Given discussions about health care reform and mental health care swirling around right now, I thought I would re-post this piece which first appeared here at All About Race in 2008. People love to cast me as an example of the American dream. And I love being an example. But I continue to examine what my success really means; and in large part it means I had a lot of help. Please share your thoughts in comments.

My conservative friends think I’ve gone and lost my mind. They think so because standing in the outstretched palm of middle age, I am increasingly politically liberal. Oh sure, my personal evolution goes against trend. In fact I bet you’ve heard some version of the age old saying, “If you’re not liberal in your 20s you don’t have a heart. But if you’re not conservative in your 40s you haven’t got a brain.” or “If you’re conservative when you’re younger, you have no soul. If you’re liberal when you’re older, you have no sense.”

I’ve always had plenty of sense. But the funny thing is, as I get older I have more compassion. As I get older, I see more clearly that some of the mistakes I’ve made have been less than determinative or even forgiven because of various privileges I enjoy. My lucky charms include the way my brain works, the way I speak, being born with a certain kind of face considered attractive in this society and a body that’s healthy. Some of this privilege stems from being raised by two very strong, persevering, innovative black women who taught me from birth that “black is beautiful” and powerful and historical and worthy. They taught me that reading was the key to everything and that my brain would save my life. I was born into a family that believed my fate was largely in my hands and that I could do anything.

In my late teens, twenties and most of my thirties I embraced the bootstrapper’s credo that if I could do “it” anybody could. But the narrative I had constructed of my life, the narrative that sustained and propelled me, had a lot missing. What I left out of that analysis was the enormous amount of assistance I’ve had along the way. There were teachers who encouraged and protected me, for example. And I was raised in a time when our economic system provided my mother with full health and dental benefits, even on a small secretary’s salary. Her coverage also included mental health benefits which allowed me to go into therapy and work through a serious depression that plagued me much of my young life. I get queasy when I speculate about the self-defeating behaviors I might have adopted if I had not had the privilege of intensive therapy in my teens.

In a recent episode of “The Wire”, one of the series’ most heart shattering characters, Dookie, asks a would be mentor “How do you get from here to the outside world?” The mentor, a good man and ex-con who started a small boxing gym to keep kids off the street, answers with a gentle voice “I wish I could tell you.” In “The Wire” “here” is Baltimore. And there are hundreds and thousands of “Dookies” searching for our help to navigate out of an urban purgatory toward opportunities that so many of us take for granted. I have to stand for those kids. And you know, it is in America’s best interest to help. I believe strong, safe communities are the backbone of a strong America. Strong, intellect expanding educational opportunities for all children is what will most ensure America’s place as an innovation leader in the world. To compete in the global arena we are going to need the best ideas from all corners of society.

And regarding being “soft” on defense? No one says that to my face. I lived through 9/11. My husband and I were under the South Tower when the first plane hit. We sprinted away from the dust cloud rolling just behind us as the second tower fell. We were evacuated from our home for four weeks. I believe in strong national defense. But I see war is a last option, not the default response to threat. I believe the strongest national defense strategy will honor gathered intelligence as it is presented. And I believe one of the strongest recruiting tools for the military would be demonstrating that we as a society value the soldiers who return from combat and the families of those who don’t.

One of the recurrent statements by conservatives is that liberals are all emotion and conservatives all rational thought. I find that observation amusing because conservatives are as angry and passionate as liberals but conservatives frame their emotions as logical. “If you don’t feel like I do, well then you must be a crazy lib!”

Maybe.