Chapter 1: In the Beginning

Lisa’s View

Born as the cherished youngest of four to my exceptional parents, James and Elizabeth Ragland, I hail from a lineage where love and vitality spring eternal. Elizabeth, affectionately known as Luby, was the resilient second child among eight to Lonie and Tom Huntley, and she emerged as the unofficial leader of her siblings in Raleigh, North Carolina. It was evident that my maternal grandparents had no issues with infertility.

Our family tree boasts branches that intertwine in unusual ways, with my mom’s sister Aunt Mae’s marriage to my dad’s brother John creating a special bond of “double cousins” who were more like additional siblings. My aunt Mae, whose own brood expanded the family roll call to almost an astonishing one hundred, could be compared to the folks in the book of Numbers in the Bible—they “begat” a whole lot by being fruitful and multiplying. I can recall my aunt Mae praying over my belly, asking God to allow me to conceive, and my uncle John asking me what was taking so long or “What do you mean you’re trying to conceive?” Something that came so easily to his family became something I would give anything to achieve.

Nevertheless, my mom was a peculiar but very proud woman. As a teenager, growing up in the segregated South, she would sometimes try to mingle with the affluent to mirror their outfits and demeanor. She would study the pattern of their clothes and create inexpensive replicas for her and her sisters. My mom was also a stickler for order. She instilled in her siblings the zeal for success that became their hallmark. It was at a dance near Chavis Park in Raleigh that she met my father, a teenager with a spark, hailing from Knightdale, North Carolina. As the story goes, Mom and Dad were at a dance, and back in those days, they would sprinkle soap powder on the floor. As my dad asked my mom to dance, he fell, and that was the beginning of him falling for her.

My dad was the oldest child of six children to Mary Irene and Steven Ragland. Dad was a mighty man of prayer and stayed true to his family and his faith.

My parents’ love quickly blossomed into new life in 1944 with my sister Barbara, a beacon of kindness who was loved by everyone. Barbara married the love of her life, Don Durant, and they gave birth to my best friends, Darrol “Shamello” and Danielle Durant. Following her in 1946 were my brother James, the epitome of success and piety, who married his college sweetheart Maxine Mayotte, and they gave birth to my awesome nephews Maurice and Keith, and my sister Gail in 1954, the cool icon of the ’70s, whose children Crystal and Justin are my heart’s delight.

Mom made certain that she and dad worked hard to save for a better life up North. Shortly after Gail was born, they relocated to New York to escape the Jim Crow South.

Gail was my idol. I can still see her wearing her bell bottoms and platform shoes with a beautifully manicured Afro that framed her gorgeous brown face. I wanted to be just like her, but she didn’t care much for me. Gail loved me, but I took her place as the baby of the family and she was not very happy to give up that title. My siblings, who were twenty, eighteen, and ten years older than me, had no issues with conceiving their children.

As for me? My dawn broke on a brisk October morning in 1964, in Howard Beach, New York. The baby of the family, I was the surprise beneath the cloak of menopause and the miracle beside a growing fibroid. My mom was bedridden for most of the nine months that she carried me, which was fodder for Gail’s initial dislike of her baby sister. Coddled and adored, my childhood was a tapestry of love, religion, and song—a prelude to the days when my voice would find its strength at the dining room table, turning spoons into microphones and family dinners into concerts. My mom and brother-in-law, Don, would stand me up on the dinner table at three years old and ask me to sing the latest gospel song. I can vividly remember singing a popular song: “I made a vow to the Lord.” What I didn’t realize then was that my singing became a secret weapon used to get anything I wanted from my parents and what I didn’t get from them came from my much older siblings.

This was the life that shaped me. Every opportunity my mom got to showcase my talent at local churches, she did. She would sometimes send up an anonymous note by an unassuming usher to whomever was leading service and request that Lisa Joy Ragland lead a solo. I had no fear, and I would walk proudly to the pulpit and sing my heart out. The church would shout and applaud, and I thought I was a superstar—the beginning of pride.

Around age eight, my mom began to position me on different gospel programs around the metropolitan tri-state area, and I received accolades and standing ovations until this one little girl, who would literally blow the roof off any church, started appearing on the same programs. Whenever I saw her name on a program, I would start to cry. I hated to go before or after her. I was cute singing my little old lady church songs, and my staple song was “Lord Don’t Move my Mountain.” But this girl had a gift that loomed as large as the sky, and her voice would stir souls and touch hearts with every note she sang. Her name was Whitney Houston.

My formative years were steeped in an atmosphere rich with love and spiritual guidance, surrounded by the comforting rituals of church life. Sundays were marked by the sound of hymns, gospel traditions, and loud shouting in my church, Saint John’s Baptist Church, in Far Rockaway, New York. The original pastor of the church, the Reverend Joshua A. Jackson, was my mom’s uncle. All our family who migrated from North Carolina and their children went to this family church. My parents and our immediate family would drive twelve miles each way to this church, and I can still smell the fragrance of the chicken dinners and sugar-filled homemade pound cakes that were available after each service in the basement. I found refuge singing and laughing in the church with my cousins Terry and Tracy.

The year I was born was the same year my maternal grandmother passed away from a heart attack. At the time of her death, my mom, a few of her siblings, and her niece were pregnant. There were five of us born that year: Allen, Tracy, Gloria, Terrance (Terry), me, and Pam. I was extremely close with Tracy, my second cousin, and Terry, my double cousin, since we were the ones who attended church almost every day of the week. Tracy could play the piano at an early age, and Terry, his brother Brian, and my nephew Darrol (Shamello) and I would sing, direct the junior and youth choirs, and pretend we were preachers and act as if we were the leaders of the church. I was the female Kirk Franklin before his time, writing a song for my choir’s anniversary to the tune of Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean.” And I dared the church mothers to challenge me, so they didn’t.

Needless to say, I was considered a “church girl,” but I had no idea that someone could be very active in the church but still not have a true relationship with God. I did more sinning in the church than I did anywhere else.

I was almost nine years old when my family moved from my birth home in South Ozone Park to Laurelton, New York. The new neighborhood was integrated and very nice. My parents purchased our home for $23,000 in 1973. I loved the neighborhood, especially because there were six girls my age who lived on 231st Street. I didn’t know then that two of these girls would be my lifelong ride-or-die besties.

Tracey Jones lived two doors down, and she was a few months younger than me. The baby of her family, she was just as spoiled as I was. I remember one day while we were playing Double Dutch, Tracey’s mom commanded us to go back in our houses and take off our trendy clogs, until she got paid on Friday, because she had not yet purchased a pair of clogs for Tracey. Tracey also lived with her four older siblings, but she was so spoiled that her mom would buy beverages and put Tracey’s name on it so the other children wouldn’t drink it.

Shelby Kearney lived six doors down and across the street. She was two years older than me. Tracey and Shelby were inseparable until I moved on the block. We looked up to Shelby because she was older, and we thought she knew everything about life. Shelby was the baby of four siblings, and she was determined to be rich one day, even as a young girl. While Tracey and I were going through puberty, Shelby had the body and face of a goddess, and it amazed us how she could attract grown men. We were the best of friends, and Shelby appeared to be our fearless, knowledgeable leader until one day she decided that, since her father and my uncle were in the same lodge together, that she and I would no longer identify as friends but instead would tell everyone we were cousins.

We all bonded off our love of gospel music, boys, and choirs and because our families were from the South. We would laugh for hours about how our parents could mess up some words because of their limited education and being raised in the South.

When Shelby entered high school, Tracey and I were entering junior high school, but we would hang on every word of Shelby’s daily experiences, because she went to school in Manhattan, while we went to the local junior high schools close to our homes.

Shelby introduced us to the idea of tongue kissing and sex, and marijuana, although she was considered a “good girl.” Tracey and I went to different junior high schools, but we were with each other daily because Tracey started attending church with me and my family in Far Rockaway, New York.

Growing up in the 70s...