David McElroy

Motivation should come from within. That’s what everybody says. You can read it in self-help books and on motivational posters. It’s what every well-meaning friend tells you.

Needing motivation from someone else is a crutch.

Ideas have always been easy for me, but being able to execute on those ideas has been trickier. I start projects and I can even know that a piece of work would be good if I finished it, but I lack the motivation to finish.

I end up staring at a blank page that never turns into a script. I look over old notes from a book project that never made it. I look at ideas I love — projects stillborn yet still full of possible life — and I feel powerless to breathe life into them. I crave a flesh-and-blood motivation — admiration, love, approval, passion — to inspire me to make my art.

I long for a crutch to help me walk.

For many years, I had wanted to make a film. I had ideas and I talked about making a first short film for a long time. But for years it was only talk — until something changed.

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The little family stood out because of the mixed skin colors but mostly because all three children were so young — enough to keep both parents constantly dealing with one or another as they ate dinner at Chick-fil-A in Birmingham on a Saturday evening.

The parents were both white and appeared to be early to mid 30s. A boy who appeared Latino was about 4 years ago. A black boy and girl were both about 2 or 3, I’d guess.

The table was a constant buzz of talk — children asking questions and wanting help, parents correcting and guiding. But it was all orderly and the tone of voice was always loving and kind. One of the boys seemed fascinated by my MacBook and he had trouble understanding his mom’s explanation that it’s impolite to stare at strangers.

After they ate, they pulled out little books and read together. Each child had a different book. I couldn’t tell what the books were all about, but I saw the younger ones pointing to cows and dogs and pigs and correctly identifying each. Both parents worked with each child from time to time.

It was like controlled chaos, but full of love and happiness.

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Larry was 17 years old in 1974. He had lied about his age to get his first job, working at a steel fabrication shop. As he approached his 18th birthday, he had been working for nearly six months. Getting a loan to buy an inexpensive used car changed his life.

Race relations weren’t great between blacks and whites in Birmingham in 1974. Larry had started his education in all-black schools and then been part of integration, something that had been very controversial and at times confrontational. It was a time and place when many black people and many white people were suspicious of one another.

Larry’s attitude toward white people was guarded and suspicious. Who can blame him for feeling that way? He knew that many white people around him didn’t want him as part of their society. His attitudes hardened because of small battles, too. When he was in high school, the principal told him he had to shave off his afro or leave the school — so he transferred to a vocational school rather than comply.

By the time Larry had that first job, he was wondering whether a young black man could get a break from a society that had been dominated by racist white men. And then he needed to buy a car.

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