Athens:glimpses of home: Renard Phillips

the latest in the Athens series in the Athens News:

Eyes that have seen the world find simplicity in Athens

Athens: glimpses of home

By Jenaye Antonuccio (photo by Sherry DiBari)
March 3, 2008

He has witnessed the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, been the recipient of the only meal in the house while others go hungry, and stood upon a Finland floor that lifted to reveal an ice hole for fishing.

Yet, he has chosen to settle in rural southeast Ohio, working as a librarian at the Athens Public Library. But for Renard Phillips, context is like a flashlight beam, shining onto the dark shapes of before and after. Without knowledge of surrounding words and circumstances, discovering meaning is difficult.

“Context is one of my favorite words, and we rarely give the effort to provide it,” Phillips said.

He maintains that out of fairness and respect, a person’s context should be explored. “People out of laziness want to put people in a box, reducing to a one-dimensional type of category. For example, my context is not just, ‘I was born in Georgia.’”

Phillips’ pre-Athens life is extensive and fascinating. After the death of his mother, and that of his father a few years later, he was forced to become secure without family ties.

“Home is where I am. It’s about applying me to where I am,” said Phillips. “My sense of home has not evolved as most people’s would.”

He began traveling, initially with Up With People, an organization designed to help build bridges of understanding between cultures for foundations of world peace. Months turned into years of rich experiences in numerous places. He returned to the United States directly after time spent in Senegal. Homecoming was less than positive.

“It was culture shock to be in the U.S. and in southeast Ohio,” he said. “I came here and all of a sudden I became intensely aware that I was black person. I wasn’t prepared for that. Our society is very ‘yes/no,’ ‘on/off,’ and ‘black/white.’ There is a whole range of things in between.”

Before Senegal, he had met a group of Afro-Germans in Berlin and realized his own ignorance about his roots.

“They really opened my eyes to how ignorant I was of Africa,” said Phillips. “I couldn’t rely on my own society to give me a healthy context of Africa, because here in the U.S., the context is negative. And if I thought so negatively about Africa, what did I think of myself?”

This prompted his visit to Senegal, where seven separate languages are spoken, to gather his own frame of reference.

“Most of us didn’t make a conscious decision what color we would be, what gender, what nationality, what ethnicity,” Phillips said. “That’s just what we were born into. We are merely products of our environment versus products of ourselves.”

Traveling was stimulating and profound for him.

“I’ve experienced the beauty in people, profound grace in people,” he said. “Two days from now I could be in another place, but still they choose to share.”

But he began to feel the down-side of a nomadic existence, and returned to the states to find closure with issues concerning his parents’ deaths.

He came to Ohio University for graduate school in international studies, but his present context is his employment at the public library. Before he was hired, he thought about the type of work atmosphere where he’d feel good about what he was doing.

“It’s a place where people want to go; no one is forcing them,” Phillips said.

Interaction with the diverse public of Athens is a given.

“You see the whole gamut of the community: from newborns for ‘lap-sit,’ to people who are well into retirement, to teens,” Phillips said. “You see kids develop from walking to talking, watch them grow up.”

Interacting with this microcosm of Athens, he said he treats everyone the same.

“I treat people with dignity regardless of their socioeconomic background, appreciating them,” he said.

Simplicity narrows a person’s context. To Phillips, Athens is a place to be simple.

“That’s the foundation of my appreciation of Athens. You can be simple here with not a lot of money, but still have a relatively good style of living,” he said. “You shouldn’t need to be wealthy to have basic things: good air, good water, good nutrition.”

Phillips appreciates Athens’ lack as opposed to its luster.

He said, “Athens does not provide all my needs, of course not, but what place would? There are things to keep you distracted in other cities.”

After seeing so much in his lifetime, Phillips views this town as a source of solace. “Athens has provided a great place for me to synthesize. Being simple allowed me to bring some order to all the input I had.”

Here in America, stimulation and materialism are rampant. Genuineness is not easy to come by.

Said Phillips, “Here a friendship is about social convenience. Most of us are not required to leave our comfort zone. You learn to appreciate what people volunteer to share with you and the way they choose to share it.”

Since 1993, Phillips has called Athens home. It is the alternatives of Athens – straw bale houses, slow food and organic venues, the focus on solar power – that appeal to him. But it is Athens’ simplistic uniqueness that roots him.

“It is not quite yet one of those places where one town after another looks the same,” he said. “Athens is a microcosm of essentials. I see it as a luxury to live here."