I’m descended from the brother of the first slave trader in our family, and there were three generations of people who traded in humans in this family.

During the summer of 2001, a group of white descendants of the DeWolf family went on a journey to deal with what white people need to talk with each other about and learn about. Our family group of ten retraced the Triangle Trade from Rhode Island to Ghana and Cuba to make a documentary feature film called “Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North” that will be released in 2008.

A lunch during this Coming to the Table event was the first time I’ve heard a black person talk about what it feels like to be called a nigger. It was the first time in my life that it didn’t raise all this intense fear and emotion in me, hearing that word in a conversation, because the conversations were designed to confront these truly personal and difficult issues in a safe environment. It was enlightening and gave me hope for future conversations like this.

In this nation we cover our pain. We have a headache, we take aspirin. We’re depressed, we take drugs. We watch reality TV to escape reality. We do everything except connect with each other. Being able to be here is one more reinforcement that I can talk to black people directly about issues that matter. Learning about black folks having secrets that they don’t share with us white folks is another revelation. Maybe we can get over that. The thing I so appreciate about the people here at this retreat is this absolute willingness on everyone’s part to embrace each other and face our ancestry and our futures together; the willingness to give up our silence.

Obviously I can’t undo the unfairness of the past. But if I can make it so my grandson and his grandchildren have it better than we do, then we become good ancestors. After all, we’re the ancestors of the future.

Tom’s powerful memoir of his life-changing journey with his cousins, “Inheriting the Trade,” will be published by Beacon Press in January 2008. For more information, go to www.inheritingthetrade.com.