A difficult child becomes a woman of substance ... and writes a book
"Many times I feel like a stranger in my hometown. It became more and more depressing to see men and women who had shared dreams of achievement and success fall prey to substance abuse." - Leslie Morris
BY LINDA DeNICOLA
Staff Writer

Every life is full of stories - and of ironies - as Leslie Morris, a Long Branch native, knows very well.

But most of us never get around to putting our stories down on paper or making them public by writing a book, especially one that is as honest and clear-sighted as "How Ya Like Me Now!."

Morris was born in 1953. Her memoir, about growing up an African American child in public housing, is full of family characters that include brothers, sisters, aunts, two indomitable grandmothers, a supportive father and, most important of all, her mother, Christine Morris.

Morris' mother, like most mothers, looms large in her life, and in her book. The irony here is that her mother passed away on the day the book was published.

"My mother passed away at 5:30 [a.m.] and I got the phone call that the books were on their way at 8:30. She was really sick during the last few months. I had read a lot of the book to her and interviewed her for the chapter on her past life. She was looking forward to the release of the book," Morris said.

She noted that her mother was a strong person and that is how she is portrayed in the book.

"She had a lot of ambition. She raised us in the church and gave us good values. She was of the generation of women who were part of the last migration north," she said.

Morris said her mother was a domestic worker who encouraged her children to get a good education.

"I internalized that value," Morris said. "My siblings have done well too."

Alfred A. Edmond Jr., another African American Long Branch native who graduated from the same high school and went on to a larger life, wrote the forward to the book.

He is the senior vice president/editor in chief of Black Enterprise magazine.

"At first glance, Morris' book seems to be just an inspirational autobiography detailing how a poor black girl from Long Branch's Seaview Manor housing project overcame emotional problems and defied predictions of her societal demise to earn an undergraduate degree with honors from prestigious Simmons College, Boston, and master's degrees from Boston College and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, before building an illustrious career in human services and public health," he writes.

He applauds Morris for using her childhood experience and her lifelong education to draw clear connections between emotional struggle and destructive behaviors as well as the dangers and pressure "blocking the ambitions and driving the poor choices of too many black children today, who often see poverty, hopelessness, substance abuse, premature parenthood and violence as inevitable."

Morris says in her introduction that she was inspired to write the book in 1990, after reading "Brothers" by Sylvester Monroe, who wrote about being raised by a single mother, growing up in public housing, excelling in school and being handpicked to attend a prestigious white school in New England.

Her book is divided into chapters with titles like "Juvenile Delinquent," where she provides the details of her only encounter with the juvenile justice system, stemming from a gang fight that almost landed her in juvenile jail.

Jerome Hamlin, retired Long Branch police officer, who also praises her book, comments on that period in Morris' life.

"Leslie's initial brush with the juvenile justice system turned out to be her last, thanks to the great wisdom of a jurist, the Honorable Leo Weinstein, judge of the Juvenile Domestic Relations Court."

He said Weinstein recognized that Morris was a "bright pearl" who would one day distinguish herself.

In the afterword, Morris makes important connections between then and now. She writes that some of the kids she grew up with fell short of their dreams because they lacked self-confidence, a belief in themselves, or, as she says, "the intestinal fortitude to succeed in the larger world."

When she was growing up, neighbors looked out for each other and each other's children.

"They were strong men and women who worked and took pride in their communities, their families. They had standards," she said.

In addition, she said, children grew up exposed to all kinds of people, professionals like the local doctor, pharmacist, dentist, and teachers, because they lived in the same community.

"A black child growing up was exposed to people from all walks of life," she said, but as black people began to assimilate and became more mobile, they left the inner city areas leaving behind poor, uneducated people.

"Two, three generation later, you have children being reared by drug-addicted parents in fatherless homes with no healthy male role models. Family structure is gone."

She added that in the 1950s and 1960s, most children in her community felt safe.

"We didn't know parents who were in prison or on crack," she said, adding, "life was scary outside of Long Branch for an African American child who had never been more than 10 miles from the neighborhood. But in the 1970s, when drugs moved into the communities, even home became a minefield.

"When crack hit Long Branch in the early '80s, it wreaked irrevocable havoc on the black community," she said, noting that much has changed in her hometown since her childhood.

"Many times I feel like a stranger in my hometown. It became more and more depressing to see men and women who had shared dreams of achievement and success fall prey to substance abuse."

Morris said that when she was growing up, the church was very instrumental, but the church needs to be doing a lot more to reach out to gangs and lost children.

"You've got to provide an alternative to drugs. People need jobs. They need an incentive not to do drugs, not to become pregnant as a teenager," she said.

She explained that when she was accepted to Simmons College, that was tangible. She knew it was her "big break."

She said young people can't make good choices if they don't know they have choices. There must be programs that expose them to other lifestyles.

"I am appalled by the gang situation in the long Branch area. We're raising kids that don't have a conscience," Morris said. "That was totally unheard of in my day."

She has devoted her career to understanding the issues and helping adolescents. She has directed teen pregnancy and parenting programs, and developed and implemented an adolescent school-based health center in Jersey City.

In addition, a nationally recognized teen abstinence program that she founded was featured on CBS and cable networks.

In her work, she saw firsthand how girls were engaging in sex because they were seeking the love and affirmation that they should have received from their fathers, and witnessed hundreds of young black boys leaving school, "a sure route to crime and imprisonment."

It has been seven years since she moved on from the school-based program, but Morris keeps in touch with a number of the youths who benefited from her initiative. She feels heartened by the successes, but she is too honest to fool herself. She says "the missteps and tragedy far outweigh the success stories."

Morris acknowledges that there was tension in her household, conflict with her mother, acting-out behavior that landed her in trouble and self- esteem problems, but at least she didn't grow up with parents who were crack addicts, parents who neglected their children.

"Parents back in the day worked hard. They sent their children to Sunday School and church. They disciplined their children, and despite some of the mixed messages, they did have expectations and standards," she said. "The values that I grew up with as a poor, black child in the [19]60s, are missing in the lives of too many poor, black kids today."

She encourages people to join mentoring programs like Big Brothers/Big Sisters, or to provide tutorial services through local community centers, or serve as a foster parent to the thousands of children in the foster care system.

"African American men in particular must step up to the plate and provide support and guidance to young brothers who are struggling in school and other aspects of their lives."

Morris still works with children through mentoring, public speaking, counseling.

"I still maintain contact with young people through different youth groups. I will always have a yearning to give back," she said. "Nothing disturbs me more than to see adults with resources do nothing to give back to children that are less fortunate."

She believes that everyone has a responsibility to be a catalyst for change.

"No matter how small or large a role we might play, each step toward change can improve conditions for our young people and our communities."

Of late, Morris has been busy attending book signings. In January she was in West Orange, Silver Springs, Md., and at the Quinn Chapel, A.M.E. Church in Atlantic Highlands.

This month, Black History Month, she will be at book signings in Miami, Fla., Cumberland County and Somerset among others. In addition, she will be at the West Long Branch Barnes and Noble in the near future and at Brookdale Community College in the spring.

Morris said feedback on her book has been phenomenal.

"At first people in Long Branch were leery, but once they read the book, they said they liked it."

Morris writes that her mother provided the necessities for her, but she rarely showed affection. "I have few precious memories of her hugging or kissing me," she said.

Speculating on what made her mother so stern, she has decided it was because of the hard-scrabble life she had as an African American child growing up in the heart of the Jim Crow South, picking cotton alongside her mother and helping her clean white people's homes at a time when there were colored-only sections in movie theaters, on buses, at lunch counters.

"Mama grew up believing that it was more important to know how to survive than to wear your emotions on your sleeve," she said.

Morris calls her mother, "a true survivor." Morris herself, should be called a true thriver. There is no irony in that.

For information about Morris and "How Ya Like Me Now!," visit her Web site www.howyalikemenow.com.