I believe I was donning my favorite New Orleans Saints football team cap (not to be confused with my favorite NFL team), that 10/4 day, which immediately took us to football, which took us to the Oakland Raiders, which then took Barbara to their flamboyant Hall of Famer Defensive End John Matuzak’s (1950-1989) off the field party hardy habits back in their day, back during their span of “Commitment to Excellence” and Super Bowl Championship seasons of 1977 and 1981. She had fond and what-were-we-thinking Oakland-East Bay territory memories, I could tell. And, she was preaching to the choir, for the Raiders have been my favorite NFL team ever since my Uncle Dale took my brother and me to a Dallas Cowboys [14-17] Raiders-winning pre-season game in front of 51,391 fans at the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum on July 31, 1976, during our family American Bicentennial summer vacation.

Barbara didn’t stop with football, she also shared stories of her fellow ASU Sun Devil student-athlete classmates and future World Series champions and Hall of Famers Jim Palmer of the Baltimore Orioles and ‘Mr. October’ Reggie Jackson of the Oakland A’s and the New York Yankees. I then went Hollywood left-handed, on my left foot, in left field on her, saying I thought she resembled southeastern North Dakota-native, Golden Globe and Primetime Emmy Awards-winning actress Angie Dickinson, star of Police Woman (1974-1978); who I now understand had just celebrated her 94th birthday four days earlier, who I had not seen hide nor hair of since the seventies, back when her show had the plum primetime Friday 9pm (CST)/10pm (EST) time slot during its first two seasons.

Wow, 94; Police Woman, we watched it weekly together as a family in front of a big sturdy floor model Zenith console TV that had no legs. I truly extend her birthday wishes for the same stable level of good nonagenarian health as my own 91YO the ‘Dad’ Woods, who was chain-sawing downed tree limbs earlier this week. Ms. Dickinson, perhaps, in my opinion, played an even bigger role than Mary Tyler Moore in the inspiring of aspiring little girls and grown women in that man’s man’s world of the 1970s when brawn trumped brains. Just thinking about the women in my life, in my circle, in my family today, I can only think of maybe two who had careers as a journalist; e.g. the MTM Show fictitious WJM-TV Minneapolis. On the contrary, I can think of countless women I know who are now retired law enforcement professionals. Don’t get me wrong, Mary Tyler Moore was a pioneering female entertainment world in-front and behind-the-scenes powerhouse, who opened doors for her fellow female actors, such as Valerie Harper (Rhoda), Cloris Leachman (Phyllis), Betty White, and such. As I sat there listening to Barbara, I pictured her as a seventies trailblazing young woman as well; e,g., and full circle, Angie Dickinson.

Yes, so, Barbara, she quickly throws it back to me with a million dollar ‘Calabasas Real Estate mogul’ smile saying she didn’t have Angie Dickinson’s legs. I was temporarily caught off guard. I had nothing to lobby back across the net. I have never associated Angie Dickinson, or any (non-Olympic athlete) female entertainment star of any ethnicity, with their legs; well, all except for Tina Turner, “…Proud Mary keep on burnin’ Rollin’, rollin’ (Roll on), rollin’ on the river.” Still listening to The Mountain 93.9 over the Internet some three weeks removed from the NAZ, a few days ago I heard the lyrics to AC/DC’s “You Shook Me All Night Long” (1980); “She had the sightless eyes, telling me no lies; Knocking me out with those American thighs.” Still and all, in the course of a second or two, and without missing a beat, I kept it moving; chalking up Barbara’s extolling thoughts on Angie Dickinson to a cultural differences moment.

Hm, okay, I wanted to make a point about my Saints cap? It, more times than not, leads to a common segue for me; me introducing the true and still untold story of what really happened in New Orleans during the Hurricane Katrina government response twenty years ago. Wait a minute; did I actually even have my Saints cap on at the Rocktoberfest, or was it my #2 go-to plain black visor cover? At any rate, even in the NAZ, the subject of the National Football League is never far from the surface…in October. And the subject of New Orleans is one of my top three go-to responses to the standard and simple: “What do you do, Michael?”

Now, whether a person is black or white or read all over, I always start them off with my standard: there are three types of Black people in New Orleans: 1} The brown >>> to black skin Negro (Black) like me; 2} the high-yellow skinned Black Creole; 3} and the Passé Blanc (French for those who pass for white). And that the local Louisiana authorities, who were in charge and responsible for what would happen, not the President of the United States as was the protocol at the time in 2005, were virtually all of a Creole complexion and lighter. I tell people plain and simple, the lighter New Orleanian Blacks, in leadership after the levees broke, were in fear of their own darker devastated and trapped New Orleanian Black constituents. I am not putting down any group of Louisianans. Southeast Louisiana folks, they ALL know what I’m talking about when it comes to ‘shades of Blackness’, and the class and caste system in Greater New Orleans. No, I’m not putting down, I’m putting out. I’m educating my fellow Americans on the, as Paul Harvey would call it, ‘The Rest of the Story.” The still untold story of what really happened in the response and rescue and relief effort during arguably the biggest natural disaster in American History.

I then explain that the average post-Katrina levee breach trapped-in-the-flooding-zones survivor/victim was rescued six time: 1] flooded home to attic/rooftop; 2] rooftop to neighborhood school/church; 3] neighborhood school/church to levee/elevated hwy; 4] levee/elevated hwy to major collection points (the non-flooded Superdome, Convention Center, I-10 & Causeway, Algiers Point Ferry Terminal, Univ. of New Orleans, etc.); 5] major collection to Louis Armstrong Int’l {MSY} Airport and/or I-10 MM 209 staging area; 6] MSY to airports across America; and/or MM 209 to Baton Rouge, out-state Louisiana and Texas.

I then hit my on-bent-ears first-time listeners with the third and final knockout punch (point). I tell them, “The federal government did not fail the day; the federal government saved the day.” I tell them that true, it is still to this day seen as one of America’s darkest hours, but I have substantial evidence, hard proof, and concrete documentation it was actually one of America’s finest hours. Not the levees breaking; rather, the rescue effort that followed. I have the never before told stories of the governmental responder Heroes and SHeroes! Now, who benefited from Katrina going down as a great American fiasco? What “group” won the US House and Senate back in 2006? What “group” won the White House back in 2008? I’m not admonishing anybody, nor am I anti-any “group,” for I voted more often than not for “that group” who benefited from the Katrina political backlash. I voted for Obama. No, I am simply summarize and share what I painstakingly documented and meticulously analyzed from over the span of seven years (2006-2012) of eye witness interviewing and the scouring over the voluminous files and documents explicitly provided to me by local state and federal government agencies. I was the only one asking. I say this with confidence because none of what I have been told has made it to the streaming services, the podcasts, or the cable channels. None of all I have been told has made it to the light of day……yet.

Boston DNC ’04: Jesse Jackson, awaiting Obama Keynote Speech

Boston DNC ’04: SC Rep. Jim Clyburn, future Majority Whip

Boston DNC ’04: Conservative Talk Show Host Larry Elder

Boston DNC ’04: DNC Chair Terry McAuliffe, future VA Gov.

Leaving Boston DNC ’04 for SFO: Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown, fmr Calif. Gov. & future Calif. AG and Gov.

Man, I know; okay…that third point? I hit them with the game-changing life-saving efforts of the “All-American” nicknamed US Army 82nd Airborne Division, who landed on my birthday, September 3, 2005, at New Orleans Louis Armstrong Airport. Commanding Officer Major General William Caldwell IV, after expeditiously receiving his orders from US Army Lt. General Russel Honore, his elite paratroopers immediately, not in a militaristic way, but in a my-fellow-American humanitarian way, squashed the fear factors that began with the local New Orleans government leaders and exploded in the wee hours of the morning on Day 4, Thursday 9/1/05, of the mega disaster simply known as “Katrina.” Task Force Katrina Gen. Honore told the 82nd Airborne CO Caldwell to, “Fix it!” And these soldiers were not the only heroes of (that light of) those end of the world like Katrina days.

Barbara was intrigued. She and I were amicably deep in harmonious exchanges of ideas and thoughts. She goes on to share more of her back story, that she is a fairly recent widow, that her and her England-born and raised Anglo-American husband was a master builder, that they met in California and together then went into the land development and home building enterprise in Southern California, the most recently in the affluent Calabasas area of Los Angeles County. She said that local and state government regulations finally became the death knell of their family business enterprise and that they decided to call it a day and retire to Prescott.

I then shifted gears to my unconventional views on this year of our Lord 2025, elucidating to Barbara that we were still mutually freely exchanging ideas and thoughts here; that we will not be bound by political correctness this early evening on this party porch deck in Yalapai Hills. “Speak your mind,” Barbara Phillips, as I, Mykl D. Woods, will continue to speak mine. Again, the terms: Charlie Kirk, Donald Trump, MAGA, GOP, conservative or government shutdown, still never came up. What did come up next; what I brought up next was Black History. I told Barbara the vast majority of my Black non-conservative circle of friends and family and associates, which accounts for over 80%, were very emotionally upset, and even traumatized, this year with most of them now claiming the “Woke As They Come” moniker. I told her, in so many (in so little) words that although I had always been ‘Black’….I had never been ‘woke’. I told her that I was not taken the attacks on wokeness and/or so-called Black History personally. Now, as I am penning this post, I am just now realizing that I did not make it clear to her that I was not ‘anti-woke’. Now she is really feeling comfortable with her real thoughts on this topic and is freely sharing them, as I wanted all along. This is how I learn what my fellow Americans of all walks are really thinking.

I then took her back to 1994, and shared with her that I was the author of a publication titled, yes, AFROMATION: 366 Days of American History. I shared with her that it was I who first proclaimed, publicized and promoted the phrase “Black History Is American History” with my reference handbook being the proof of my revolutionary stance. Now, keep in mind she and I are free flowing with no politically correct or incorrect inhibitions. Barbara Phillips of Prescott, Arizona’s immediate response to the term “Black History Is American History” was that of disdain for it. I say this because the next words out of her mouth were, “they try to divide us.” Now which one of the three subject words in that 5-word phrase was unsettling to her? Was it the word History? Was it the word American? Or, was it the word Black? We will circle back to this later in this blog post. But on 10/4, I did not miss a beat. I did not halt the flow. We kept it moving. I pivoted to…one could say, I ratcheted up to the topic of slavery in America.

Now with me, since 1994, I have always focused on the CONTRIBUTIONS TO AMERICA by Africans, Coloreds, Negroes, Afro-Americans, Blacks and/or African Americans. When I dig into American History on the topic of slavery, I follow the profits, and not the pain. I follow the revenue and not the racism. I don’t push a demand for reparations, I push a demand for respect, first and foremost, for the still not yet appreciated astronomical role our enslaved ancestors played in making the United States of America the most powerful and richest country in the history of the world.

Every person today living out the American Dream, no matter their ethnicity, is benefitting from the manual influence and results of those millions of Africans enslaved in British America turned United States of America. Let me make myself clear. I am benefitting, at this exact moment, from the same said HISTORICAL RESULTS. I am not taking the popular and trending year 2025 stance of that of a victim. I am taking the stance of a stakeholder in 2025 America; a stake I inherited down through the generations of my Western Hemisphere family tree that spans backward well over the past 200-250+ years into time and Amerispace. This is what will be on my beautiful mind on July 4, 2026, as I celebrate our country’s Big 250; my granddaughters’ inherited stakes, my freedom to not to have to self-identify as a victim, and my beloved Antebellum America ancestors’ Historical Results!! Their cotton-picking launched the Industrial Revolution and changed the world.

Now with Barbara, I could tell she was starting to feel uncomforted over the history of slavery; a feeling organically originating from inside of her and not emanating in a cancelling way out from inside out of me. We were not Tom Petty-like free falling; rather, we were still conversational free flowing like the 1930 Colorado River pre-Hoover Dam construction. I believe I told her that without slavery in America; I’m not sitting here talking to her. I would never have been born. This is not a pro-slavery statement; I wasn’t around during that time, and I had no say, no vote. No, it was a pro-Mykl D. Woods (1962-____) statement. I’m here! …hear me roar!!

Barbara, she now steps up her game and takes me way back to 1635 during the time her religious freedom-seeking British and German ancestors, Quakers and Mennonites I believe, arrived in the American Colonies; the New World from their POV. She makes the strong and emotional statement that she did not want to feel shame because some of her non-Quaker ancestors owned slaves; while showing shame on her face as she said it. She, with great dignity and a drop of vulnerability, tells me she is a descendant the Thones Kunders (1653-1729), who it is said that on February 18, 1688, the first protest against slavery in the colonies was drafted at his home, which was located at what is now 5109 Germantown Avenue in the Germantown section of Philadelphia. It was about now that I was beginning to realize I did not know if her politics were that of the Republicans or the Democrats. As I said twice before, I never heard, and still haven’t heard the trigger (litmus test) terms: Charlie Kirk, Donald Trump, MAGA, GOP, conservative or government shutdown.

Wow, well, the sun is now setting on my first ever Rocktoberfest Saturday in the NAZ, and we are still going strong. Having finished her main course food plate, Barbara was now wondering what sweets were available inside the home on the dessert table. She gave me her realtor business card, gracefully excused herself, said she would return and told me to hold her seat. Still seated in my “Times Square” prime location, I immediately began my next conversation, this time with the only other Black man besides me and Don at the event, the Chicago-native, former US Marine and San Diego Area retiree transplant to Prescott, Jim Boyd. Don is still inside the home where the big core group is being entertained by a classic rock musician playing for tips, and he is at talking with the Mrs. Boyd, who was sitting at the bar. I quickly learn that Jim is also a Buffalo Soldier Reenactor for the Prescott Region, along with Seattle brother Don. It seems Jim and his wife had just celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary, and I enjoyed hearing every word of how they met at the Burger King inside the Sears Tower in the Chicago back in the 1980s. Jim had his cocktail, and Jim had my attention. The next thing I know, a very large man of prominence and stature and admiration, who they say was a retired sheriff’s deputy (or did they say retired sheriff), makes his way up to the porch and sits down immediately in the first open seat; in Barbara’s seat.

I ONLY HAD ONE JOB TO DO, (LOL). Even though I rescued her libation, I think it was a Michelob beer product; I lost Barbara’s prime location porch deck spot. She laughed. Barbara, she had simply replanted her flag at to the inside the home dessert table surrounded by her wonderful circle of friends, where the beautiful conversations of the beautiful people were in stereophonic sound. It was not long after that that Don and I made our exit. It was time to bounce. It was time to rock and roll. I was glad he brought me. I was glad Bob and Jen received me. I was glad Barbara had enlightened me. I was she appeared to have been enlightened by me.

For the past six years, since my “Soberdemic” kicked in, visiting Sedona, Arizona had been and still is high on my Bux-it List. I want to experience the vortex that I had been reading about. Sedona lies 48 miles east on US 89A, passing through Cottonwood, AZ (pop. 12,939). I saw Don’s home, which I affectionately referred to as The Chisholm Trail, again, with my room being my Bogota Suite. What I’m saying is for the purpose of my October trip to the NAZ, I viewed Prescott Valley, which includes Don’s home and back yard, as a spiritual extension of what I believe and imagined Sedona to be.

It’s now Wednesday, October 8, 2025, and I need to get back to Las Vegas. I pack up, clean up, saddle up, settle up (gas money to go along with the week’s grocery and take out food monies) and thank up my Seattle brother Don for his warm and spiritual and loquacious hospitality. Because of the unique interstate and intrastate logistics to commercial travel options presented with visiting Yalapai County, the best mode of transportation for me that day to exit the wild wild west was a one-way car rental back to Las Vegas Harry Reid Int’l Airport for drop-off.

I bid adieu to Don’s home, aka The Sanctuary. Don drives me to the Enterprise Car Rental facility at Gateway Mall in Prescott, where a staff member named Lawrence and a high-mileage Toyota Tacoma pickup truck are waiting on me. He and I had spoken by phone the day before, so I was able to pick up where we left off with small talk at the Enterprise counter. I present my Nevada Driver’s License and credit card and he sees the name W-O-O-D-S prominent on both. This takes Lawrence, an American who fits the typical median demographic profile (of ethnicity and age) of a Prescott-Prescott Valey Area resident, into an antidotal story about two other men named “Woods.” It seems a previous customer, who must have been a Black man bearing my same surname, came in to rent a vehicle, and Lawrence went straight to the Tiger W-O-O-D-S relative association.

This takes me back to spring of 1997 when I was in Detroit promoting my Afromation ‘Educational’ Movement to Integrate American History, and on the hearts and minds and of most TV watching Detroiters was a young and handsome Stanford University alumnus named Eldrick Tont ‘Tiger’ Woods, who was making his move at Augusta National Golf Club. On rounds two and three, Tiger Woods scored the best (65, 66), which led to that Sunday afternoon, April 13th nationwide are-you-watching-CBS TV moment when the {in living ‘biracial’ color} Tiger Woods held on to become {The Master}s Champion; his first but not his last, ’97, ’01, ’02, ’05, ’19. His fame skyrocketed in all communities; e.g., ‘Enterprise Lawrence’ still obviously being a TW fan to this day. In the Black community, many would say TW surpassed Michael Jordan on the fame chart, for a while, at a level that would not be seen again until Election Day 2008 when another biracial phenomenon would take his place in the hearts and minds of the people on national TV from Grant Park in Chicago.

Now, while Lawrence is going on and on about TW’s cousin this TW’s cousin that, my mind wanders off into thoughts of my Louisiana family tree. I then jump back in to the discussion and tell him “Woods” is an Irish name. I then tell him my 91YO Louisiana-born father’s maternal grandfather was an (white) Irish man named Thomas Rone of Plain Dealing, Louisiana. I then ask Lawrence what does the phrase “Black Irish” mean? Again, like Barbara at the Rocktoberfest, like all conversations I join in on with my fellow Americans, there is no wrong thing to say to me if what you say is what you truly think and/or believe. I am not a canceller of American opinions; I am a consumer and collector and watchdog and a protector of American opinions.

Anyway, I’m thinking “Black Irish” pertained to distant cousins or something. Lawrence’s response to me was that it meant you were Black and Irish. I thought, huh. Okay, now, the proverbial trig in the trigger must have been triggered, for the next words out of Lawrence’s mouth were: “I don’t see color (‘Black’).” What I’m saying is I could tell that that ole black magic-like uncomfortable, not wanting to racially offend, nor defend, feeling over race had crept up into Lawrence psyche.

Irishman Thomas Rone (not pictured) Family Photo: my mulatto “biracial” paternal Grandmother Bertha Rone Woods, 2nd from right, in pre-Great Depression Era America down in Plain Dealing, Boosier Parish, Louisiana

We segued back to closing the deal on my one-way rental agreement and went out to the parking lot to see my Tacoma pickup truck where I could tell he felt good for he started sharing his stories of working in Vegas; being reminded by my Nevada Drivers License. I didn’t get to share this with Lawrence, but there are three things I have in common with Tiger Woods: our last name, the Louisiana birth state of our ‘Mister Woods’ fathers; and the attitude that I, too, do not like to be pigeonholed, especially not by other Blacks, only due to the color and/or shade of my skin.

If I had been sent a survey by Enterprise; if I had responded to a survey, I would have given Lawrence 9 out of 10. We were good. Then it comes time to run my credit card, a global banking conglomerate that I was having an excellent six-year run with; responsible, credible and a 100% on-time payment status and all. But on this current Western Americana travel operation that began on 9/29, I had to make many lodging and car rental reservations in various cities, with everyone demanding temporary holds for various amounts and lengths of time that were stacking up and backing up. The financial algorithms gods of Lower Manhattan that 10/8 day uncharacteristically rejected the only credit card in my name I had been traveling with; an anomaly for me. Lawrence asks if I have another card. I did have another credit card from the same bank actually, but it was in my 91YO father’s name, Mista “Woods.” A card I held, only to make (e-commerce) purchases for him on his direct and explicit behalf. What the heck. I said to Lawrence, “Try this one.” Because of all the initial TW’s cousin or not conversation, what is the only word he sees? Yep, W-O-O-D-S; with no imprinted “Michael” in sight. It’s run. It’s accepted. I shake Lawrence’s hand, and I hit US 89 for a return beautiful picturesque scenic drive through the NAZ, through Mohave County, Arizona, the second-largest county by area in Arizona and the fifth largest in the contiguous Unites States, back to Las Vegas where I immediately drafted a check to reimburse Mister Woods for the unexpected travel anomaly of a car rental charge to his card, and dropped it off at the USPS Post Office on Sunset Rd. across the street from Harry Reid Airport.

One week later, on an American Airlines LAS-ORD redeye flight cruising easterly aboard an Airbus A-321 at 33,000 feet over what I presumed at the time was the Cornhusker State, with my final destination after connection being Omaha, I thought about my conversations and conclusions with Barbara and Lawrence in Prescott, and also Don in Prescott Valley. We know Lawrence saw “Woods,” but did he really not see ‘Black’, as in our 10/8/25 “Black Irish” topic? We know that Barbara saw Mykl/Michael, but did she really get thrown off after hearing ‘Black’, as in our 10/4/25 “Black History Is American History” topic?

Well, let me back up to the time before September 2025. I have been what I coined as “woke-slapped” several times this year, all by Black women who either explicitly informed me or expressed to me by their actions that they now identify as “Woke As They Come Me, Mister Afromation (1994-2005)?! Getting his Blackness card scrutinized?! By the Neo-wokers of Black America?! WTW!!!

As I tell all of my “woke slappers,” I tell them I will defend their rights to identify with _____ and express about _____ , whatever, til my last breath, and that I will stand tall and strong for my First Amendment Rights as well. There have been many times this year when I felt like an American man without a Black nation. Since the Floyd George national reckoning of 2020, most Black Americans today like to still state, “Black History Is American History.” The big difference now, during this here year of the woke wreckoning, is that Black Americans say it, but don’t mean it. “American History Is Black History” is what they (my people) really mean in 2025. And as for the Barbara’s and Lawrence’s of the nation, today they no longer think of that same phrase that I launched in March of 1994, “Black History Is American History,” as a uniting phrase, as a united phrase, as a patriotic phrase; all because of one word, “Black.” They now see the phrase as a great divider…in my educated opinion.

I’m not complaining here, I am explaining what I learned since Labor Day Weekend 2025. Do I now believe that I have more in common with the people of Prescott than with my proverbial own kind? Historically? Of course not. Culturally? No way. Politically? I say, ‘one (wo)man, one vote!’ Philosophically? Hmm. Spiritually? Mmm. Genetically? I have not found any new lost ‘White Irish’ grandfathers in my family tree, so… Musically? I hear their rock, but I roll all through my soul from head to toe with the black music. Patriotically? Maybe, perhaps. Homogeneously? am both a descendant of the Irish immigrated and the African imported. Americanally? Absolutely. I’m American. I am America.

Back to the Arizona future of October 2025. Aside from Don, Jim and his wife, the only other Black I saw in Prescott and Prescott Valley, combined, was while grocery shopping with Don; out of the corner of my eye I caught a young good looking brother with dreadlocks working at the Glassford Hill Florentine Fry’s Food Store back inside the pharmacy restricted area. Maybe my buddy Lawrence at Enterprise was not being literal, nor figurative; but rather actual and factual. One can’t, won’t, don’t see color if there are, virtually, no people of color in your entire county to see.

I’m not throwing rocks; I’m rolling stones and gathering moss. What I experienced in the NAZ has “actually” been one great scientific experiment lab for me and my beautiful mind. How do Americans who don’t see or live near color, feel about color? How do they feel about themselves? How do they feel about America? What did I learn? The NAZ has helped me to talk to America; to talk to the world about my America, our America, the America.

The Gamon Couple of Eastern Washington State has also helped me. After spending over two hours with them at Omaha Eppley Airfield, I still do not know their politics either. It didn’t come up in my style of communicating and conversating. There was one thing Ralph said that stuck with me. He felt good about America today, but that he wished the “rhetoric” was more tuned down, more civilized perhaps. I responded back to him with the “rhetoric” you speak of, that there is the freedom, the freedom of expression; arguably the number one thing that makes America the envy, center and blueprint of the free world. I would never want to live in a nation where I was forced to think and talk the same as everyone else; e.g., North Korea, Vietnam, Cuba. I would not know how to act. I would not last long; e.g., the Argentine and Chilean football stadiums of the 1970s. “Los Desaparecidos.” But here in America, my longevity has its place. I’m not defending the “rhetoric,” I am defending the freedom to “rhetorize.” Here in America, I believe the most important thing to an American is their freedom. Very recently, I shared with a longtime Hurricane Katrina project collaborator, Uptown New Orleans resident and dear friend, IT Professional Budd Hirons, during one of our frequent and longstanding rap sessions that it is my (American citizenship) nationality that protects me and my rights, and not my (Blackness) ethnicity.

 
R.I.H. MOMMA CAROLE ELIZABETH ANDERS WOODS-HARRIS (3/17/1940 – 4/11/2024)
 

And finally, in a ‘lastly’ and an ‘in conclusion’ kind of way, it felt awesomely refreshing to both breathe the Puget Sound Region’s air again, and to inhale the NAZ – Prescott Region’s air for the first time ever. In the 18 months since my pretty momma’s passing, Carole Woods Harris (1940-2024), I have been tried and tested, over and over, continuously. My 2025 major concerns have nothing to do with what’s going on in Washington, DC, and everything to do with what’s going on in my own circle of influence(d). I’m tried in the Carolinas. I’m tried in Omaha. I’m tried in Vegas. I’m tried from heaven. I was even tried in Prescott Valley, only one hour into my arrival and before I reached my final destination. I view this Post-Matriarchal ‘Momma Carole’ Age of tried, trials and tribulations as tests of M.D. Woods’ manhood, son-of-a-hood, brotherhood, American-hood, Black-hood, humanity-hood, mental-hood, fiscal-hood, perseverance-hood, and faith-hood. I’m here today to tell you that Mykl D. Woods is a test taker, and a test passer. My beautiful intelligent single mother-of-two health administration professional daughter, on Mother’s Day 2025 in Denton, Texas, graduated from the University of North Texas with a 4.0+ GPA. I’d like to say that the apples don’t fall far from the tree. But what I will say is I’m not a test ace like my Little Momma Sweetie. But over the past six year, all I do is pass life tests. Maybe this is why the, without warning life changing prohibition of alcohol, AND recreational drugs, Wiley Coyote cartoon anvil fell on my head six years ago and knocked me L-seven square straight. Maybe I have been placed on a mission from a higher source, a higher power, a higher ground. Maybe? Probably? Definitely! Whatever the case I will keep it moving ready and forward…on the strength.

When I finally, for the first time, made it to Don’s splendid home in Prescott Valley on 10/2, the first thing he did was give me the tour. As most people enter their house through their garages, our last stop was in his front door foyer area where he picked up what I would describe as a healing frequency bowl, and with the stick he began to circle the rim and “sing-chant?” You see, what had happened was while on the way to the house, I unintentionally triggered an emotion in him, and we slid into a brief heated discussion on a topic most curious to me, but most serious to him; Boeing “jets!” Back in the foyer, sing-chanting, sing-chanting… It was after two minutes or so of Don hitting the healing frequencies and striking the harmonic spiritual balance that I said to myself, “Prescott Valley will be my ‘Sedona’. His home will be my vortex. Don is my eastern mystic.” Vortex?

 

According to Google AI Overview: A Sedona vortex is a location believed to be a center of Earth’s energy, thought to be especially concentrated and conducive to spiritual experiences like meditation and healing.

Don, not only a renowned guitarist, but also licensed drone pilot; he, being on the money, foresaw my NAZ trip as a “spiritual sortie,” a test-run if you will. Will I return to the NAZ? My answer is the universe will let me know; i.e., “I’m on schedule.” Not long after returning to Vegas, I mailed Don what I thought was nice thank you card; yep, ole skool style. The sentiment of my snail-mailed greeting card was that I felt my October 2025 NAZ experience will be looked back on in the near future as a defining (experience) moment in my life. I have already noticed a major change in my own psyche, in my own energy, in my own surroundings, in my own focus. I am no longer mad. I feel very good peace of mind for the first time since the final call of our family matriarch on April 11, 2024; R.I.H. My Pretty Momma. But this too is important; I never wanted my NAZ time to only be just about me; to only be a single-lane North Central Arizona highway in one direction. Don did tell me recently that I inspired him back in the day to write his life stories. Wow. If I was able to add value to Don’s ‘today’ world, then I am truly thankful to have been given the opportunity to give as I receive. Don is, with Ms. Barbara P. still fresh on my mind, Angie Dickinson-legs and knee deep into the developing of the sequel to his debut highly acclaimed autobiographical book series, The Rev Don, Redux: The Reverend Don Black White-Water Guide (2018); a white-water rafting guide, based on the stories of a Black white-water rafting guide in the Pacific Northwest. May you, too, Seattlezona brother Donald J. Chisholm, be able to profess and believe that you too are “…on schedule.” You, too, are an American success story.

Cousin Amanda, what did you say: “Write a piece that describes your trips and encounters.” Here you go…in 10.5k words, and such. I have saved my last thoughts specifically for you. What did I learn from my latest Arizona trip and encounter? I now know what America sees when they hear the phrase, “Black History Is American History”; a new historical and philosophical way of thinking when I first launched it into the public domain from Seattle in 1994, in my own educational, integrating, uniting and patriotic way. In 2025, America sees ‘Black’. America sees ‘Black’, even when there are no Blacks to be found for miles and miles around, as in Prescott-Prescott Valley, Arizona. When America says they ‘don’t see color’, they mean ‘they see color’. Why? Because this is the America. ‘Black’ is in the DNA of America. I am in the DNA of America.

I see this what-America-sees point of contention as a natural phenomenon to our 249-year old nation. Just look at OUR history. Just look at our DNA. For a person in my position, the recent travels have been an opportune time for introducing, talking, listening, observing and reflecting; in a time when deflecting is the standard norm. Somebody needs to pay an ode to Robert Redford’s 1998 character Montana horse trainer ‘Tom Booker’ and be the “History Whisperer” for America.

 

“See Grace, I’ve got a problem. When I work with a horse, I like to know its history”.

– Tom Booker, The Horse Whisperer (1998)

 

Unlike the Waterloo, Iowa-native, MacArthur “Genius Grant” recipient and Pulitzer Prize-winning coastal elite New York Times reporter Nikole Hannah Jones and her The 1619 Project, I am not going to war on the American origin story, or even the idea of America. We see how that turned out. Well, I see how that turned out. In NHJ’s own admissions, The 1619 Project brought the full faith, weight and might of the entire United States government down on all things ‘Black History’ and ‘Black Present’ (not to be confused with ‘Black Presence’), while she became a millionaire from the historical essays and their multi-media byproducts. I’m not criticizing Ms. Hannah-Jones for reaching the highest heights of her profession and living the American Dream. This is America. No, you can look at me as a freelance history war correspondent reporting today from a Midwestern don’t-call-me-woke bunker. I will ask one more time: does America see color? Does America see ‘Black’? Yes, 24/7/365, under this administration…and through bureaucratic crosshairs.

No, myself, I am not going to war, I am going to peace with my country tis of thee…. armed to the hilt with only a piece of my mind and genetic traits. Those who can’t…teach? I can, but I still teach! My current lesson plan, my current strategy is not to try and change what America sees; rather, to try and change what America feels when it sees what it sees; WHEN AMERICA SEES ‘BLACK’. Wow, could this be my (next) moment, Amanda? Is this my (next) time? Man, what an amazing life’s journey; a human opportunity I am very thankful for. I’m not done yet! Having said that, it’s time for my shout outs. Much love to my Black-Whitewater Eastern Mystic of the Great SW NAZ, Seattlezona brother Don. As the famed US Army 10th Calvary words they lived by back in their day: “Ready and Forward.” And, a hearty thanks to my fellow Americans Bob, Jen, Barbara, Jim, the Colorado School of Mines alum gentleman, Lawrence, Ralph and Theresa. I appreciate allowing our free flow of information on the American public pulse. I learned a great deal. I am all in this, together. And Ms. Barbara P., I thank you one more time for sharing your family’s illustrious British America origin story with me. It is a very important find to a public historian like me; as in how I formulate, weigh and balance stories of American History. And lastly Barbara, on 10/28 I came across, I mean, I initiated the Google Image search criteria: “Angi Dickinson Police Woman” one more time. I got a result of a mid-1970s poolside persuasion shot indoors for some reason in what looks like a beauty parlor or something. In any event, wow! I understand now what you were anatomically referencing on 10/4. No American cultural difference here. Tina T. as gone from “…simply the best” second to none to second to Angie D., in my eyes. To everybody: gracias por leer mi blog a todas, damas y caballeros.

The ‘Black History’ and ‘Black Presence’ may have been executive ordered away (by force) and/or woke-proudly segregated away from (by choice) ‘American History’ and ‘American Present’ by “‘good’ (bad or ugly) people on both sides”; e.g., Ms. Jones, Mr. President. Today, October 26. 2026, I am revealing my new revolutionary futuristic philosophical mantra update from 1994: “Black Future Is American Future; American Future Is Black Future.” #AFROMATION

To my beautiful daughter, granddaughters, grandniece, nieces and nephews, this is your times, your nation, your world, your tomorrow. This is your life. We do not need you two, too, to be burdened down with the good, the bad and the ugly history of America. We need you ready and forward moving, creating the future of America, and not fighting your ancestors’ past. On the other hand, it is yours and my ‘Woke As They Come’ beautiful Black Sistahs’ First Amendment right to worship at the church of victimhood, if you please, if you need, if you want, if you must. You’ll just never see me “there” on Sunday. I will always LIFT you up, me up, us up, them up. Always! Amen.

“This land is your land…,” my young ladies; middle aged ladies and senior ladies. Hallelujah! “…This land is my land. From California to the New York Islands .” This land may not have been made for you and me, in the hearts and minds of folk music singer, songwriter, and composer Woody Guthrie’s post-WWII America days. But, it was made {TO ORDER} by beloved ancestors of you and me. In the Brooklyn Bedford-Stuyvesant-raised soul-funk singer Sharon Jones’ 2005 pre-Katrina days, this land was made {TO ORDER} for you and me. Then came Obama. Then came 2025. In the 249-year old U.S. of A (2020 Census pop. 331,449,281), something is always coming next; and our people have been here through every and all of what came, and the what comes next. This land is what? #AMERICA

 

Jonathan, “Good morning Uncle Mike! I hope you have a great day! And I hope your story telling of NOLA during Katrina is going well. Please let me know if there is any way I can help/support your project! I’d love to learn about this as well?”

On October 28, 2025, my beautiful nephew and proud 2024 Historically Black Howard University in Washington, DC graduate Jonathan got an early start on the upcoming ‘National Up Lift Someone Day’ on October 30th. I learned from my Uncle Dale that it is an uncle’s 24/7/365 job to UP LIFT. Well, my young nephew Jon Carl is an uncle, as well. “I get you nephew. U get me nephew. Love U H.U.man!!” The stories must be told. In the meantime, I will continue to feed my readers with my words. Today’s word calorie count; 13,800, and change…‘everybody eats’ today!

 

With my written assignment to describe my “trips and encounters” now handed in, posted up, Cousin Amanda; this is me, myself and I logging off. I hope to communicate with you, ALL, in the real world soon. I’m on schedule!

Blessings & Peace,


M. Darryl Woods, American Storyteller & History Whisperer [of a biological intelligence nature]
North Las Vegas, Nevada, USA,
Earth