Kimberley Baker Guillemet - Black Prep: Life Lessons of A Perpetual Outsider

Ransom & Baker Publishing House

Los Angeles, CA

BLACK PREP

This book is a memoir. It reflects the authors recollections of past experiences. Some names and characteristics have been changed, events have been compressed and dialogue has been recreated.

Trade Paperback ISBN 979-8-9850053-0-1

eBook ISBN 979-8-9850053-1-8

Copyright 2021 by Kimberley Baker Guillemet

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, without the prior written and express permission of the author and/or publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critically reviewed and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. Neither the author nor the publisher assumes any responsibility or liability whatsoever on behalf of the consumer of this material.

Published in the United States by Ransom & Baker Publishing House

Printed in United States of America

2021First Edition

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Name: Guillemet, Kimberley, 1978-author

Title: Black Prep: Life Lessons of a Perpetual Outsider/ Kimberley Guillemet

Identifiers: LCCN 2021922446 | ISBN 979-8-9850053-0-1 (trade paperback) | ISBN 979-8-9850053-1-8 (ebook)

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact

Ransom & Baker Publishing House at .

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my fellow preps and to all those who have gone before us and prepared us.

You are more than enough.

You are fearfully and wonderfully made.

Remember this always.

********

In Loving Memory

of

Roosevelt Ray Baker Jr.

June 25, 1950 August 16, 1997

Contents

Introduction

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Aristotle

W here you from? the girl demanded as she brushed against me on the crowded bus.

Id been asked this question before. That question, THE question: Where you from? seemed simple enough, but it was actually quite loaded. And for me, in particular, the true answer was, Its complicated.

Should I answer, Im from View Park-Windsor Hills, where my parents settled shortly after they were married? That was my first home. Or should I answer, Im from Mid-City, Los AngelesWellington Square to be exact? This is where my maternal grandparents were two of the first Black homeowners on the block when they bought their house back in 1956. That was my second home. Should I give a nod to Watts, where my father lived after my parents divorced and where I went for weekend visits? Daddys house was my in-between home. Should I pay homage to my elders? After all, I was only an Angeleno because both my maternal and paternal grandparents migrated west from the SouthTexas and Virginia on my mothers side and Arkansas on my fathers sidein search of a better life with less overt racism. These were my ancestral homes.

What about all the streets I traversed on a daily basis as I made my way through the city? I seldom went a day of my life without traveling down Crenshaw Boulevard. Those streets were part of the foundation of who I was as well. Should I make it clear that I wasnt from any set or in any way affiliated with a gang? Perhaps. My school uniform, glasses, braces, overflowing bookbag and general tone and cadence should have made that abundantly clear to anyone paying attention. When people asked me where I was from in other situations, I usually defaulted to a simple L.A. or South L.A., depending on the circumstances, but those answers belied the layers and depth of my story.

I finally settled on, off Washington. I hoped it would appease the girl enough to leave me alone. After all, I was in my private school uniform riding northbound on the 210 Crenshaw bus line, not southbound. She should have been able to surmise that I wasnt a threat, I reasoned. She looked me up and down, snarled, and apparently decided that I wasnt worthy of further inquiry.

But that question, THE question, a question that had been asked many times before in many iterations stayed with me. Really, where was I from? Who was I? A master at code-switching, I often felt a conundrum. Not fully of one world, yet not fully of another, I was adept at straddling the lines of diametrically opposed ways of being.

Was it okay that I didnt fit neatly into one particular type of world? Would each of my different worldsthat of my private school and that of my communitybe accepting of me when I came to it with the heavy imprint of the other? Was I okay with that? Was I okay with me?

***

To many, I am a conundrum. Not quite one thing. Not quite another. I am certainly an amalgama mixture of materials, experiences and identities. I used to believe that my potential to develop some of my less obvious gifts and interests would not be fully realized or explored because of widely held, albeit erroneous, assumptions and superficial societal conventions.

Growing up, I felt that the world was telling me that I was too Black to be smart. Too overweight to be athletic. Too kinky and brown to be beautiful. Too lower-middle class to be refined. Too imperfect to be great. But none of that was ever true. It was not true for me and it is not true for any of us. Every part of who we are, and every stumbling block we overcome, makes us better and stronger.

My journey, like that of all people, began long before I was born. The elements that converged to produce my person are comprised of my ancestors DNAtheir struggles and their triumphs. My story is inextricably connected to and rooted in their stories. I see so much of their experiences replicated in mine. Though separated generationally, we have faced different iterations of the same oppression, the same challenges and the same hurdles, and have called upon the same resilience to advance through them.

While rooted in my familys experiences, there is a novelty to my journey and a new hope to which I grasp as I access possibilities that they could not. I am 100 percent their legacy, but 100 percent my own person. Different. Quirky. Navigating my own path through ancestrally familiar terrain.

My experiences as a perpetual outsider are not unique. If you are reading this book, chances are you have, at some point, felt the same way. Through sharing my story of being the perpetual square peg in spaces comprised of round holes, I hope to encourage students and parents who, like me, were not gifted the privileges of access, resources, pedigree and the like at birth. We must stop viewing elite educational spaces and institutions from a perspective of survival.

We do not have to stand on the outskirts of our educational experienceso grateful to be let through the door that we are afraid to make our voices heard. We can be fully engaged, fully immersed and fully present. We can and will thrive in these environments if we have the right mindset.

Four key attributes emerge through my stories and have become the Black Prep Pillars of Success :

• Embrace your unique strengths : We are all different and have our own unique set of strengths and talents. Once you have determined how and where you shine, stand ready to seize opportunities that showcase your talents.