Who Am I?

Who am I?  Why is that such a ridiculous question at first, "Who are you?”   I say (if and when asked) that I'd reply, in my ever-so sarcastic yet charming manner, "Why, I'm Tory Cook (duh?)".  Then you have to think, just exactly who the hell are you?  What makes you you and what makes him him or her her or it it?  I then think, I'm an amateur anthropologist, an empty daydreamer, a half-assed musician, a Southerner, a free spirit, a survivor, a man.  Too many things to think of in an instance!  Of course, you have to think, "what made me who I am?”  A lot that's what!  A lot of crap and joy and mistakes and fuck ups, a lot of hoorays and right-ons, that's what.  Either way, to quote a recent influence in life, I'll carry on, either way.  I have a lot to say, and no one to say it to or no one I think wants to listen.  But people do listen to what I say, even when I'm saying it in a smart ass way to make fun of them, or taunt their curiosity, or even many times just to hear my own voice!

So, who am I?  I was born on October 3rd, 1978, in a hospital in Laurinburg, NC, on a Tuesday at 4:19pm (a time that has run its ironic course in my life thus far, just close enough to the fabled 4:20, but not quite).  My mother was a young woman on the verge of experiencing the life as a mother of a first born son and a father who was well, just not ready for it all!  I'm not sure what she’d expected of that kid to become, but her choice to give birth to a child with a name like mine in a hospital in Scotland County definitely was a precursor for whom I was to be.  As I hear it told, I was quite a spoiled child, considering I was not only her first, but also the first grandchild on my maternal side.  Counter that with being born to the second born in that family of seven and I was meant to receive way too much attention (Did I also mention that was the first great-grandchild to her mother’s mother too?).  I guess that bit of indulgence might have made somewhat of an intolerable child, but to my relief (and I'm sure to her dismay), two quite rowdy brothers followed shortly along!  So we became 3 of the 4 "Cook Boys" of Raeford, NC (the fourth being my cousin the same as one of my brothers). 

I like that I was born in Laurinburg, Scotland County (it is a real place, full of golf courses, a kilt clad, bagpipe blowing high school marching band and a whole lot of folks named McLean, McLaughlin, Mc…), a black American boy from the country named Toriano Chakar.  I have just recently started to wonder what goes through the minds of people awaiting my arrival, at a job interview or to greet me for some function.  What is their TRUE reaction when they meet me and not some suave Italian or Spanish guy with a switch in his walk and an oh-so Mediterranean manner about him?  I hated that name for so long, partially because of the inability of many of my teachers to pronounce it (especially the English teachers… you’d think phonetics would be something someone teaching a language in any capacity would have an inkling of knowledge about!).  However, now I enjoy the prospect of surprising those awaiting my presence and presenting to them a young black man from Southeastern NC named Toriano.  It's a big task to keep up such a unique personality to correspond to a name like that!  I think of mama and thank her in my mind for that little gift every time.  My name is so much me now that from time to time, especially in situation where I meet someone I perceive might be impressed by ‘Toriano’ (hipsters mostly), I shy from presenting myself as "Tory", my nickname turned common alias for quite some time.  Although she may realize it, her singular decision of choosing that name put me on a road to becoming the worldly freak I now am now.  "Toriano Chakar Cook."  Rings like some prolific character in history, or at least as what I see myself as being one day.  I should have been a model.  And now introducing... "Toriano"! I think it rivals Donatella or Twiggy as a title for glamour on the runway any day (too bad I didn't get the looks or fashion sense to go with the name). 

I also grew up feeling a little weird by my middle name, Chakar.  It was primarily because of pronunciation gaffes, usually with the person reading the word on a page and struggling to figure it out in their heads, saying it (always incorrectly) under their breath, typically hitting the ‘r’ too hard or dropping it completely.  Most would just give up and say it wrong, I didn’t care to correct them (they’d soon forget it and I think I’d already become a little elitist back then so I didn’t really give a damn anyway!).   There we the few, though, who would finally give in and ask, "is that Chakar, as in chalk or Chakar as in sha?” 

Another problem that I noticed growing up surrounding my name was the general acceptance of it.  ‘Tory’ ultimately was simple to say and wasn’t ‘so foreign’, so I think most of people I interacted with in school preferred it.  I was usually one of the few non-white kids in my classes (even though the schools were pretty proportionate in terms of the ethnic diversity one might find in a small Southern town in the Eighties and Nineties.  Bane of being one of the smart kids!).  My classmates all had the name staples of Southern American life; George, Susan, Katie, Richard, James, Elizabeth; then there I was "Toriano Chakar".   Being a rather shy kid, having some teacher make a show of saying your name and draw much unwanted attention to myself and my huge glasses wasn’t exactly thrilling.  I think all would have been okay if they only had trouble with Chakar, but from my earliest memories, you would have thought someone had given people a Sudoku puzzle of tongue twisters!  

I think it is quite ironic that every country, every region of every country, I've ever visited, no one has had troubles with pronouncing this linguistically syllable basic name, except those from my home!  If my silly 'English superiority complex' computer could type in East Asian languages (like Windows XP support says it can), I could type this name in Chinese, Korean and Japanese flawlessly!  They get it! 

Then, as if fate has always meant to put me back on the ground where I belong, I get the exotic and awe-inspiring family name, ‘Cook’.  It's like seeing the most beautiful impressionistic mural ever painted, with colors never conceptualized by a human artist, to only read in the corner "Created by Wal-Mart".  Damn!  Okay, so I am a Cook, whether I feel some transcendental connection to all the folks of the world and the human cause or not.  It is one undeniable part of me that connects to who I really am.  Cook is my grandfather, my mother's father's name.  His family, as far back as we know before getting to the whole ‘long trip on a boat’ incident, is from North Carolina.  I hope an explanation of how we descendants of African-descended slaves ended up with an English name is not needed!  So, I am forever tied to the geography of my African American heritage.  My mother's mother (Grandma Cook!) is a Washington.  She pretty much grew up in New Jersey, although her family is from South Carolina.  So we, as Black Americans, are to be known, for now and forever, as Cooks and Washingtons (ain't that some shit!). 

Probably one of the most culturally saddening, yet hilarious times in my life was as an English teacher in Korea, hearing a Korean co-teacher state "Wow, you're family's name is Washington, so you have lineage to the great president George Washington!”  If I could only have had the appropriate Korean language skills and patience to explain how true that statement might really be!  My father's family name is Judd and if you know Country music, then you can see the jokes that tend to follow when I announce that little tidbit of my family history (that and the fact that I have a grandmother named ‘Minnie Pearl’).   His family, comprised of the Judds and the Manuels, are from North Carolina as well (again I state, as much as a displaced population like us Black American folks can be from anywhere outside of Africa, sarcasm very much intended on that one). 

Sometimes I feel a little jealousy towards people with African family names.  At least if they don't know where they are from, really from, they can follow their names.  I could try for a thousand years to trace my history through my names, Judd, Manuel, Cook or Washington, and would still end up somewhere in Western Europe!  Although I might have some milk in this chocolate, I seriously doubt my people were the descendants of pitifully ‘lost Moors’, just hangin' out north of the border. 

Sad really, when trying to answer the question, "Who are you?", but guess that's what lets you know exactly who you are.  I like that part about being American, especially considering that my family has a history in this country of at least one hundred and sixty years, while there are some other Americans whose families’ entrance can be traced back to Angel or Ellis Islands less than one-hundred years ago, yet they don’t know jack about their Old World roots either!  If you can formulate some definition of "thyself" from the information you got, well, then you will always know who you are.  So, who am I..., I'm Toriano Chakar Cook!

Gastonia, NC (Spring, 2008)