Cover of The HelpThis morning, while listening to the WAPT.com Wednesday Morning Webcast, I discovered that  it was reported on Feb 2011 that maid, Ablene Cooper, is suing Kathryn Stockett because the likeness of Aibileen in her novel, "The Help."  Ms. Cooper, who works as a maid for the brother of Stockett is shocked and humiliated at the stereotypes surrounding her likeness and that her name would be used.

Her employers, Robert and Carol Stockett agree and are upset as well.  In the book, Aibileen compares her skin color to a cockroach.  The following details are too close in comparison according to Ms. Cooper:

• The names, Aibileen and Ablene
•  Both maids have a gold tooth
• Both maids lost their sons to cancer

"The lawsuit, which was filed in Mississippi state court in Hinds County, asks for $75,000 with no punitive damages or other fees."Ablene will probably be the last one to get a nickel out of it," Stockett Jr. said. "You can't buy that much for $75,000." The author's father puts little stock in the suit. See Black Maid Sues Says "The Help' is Humiliating

See:  A Critical Review of the Novel, "The Help."

Cover of The HelpNo song resonates more with Over Troubled Water than the song from the soundtrack of "The Help" by Mary J. Blige entitled "Living Proof."  You can listen for yourself below.  Our stories whether oral or gleaned from the annals of history validate who we are, where we come from, and what we have been through.

We have a personal history and so do our ancestors.  We simply cannot make it unless we acknowledge these stories. Our experiences have not been easy and we bare the scars.  A great measure of our pain comes from the secrets and the denial of what we have endured personally and as a people.

We owe it to ourselves, to those who did not make it, to those who did, and to our children to document and tell the stories so that history cannot be questioned, changed, denied, or repeated.  Gathering and preserving the history qualifies us.

Talk to our people and we all will continue to identify ways to heal, to be strengthened, and to grow.  Herein lies the power:  In the story!  How can we know which way to go if we do not know where we have been?

"The Help"  will come to a theater near you on August 12.  It is a story in the words of African American maids in Jackson, Mississippi in the 1960's.  They left for work walking or perhaps on buses to the homes of white people where they cleaned, fed, and took care of another household. We will see the treatment they endured, and my goodness I learned that they even nursed the babies from my daughter who recently read the book.

The maids in this community got together to tell their story against all odds.  I am anxious to learn of the impact it had on their lives and community.  After August 12th, that impact will more than likely become even more immeasurable.  Then again, that is the power of a story. Are you ready?

Thanks to African Traced Descendants of the Diaspora for posting!