about
About
Rodger Collins, born in Santa Anna, Texas, has always been very inquisitive about how and why things work. Coupled with his fascination with anthropology and natural sciences, his early rural environment inspired him to observe people and the living things around him. This habit remained with him when his family resettled to the San Francisco Bay Area.
He is an honoree with a plaque bearing his name and celebrating his career and music contributions on Oakland’s Music Walk of Fame in Oakland, California.
Why I wrote the Books
I met and got to know many wonderful people from different ethnicities in my life journey who were naturally good folks. Some were known to have good hearts and some were thought not to have good hearts, for example, my granddaddy. In my book Guess Who I Met! I share an incident where he shared that tender side of himself although he had a very harsh life having been traded for a sack of flour and growing up in that environment as a slave.
I use to think that my granddaddy was mean and hated me. But looking back, I remember one day I saw him cry. I came to him one time and said, “Granddaddy would you be mad if I told you I love you?” I saw his eyes fill up with water. A tear ran down his face and he gently patted me on my head and said, “Go play boy.” Recently reflecting, I remembered saying to myself, “Wow, my granddaddy loved me!”
I discovered that some people who appear to be mean are only mean because they can’t or couldn’t find peace. If they could find peace and accept it, peace wouldn’t let them be mean. I was placed in the presence of many different types of people who shared their lives with me. I’m grateful to my Creator for making me like a sponge soaking up the good when I recognize it.
So, writing Guess Who I Met! is my gesture of appreciation for the countless number of people who may never be recognized for the giants that they really are. In it I share the string of discoveries I experienced along the way in my life’s journey. Although I met many along the way my biggest discovery of “persons” is when I met me.