Who is G. B. Williams?

I read two or more times Princess Megan Rose's "Who is Megan Rose?" I was at WOW! So much of what she wrote was about her likes and who inspired her, and I thought she was much more than what she shared.

Then I asked the question, "Who is G. B. Williams?" Here I am taking the challenge to tell you who G. B. Williams is. Princess Megan Rose, I hope you will read it and tell me what you REALLY think -- PLEASE?

Here goes.

First of all, for the record, my name is not G. G. Williams, and no, I am not a man. LOL, several reviewers have often referred to me as a man, and one even explained why they knew I was a man. No, I never corrected them since my picture is there with my profile. I chose the moniker G. B. Williams because my middle name is Genevia, my mother's maiden name is Brown, and my maiden name is Williams = G. B. Williams. I am a woman since I have given birth to four children, three girls, and one boy, all over the age of forty (40). All four (4) of my adult children have children giving me seventeen (17) grandchildren and twelve (12) great-grandchildren.

Who is G. B. Williams? I was born Malinda Genevia Brown, since I was born out of wedlock. A year after my birth, my mother and father married, and I became a Williams.

I am a high school graduate and a college graduate, and I hold two master's degrees. I attend all Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in the south. I am a product of my race, environment, culture, education, and self-determination.

Many years ago, I was given a business card to identify me when I attended meetings or spoke on behalf of my organization. Because my job kept changing, my business card kept changing but never did my business card ever fully describe who I was, and it simply introduced me as to what I was doing at the moment, e.g., Human Resource Specialist, Employment Manager, Executive Director, Councilmember, Mayor, and eventually it said Retiree. In between all of those titles, I was married, student, graduate (a few times), mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, aunt, niece, godchild, neighbor, teacher, babysitter, and the list goes on and on. No single title described me but told what role I was in at the time.

If you read all of the labels and titles, you might get a good idea of the many roles I held during my lifetime, but none would tell you who G. B. Williams, the writer is or even who she thinks she is. This writing will attempt to say to you about G. B. Williams.

I am a woman of high hopes and expectations. I am a romantic who has never been able to find anyone who returned the love that my romantic side wanted. I have loved and lost. I know what it means to be a single parent raising four children and waking up one morning with your children and your children's children while taking care of your aging mother.

I am a Black woman living in a world with all of the education and training a college or university could, but subjected to work for a white woman with not even a high school education who was always clear that she knew more than I would ever know about the job which accounted for her making there times more than I did. However, I did the work, wrote the report, and represented her at meetings while she attend dinner parties and other engagements with the dignitaries.

I am the president of the PTA who made sure that the Board of Education purchased books for our Black schools and spent days and hours writing letters, speaking at meetings and rallies to make sure that the schools my children attended had basic necessities to be taught the basics. I am the coordinator of the end of the year school picnic, and the teachers' luncheons.

I am the leader of the rebellion in the neighborhood to get the metro to stop allowing its buses to speed through our neighborhood and shake the very foundation of our homes in a neighborhood where I was not wanted and was redlined, and even threatened to be assassinated by the White Power of Mount Rainier.

I am the go-to mayor for all of the mayors in Prince George's County Maryland since being elected in 2005. As mayor, I served as president of the Maryland Mayors Association, the Maryland Black Mayors Association, president of Women in Government Services, Maryland Municipal League Board member, and head of the Community Emergency Rescue Team (CERT). So many more roles in leadership that upon retirement my Council named one of its municipal buildings the Malinda Miles Municipal Center.

I am a teacher of classes and theories about equal employment, affirmative action, writing position descriptions, and scoring jobs to ensure equal pay for equal work. I was responsible for hiring and firing employees whether friends or foes.

I am an avid believer in Jesus Christ risen from the grave that will be coming back one day to raise the dead and claim His disciples for himself. I evangelize to those who are interested and ready to hear and learn of Him who has made heaven and earth and given me the opportunity to share His good news.

I am a writer who has written since the age of seven (7) when told by my mother that I could not fight the whole world, but I could write about my feelings and why I was having them as well as what I could do with them. Then one day a teacher told me that the pen was mightier than the sword. No truer words were ever spoken, so I write. I write with passion and emotions, but I also write with opinions and facts. I am not a scientist so I never write with scientific facts, but I can and do write from experience.

I love music and find inspiration in music whether it be gospel, jazz, the blues, country and western, hillbilly, or rock 'n roll. Music in any language provides a level of comfort and tranquility when introduced at the right time with the right beat and the right words. I took piano lessons, and can't play a lick, but love piano music. I love bass guitars, saxophones, stand-up bass, and trombones, and even though I always give it my best, singing is definitely not my strong point although I have been told by a few that I can really sing. My mother always said do not quit your day job when caught singing at my best.

I am part and parcel of my background -- cotton fields, tobacco, gum, rabbit tobacco, corn, beans, peanuts, and many other farming chores including milking the cow, slopping the hogs, riding the horse, plowing the mule, and people dipping snuff and chewing tobacco. I would not be me, if I had not done my share of canning, making syrup, gutting, and cleaning hogs and cows so that we might eat throughout the winter. In my environment, we all did our fair share to make sure the family was able to survive -- chopped wood made fires, cleaned out the soot so the stove would burn, and pumped the water for everyone to drink, All of these chores were done after working almost twelve hours (12) at someone else's farm. No, life was no bed of roses, but it taught good work ethics, responsibility, family values, and a whole lot more.

My life has not been a bowl of cherries without any pits, but it has been the life that God has given me, and it has done a heck of a job in shaping me.

I am compassionate. I am religious. I am saved by the blood of Jesus, and able to love my brothers and sisters of all races, shapes, sizes, colors, and religions. I do not believe in abortions but will fight to the death for you to have the right to have an abortion SO LONG AS YOU DO NOT FORCE those actions on me or mine. The same is true with my beliefs about same-sex marriages. It is not my place to judge you, your beliefs, your religion, or no religion. I am primarily concerned with saving my soul and that has proven to be a full-time job for me. My background taught me to live and let live; that children should honor their parents, and that God should be first in all things.

Who is G. B. Williams? She is a conglomerate of her birth, culture, environment, beliefs, taboos, and faith, as well as her past, present, and future. I am not all that I could or should be, but I am all that I am based on the voices I have made AND the choices that have been forced upon me for one reason or another.

G. B. Williams is a woman, a baby boomer, a divorcee, and a wealth of wisdom based on experience and education, but also through trial and error

G.B. Williams is the sum total of her seventy-five (75) years spent on this earth -- from conception to this very moment and will continue to grow and expand as God continues to give her life.

Who is G. B. Williams? All of this and more!