danielle belton
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My Ancestors Want Me to Make a Banana Pudding for Juneteenth [Updated]
My mother hated to cook. She was a good cook when it came to things she liked—rice, chicken, all kinds of soul food and sweet desserts—and a bad cook for things she didn’t understand or eat. For years, I thought steak was supposed to be tough like shoe leather and chewier than gum. I thought…
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What Juneteenth and My Father Taught Me About 'Expectations'
I wouldn’t know Juneteenth without my father. He’s the Texan. He grew up celebrating the holiday that started on June 19, 1865, when slaves on Galveston Island, Texas, finally learned they’d been freed under the Emancipation Proclamation two years prior. Even though he now lived in St. Louis, he’d always make the same jokey reference…
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The 19 Things I Cooked in Self-Isolation and What They Say About My Mental State
“I’ll do something that makes me happy.” That’s how I justified that red velvet cake I made that I didn’t even bother to put icing on, as I was so happy to eat it just plain. Greedily, like a little kid. But it was a large and I had to eventually slice it up and…
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How to Win Friends and Influence People in a Psychiatric Ward
They tried to make it nice. They festooned the rec room in plastic Christmas decorations and bought us all donuts. There was even a special meal—dressing and gravy with a slice of turkey. But store-bought donuts and cafeteria holiday dinner didn’t change the fact that we all—patients and nurses included—were spending Christmas in an L.A.…
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The Root Joins PBS' Independent Lens and the film Bedlam for a Discussion on Mental Health and Mass Incarceration
The numbers are staggering. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, more than one in five adults—essentially 40 million Americans—are living with mental illness, including severe mental illnesses like schizophrenia, severe depression and bipolar disorder, of which I, too, am a sufferer. But when it comes to me, someone who enjoys a great career…