The Last Black Unicorn

While trying to deal with the sadness that comes from living in a country moving towards fascism, I've searched for stories of inspirational people. I listened to Oprah interview Bryan Stephenson who wrote Just Mercy. Stephenson is a lawyer who started the Equal Justice Initiative. He has spent his career defending people on death row who have been convicted of crimes they did not commit. He is a lovely and hopeful man. Then I listened to Oprah's interview with Anthony Ray Hinton, a man who spent 30 years on death row for a crime he did not commit. Stephenson had been his lawyer and Oprah learned about Hinton when she interviewed Stephenson. Hinton is another extraordinary individual who overcame infinite obstacles and walked out of prison a hopeful person. Then I listened to Oprah's interview with Malala and her father. All of these people have one thing in common: they chose love over hate even though they are victims of extraordinary acts of hatred and violence.

Tiffany Haddish is a comedian who had a terrible childhood. Her story of success is an extreme version of the Horatio Alger stories. Somehow, she overcame poverty, abuse, illiteracy, race and gender discrimination to become a famous stand-up comedian and movie star.

This book is not well-written. Haddish didn't learn to read until she was 15. I listened to her read the book so it felt like I listened to a person tell me stories from their life. She is a very fun person to spend time with .. funny, hopeful, real. Many of the stories are very sad.

A heard about the book from a 75 year old white woman from eastern Washington who sat next to me on my flight to SLO earlier this month. She mentioned that she'd read it in a book club and was the only person who liked it. The other women thought it was too vulgar. It is definitely that .. so .. don't read it if you can't handle vulgarity.