.

the two talent agencies, Dixon performed across Germany and England in both opera and concert settings.

“I was just trying to make some money while making some connections,” she says.

However, when doctors diagnosed her mother with breast cancer in the late 1980s, she decided to fly home, and she never returned to Europe to continue her career overseas.

Instead, Dixon established her own music business, Music Plus Studios, in Birmingham. The business eventually expanded to three locations and employed more than 20 instructors who taught voice, guitar, drums, violin, acting, flute and more. Altogether, more than 600 students furthered their music education at Music Plus each week.

Once again, though, family led Dixon to make a major life change. Wanting to be closer to her daughter, Dea Dean, who had come to Jackson to attend Belhaven University and later the Reformed Theological Seminary to finish her degree in counseling, Dixon left Birmingham six years ago to make a home out of the capital city.

Another factor for Dixon’s decision to move to Jackson was that her daughter Dea and her husband Jack, who works in medical sales, were preparing for children.

“I knew that I wanted to be around my grandchildren,” Dixon says.

Dixon still runs Music Plus Studios, which operates out of the city center in Madison, and she also offers voice and piano lessons through Mississippi Music in Flowood.

“I don’t sing in public much anymore, but I will still sing with an orchestra because that’s my love.” Dawn says, adding that she enjoys performing in elaborate shows.

Presently, Dixon lives in northeast Jackson with her kittens and looks forward to the day her two grandchildren, ages 3 and 5, are able to stay overnight with her.

To learn more about lessons, call 1-205-969-1443.

Looking for something great to do in Jackson? Visit JFPEVENTS.COM for more.

COMMUNITY

CONCERTS & FESTIVALS

History Is Lunch Series July 15, July 22, noon-1 p.m., via Facebook Live. The Mississippi Department of Archives and History hosts the series of lectures featuring guest speakers presenting on varying topics. Livestreams available virtually through MDAH’s Facebook page. Free admission; call 601-576-6800; mdah.ms.gov.

The District Green LIVE July 9, July 16, 7-9 p.m., at The District at Eastover (1250 Eastover Drive). The District opens its central community green space for people to bring their lawn chairs or blankets and view the live performances held weekly by different artists. Social distancing required. Food available for purchase from nearby restaurants. Free admission, food and drink prices vary; call 601-914-0800; find it on Facebook.

KIDS Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Secrets of the Sewer! July 8-22, 9 a.m., at Mississippi Children’s Museum (2145 Museum Blvd.). The children’s museum presents its latest traveling exhibit based on the Nickelodeon television series. $10 admission; call 601-981-5469; email neely@ mcm.ms; mschildrensmuseum.org.

Farmer’s Table Children’s Camp July 13-17, 9 a.m.-noon, at Farmer’s Table in Livingston (1030 Market St., Flora). Connor Wolf leads the summer camp where participants ages 7-16 learn to prepare multicultural dishes. Each day focuses on a different dish. Limited to 10. COVID-19 guidelines enforced. $299 full week; call 601506-6821; farmerstableinlivingston.com.

SPORTS & WELLNESS Choreorobics Dance Off July 12, July 14, July 17, July 19, July 21, 5:30 p.m., Zoom.

Professional dancers and choreographers Roger & Tena host virtual hip-hop dance and fitness classes via Zoom. $7 per class, $10 two classes, $40 unlimited classes/month; choreorobics.com.

LITERARY “The Dearly Beloved” Virtual Happy Hour July 8, 5 p.m., Zoom. Square Books hosts a virtual discussion via Zoom with Cara Wall on her book. RSVP required. Copies available for purchase. Free admission, RSVP; call 662-2362262; squarebooks.com.

The Sob Sisters Talk Books July 14, noon, via Facebook Live. Lemuria hosts the virtual event through its Facebook page where renown authors Susannah Cahalan, Karen Abbott and Ada Calhoun discuss their books and more.

Free admission; call 601-366-7619; email info@ lemuriabooks.com; lemuriabooks.com.

PROFESSIONAL & BIZ Summer Legal Clinic Series July 10, noon, Virtual. The Mississippi Volunteer Lawyers Project hosts the series of workshops to explain and answer any questions from the general public regarding no-fault divorce, uncontested

guardianships, simple wills, advance healthcare directive, power of attorney, and felony and misdemeanor expungement matters. Free admission; call 601-882-5001; mvlp.org.

Quick Bite—Sharing the Crayons: Appreciating Diversity July 10, July 17, 12:15-12:45 p.m., Virtual. Pam Confer leads the webinar on diversity in the workplace. The course aims to help participants understand the subtle ways bias can occur, identify the elements of cultural competence in the workplace, establish a framework to increase inclusion at the organizational level, recognize the three dimensions of cultural awareness when interacting with other cultures, and develop the skills needed to practice respectful and caring behavior toward culturally diverse individuals and groups. $25 single training, $40 two trainings, $15 each (3 or more); call 601-968-0061; alliancems.org.

Why Your Data Matters Now More Than Ever July 14, 9-10:30 a.m., Virtual. Billy Wear leads the webinar on grant-making that showcases important tools organizations can use to understand the role of contributed data in informing important decisions and conversations across the sector while being conscious of social needs based on health, economics and race. $25 single training; call 601-968-0061; email connect@alliancems.org; alliancems.org.

Digital Marketing Strategies For Small Businesses July 17, 10 a.m.-2 p.m., at Jackson Downtown Convention Center Hotel (9009 S.E. Adams St., Suite 1911). The workshop helps participants learn about current trends in small business-related web design and marketing.

Admission TBA; call 503-451-6675; email deb@ sharptackmedia.com; sharptackmedia.com.

Managing Situations Impacting Your Organization July 20, 1-2:30 p.m., Virtual. Donna Marcum leads the webinar on the tax-related financial requirements for general operations, payroll and staffing, programs and governance that are necessary to establish and maintain a nonprofit organization. $25 single training; call 601-968-0061; alliancems.org.

BE THE CHANGE Virtual Dash ‘N Splash July 8-22, anytime, Virtual. The Brain Injury Association of Mississippi organizes the annual fundraising event as a virtual 5k. Participants receive a T-shirt and a $10 gift card to Kathryn’s. Participants encouraged to share photos and videos of themselves running, walking or rolling the distance while beating the heat on the event’s Facebook page. Awards include “Biggest Team Award,” “Most Team Spirit Award,” “Best Photo Award” and “Most Creative Video Award.” Ends July 27. $20-$25 registration; call 601-981-1021; raceroster.com.

Virtual 5K Trash Dash July 11, Virtual. Keep Jackson Beautiful organize the inaugural plogging event, wherein participants collect garbage from the streets of their chosen neighborhoods or other public areas while walking/running the 5k.

Participants may choose to log in their kilometers and plogging before the listed date. Registration covers the cost of a T-shirt and plogging kit.

Proceeds benefit KJB and its mission to make the Jackson metro, and Mississippi at large, cleaner. $25 adult, $15 child; call 601-953-1123; keepjacksonbeautiful.com.

Send upcoming events to events@jacksonfreepress.com.

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

EVENTS

courtesy Dawn Dixon

A

passion for music may have led Dawn Dixon across the Atlantic Ocean for a time, but her love for her family brought her back to her southern roots.

Native to Birmingham, Ala., Dixon was raised in a musical home. “I grew up in music,” she says. Her grandfather, John Urquhart, played both the saxophone and the trumpet and used to tour Europe with his own band in the 1920s. Meanwhile, Dixon’s grandmother would sing live on radio shows during the era.

After graduating from high school, Dixon enrolled in Birmingham-Southern College, earning a bachelor’s degree in vocal performance in 1982.

Dixon credits her later success in music to her college instructors. “When I went to college, I had the best teachers in the world,” she says. “World-class teachers in voice and piano. If you get that kind of training, you can’t help but be good. It just happens.”

Rachel Mathes and Andrew Daney fine-tuned Dixon’s vocal skills, with the former helping her improve the technical aspects of the craft, while the latter helped her insert personality into her big voice.

Edna Knox of Juilliard taught Dixon piano.

Seeing promise in Dixon, Mathes—who herself had a long-standing career as a professional singer throughout Europe and the United States—invited the recent college graduate to sign with Paasch Agency in Dusseldorf, Germany, and Dahlrymple Agency in London. Through

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Top 10

I have been lucky enough to live in several areas in central Mississippi, and I have found some of the coolest places to hang out in your off time to be right here in the Jackson metro. I lead the local HeroClix community at Van’s CCG, helping those interested learn the game and connected with other players.

Frezale Smith

1. Van’s Comics, Cards & Games (731 S. Pear Orchard Road, Ridgeland, 601-8989950, vansccg.com) Van’s is literally my favorite place on earth. Travis, one of the owners and managers, is honestly one of the best people I know. Brayn who works behind the counter Thursday through Sunday is everyone’s best friend.

I love board games, comics, trading-card games and a sense of community, and Van’s has them all.

2. Sal & Mookie’s (565 Taylor St., 601368-1919, salandmookies.com) Sal’s food, atmosphere and family-oriented focus make it one of my favorite places.

3. The Bean (2914 N. State St., 769-5725752) When the shop formerly known as Sneaky Beans changed hands, I was afraid the cool, homelike feeling of my favorite coffee shop would be MIA, but my worries were for naught, as it’s still a great place to waste an hour while sipping some of the best coffee in Jackson, in my opinion.

4. Cups Espresso Café (multiple locations, cupsespressocafe.com) To me, Cups has some of the best frappés and pastries in the metro. My coworkers and I are daily guests of the Fondren location, which features great music and has an amazing staff.

5. Nandy’s Candy (1220 E. Northside Drive, 601-362-9553, nandys-candy. myshopify.com) The favorite place of my favorite person, Nandy’s Candy has an unbelievably long list of snowcone flavors and about any type of sweet your heart desires.

6. The Warp Zone (393 Crossgates Blvd., Suite C, Brandon, 601-706-4764) Having every console imaginable and plenty of comfy gaming chairs, this gaming lounge and arcade is a gamer’s fantasy.

7. Brandon Public Library (1475 W. Government St., Brandon, 601-825-2672,) This library is comfortable with a homey vibe on the inside and a big, beautiful park outside.

courtesy Frezale smith; courtesy vans; File photo; immo Wegmann on unsplash; tera eichelberger; courtesy nandy’s candy; courtesy Warp zone; zaini izzuddin on unsplash; courtesy leFleur’s bluFF; courtesy not just a burger; courtesy the jungle exotic pets

LOCAL LIST

8. LeFleur’s Bluff State Park (3315 Lakeland Terrace, 601-987-3923, mdwfp.com) Any nature lover would find it very easy to lose track of time and get lost in this absolutely beautiful wonderland.

9. Not Just A Burger (Outlets of Mississippi, 200 Bass Pro Drive, Suite 570, Pearl, 601-398-3480) This small family business features the best burgers I have ever had.

My favorite is the sauté burger.

10. The Jungle Exotic Pets (1988 Old Highway 49 S., Richland, 601-933-0299) A lifelong animal lover, I was blessed enough to work with the beautiful exotic animals found here through most of my teenage years.

The world may be on pause, but life isn’t.

REGISTER TODAY hindscc.edu/essential

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

Fall classes begin August 17.

21

47 Closer 48 Unwritten exam 50 Losing streaks 53 Forged check passer 57 Impish kid 60 Establishment that can be combined with a laundromat or arcade 61 “All right, whatever ...”

62 Purple ___ (New Hampshire’s state flower) 64 Hundred Years’ War leader captured

by French nobles at age 18 66 NBC comedy with Glenn Howerton and Allisyn Ashley Arm 67 NASCAR course shape 68 “Switch” ending 69 Small, round, and shiny 70 Like an optimist’s outlook 71 “Life of Pi” author Martel

BY MATT JONES

Down

“Eighteen Again” --in honor of Jonesin’s 18th anniversary.

Across

1 Yale graduates, slangily 5 Carpet cleaners, in brief 9 Exams for high school jrs.

14 “The Wizard of Oz” surname 15 Without ___ (perilously) 16 “Let’s do this!”

17 “Great” Macedonian king who had his first military victory at age 18 19 “Lemon Tree” singer Lopez 20 Budapest’s river 21 ___ Nas X 23 Pascal or newton, e.g.

24 Turn blue?

25 Muddling through 27 Pahoehoe or a’a, e.g.

29 Flock of geese 33 Its clock speed is measured in GHz 36 At age 18, she got her ideas for “Frankenstein” during a summer stay in Geneva 39 Football game intermission 41 Hair braid 42 Roof edge 43 “Little Sure Shot” who was an accomplished sharpshooter at age 18 46 Putdown

1 “My goodness!”

2 ‘80s-’90s legal drama 3 “The L Word” creator/producer Chaiken 4 Type of reproduction 5 Barn attachment 6 “Anything else?”

7 Former “The Voice” judge ___ Green 8 Word before mall or steak 9 Casino section 10 It’s real, y’all 11 “It’s ___” (Pet Shop Boys hit) 12 Collette of “Wanderlust” 13 Fit of vexation 18 James Garfield’s middle name 22 Flame source at some concerts 25 Former French first lady ___ BruniSarkozy 26 Scottish denial 28 Vicks ointment 30 Pleased 31 “Shazam!” star Zachary

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Voted Best Place to play pool

July 8 - 21, 2020 • jfp.ms

Best of Jackson Best Place to Play Pool Since 2006

22

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32 Mr. Potato Head pieces 33 “Rumble in the Bronx” star 34 Greenhouse glass 35 Lower-arm bone 37 Tibetan source of butter 38 Grain-storage towers 40 Purpose of a certain kit 44 “Slippery” fish 45 One of the “Animaniacs” siblings 49 Dublin’s river 51 Huge 52 BYU location 54 Pageant prop

55 “The Smartest Guys in the Room” company 56 Scouting mission, briefly 57 Say too much 58 Ready to eat 59 “Fantastic Four” actress Jessica 61 ___ Connect (super-brainy BBC game show) 63 Overly modest 65 ___ in “apple”

Last Week’s Answers

For answers to this puzzle, call: 1-900-226-2800, 99 cents per minute. Must be 18+.

Or to bill to your credit card, call: 1-800 655-6548. Reference puzzle #936

CANCER (June 21-July 22):

Cancerian author Mary McCarthy provides you with a challenge you’ll be wise to relish during the rest of 2020. She writes, “Everyone continues to be interested in the quest for the self, but what you feel when you’re older is that you really must make the self.” McCarthy implies that this epic reorientation isn’t likely until you’ve been on earth for at least four decades. But judging from the astrological omens, I think you’re ready for it now—no matter what your age is. To drive home the point, I’ll say it in different words. Your task isn’t to find yourself, but rather to create yourself.

Don’t wait around passively for life to show you who you are. Show life who you are.

Some night soon, I predict you’ll have an agitated dream while you’re asleep: a nightmare that symbolizes an unresolved conflict you’re wrestling with in your waking life.

Here’s a possible example: A repulsive politician you dislike may threaten to break a toy you loved when you were a kid.

But surprise! There’ll be a happy ending. A good monster will appear in your dream and fix the problem; in my example, the benevolent beast will scare away the politician who’s about to break your beloved toy. Now here’s the great news: In the days after your dream, you’ll solve the conflict you’ve been wrestling with in your waking life.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):

“Love is the best school, but the tuition is high and the homework can be painful,” writes author Diane Ackerman.

I’m guessing that in recent months, her description has been partially true for you Virgos. From what I can tell, love has indeed been a rigorous school. And the tuition has been rather high. But on the other hand, the homework has been at least as pleasurable as it has been painful. I expect these trends to continue for the foreseeable future. What teachings about intimacy, communion, tenderness, and compassion would you like to study next?

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):

“A single feat of daring can alter the whole conception of what is possible,” wrote Libran novelist Graham Greene.

His words can serve as a stirring motto for you in the coming weeks. I sense you’re close to summoning a burst of courage—a bigger supply of audacity than you’ve had access to in a while. I hope you’ll harness this raw power to fuel a daring feat that will expand your conception of what is possible.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):

“It’s not always easy to tell the difference between thinking and looking out of the window,” wrote poet Wallace Stevens.

That’s a problem you won’t have to worry about anytime soon. The coming weeks will be a favorable phase for you to both think and gaze out the window—as well as to explore all the states in-between. In other words, you’ll have the right and the need to indulge in a leisurely series of dreamy ruminations and meandering fantasies and playful explorations of your deepest depths and your highest heights. Don’t rush the process. Allow yourself to linger in the gray areas and the vast stretches of inner wildness.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):

The coming weeks will be a favorable time to undertake a transformative vision quest, even if the exigencies of the pandemic require your quest to unfold primarily in your inner realms. The near future will also bring you good fortune if you focus on creating more sacredness in your rhythm and if you make a focused effort to seek out songs, texts, inspirations, natural places, and teachers that infuse you with a reverence for life. I’m trying to help you to see, Sagittarius, that you’re in a phase when you can attract healing synchronicities into your world by deepening your sense of awe and communing with experiences that galvanize you to feel worshipful.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):

“To love well is the task in all meaningful relationships, not just romantic bonds.” The author and activist bell hooks wrote that. (She doesn’t capitalize her name.) In accordance with the highest astrological potentials, I’m inviting you Capricorns to be inspired by her wisdom as you upgrade your meaningful relationships during the next six weeks. I think it’s in your self-interest to give them even more focus and

respect and appreciation than you already do. Be ingenious as you boost the generosity of spirit you bestow on your allies. Be resourceful as you do this impeccable work in the midst of a pandemic!

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):

“One-half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it,” wrote author Sydney Howard. Now would be a perfect time to act on that excellent advice. Is there any obstacle standing in the way of your ability to achieve a beloved dream? Is there a pretty good thing that’s distracting you from devoting yourself wholeheartedly to a really great thing? I invite you to be a bit ruthless as you clear the way to pursue your heart’s desire.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):

Author Ellen Goodman writes, “The truth is that we can overhaul our surroundings, renovate our environment, talk a new game, join a new club, far more easily than we can change the way we respond emotionally. It is easier to change behavior than feelings about that behavior.” I think she’s correct in her assessment. But I also suspect that you’re in a prime position to be an exception to the rule. In the coming weeks, you will have exceptional power to transform the way you feel—especially if those feelings have previously been based on a misunderstanding of reality and especially if those feelings have been detrimental to your mental and physical health.

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ARIES (March 21-April 19):

“As beautiful as simplicity is, it can become a tradition that stands in the way of exploration,” said singer Laura Nyro.

This is practical advice for you to heed in the coming weeks.

According to my analysis, you’re scheduled to enjoy an extended engagement with rich, fertile complexity. The best teachings won’t be reducible to a few basic lessons; rather, they’ll be rife with soulful nuances. The same is true about the splendid dilemmas that bring you stimulating amusements: They can’t and shouldn’t be forced into pigeonholes.

As a general rule, anything that seems easy and smooth and straightforward will probably not be useful. Your power will come from what’s crooked, dense, and labyrinthine.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):

You may think that playing heavy metal music and knitting with yarn don’t have much in common. And yet there is an annual contest in Joensuu, Finland where people with expertise in needlework join heavy metal musicians on stage, plying their craft in rhythm to the beat. The next Heavy Metal Knitting World Championship will be July 15-16, 2021. This year’s event was canceled due to the pandemic. If it had been staged, I bet multiple Tauruses would have been among the top ten competitors. Why? Because you Bulls are at the peak of your ability to combine things that aren’t often combined.

You have the potential to excel at making unexpected connections, linking influences that haven’t been linked before, and being successful at comparing apples and oranges.

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GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

In 1848, Danish King Frederick VII agreed, under pressure from liberal agitators, to relinquish some of his absolute power. Thereafter, he shared his decision-making with a newly formed parliament. He was pleased with this big change because it lightened his workload. “That was nice,” he remarked after signing the new constitution. “Now I can sleep in every morning.” I recommend him to you as an inspirational role model in the coming weeks. What so-called advantages in your life are more boring or burdensome than fun and interesting? Consider the possibility of shedding dubious “privileges” and status symbols.

Homework: Is there a so-called weakness or liability you might be able to turn into an asset? FreeWillAstrology.com

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