Adinkra Gye Nyame , a Ghanaian symbol that means “no one knows the beginning or ending of anything, except God.
She was born on April 6, 1949. She earned her wings, Friday December 16, 2022 She was 73, a native and resident of Chicago, IL. She was a graduate of DuSable High School and DePaul University As a child, Susan could be found playing in front of the house, roller skating, jumping double dutch or dancing to Motown sounds. She had lots of friends. Those friends remain in her network today. There were many days that she had to drag her little sister along in her adventures with friends, but she was extremely protective of her sister and would not let anyone discipline her other than herself.
Susan has always been fashion conscious. Her mother was a beautician, but Susan’s mother could not meet Susan’s standard for fashionable hairstyles. Susan was also very particular about the way she dressed. Her weekly allowance was not sucient to keep her in the style she wanted to present, so she got a job at an early age, and began to take charge of her personal image.
Susan was an avid reader, having developed a love for reading while her parents read to her as a child. She seemed to memorize the book and would reread the book to her parents. Eventually, she got a job at the Blackstone Library. She invested much of her time reading and writing. She would write poems for her friends when they wanted to impress someone they were dating. She was published in one of the early editions of Essence Magazine.
Susan had an interesting way of demonstrating her intelligence. Instead of going to school and getting good grades, she left home supposedly to go to school, but it is still unclear where she spent the school day. It was not until progress report time that Susan’s mom learned that Susan was in jeopardy of failing. Susan would immediately be put on punishment. Her
social life was put on hold until she
completed all the homework and tests that should have been completed during that progress report period. When she was released from punishment, she resumed her social presence until the next progress
report reached home.
Susan AKA Ahnydah (the Administrator) enjoyed a bevy of diverse experiences throughout her life and has impressively navigated the journey during every challenge. Susan was a change agent wherever she called home (whether in West Africa or the South Side of Chicago).
Susan longed to visit Africa since a young child after seeing Kwame Nkrumah (first president of modern-day Ghana) in his ceremonial Kente cloth robes. This curiosity would lead her to Liberia, West Africa for eleven years.
In 1978, at the age of 29 Susan joined the Original Hebrew Israelite Foundation AKA The Nation. Through a series of events, Susan was heading to Liberia in 1979 as a member of The Nation. Shortly after arriving in Liberia, Susan reached out and was grateful to receive an opportunity to work for the Liberian National Red Cross. She welcomed the challenge of working alone in the Liberian community for over 10 years, eventually becoming the Directress of the Liberian Red Cross. After moving away from The Nation, Susan was deeply implanted in the Liberian culture rarely interacting with any Americans.
In addition to working as a Directress of the Red Cross, Susan grew and packaged mung, lentil, and azuki bean sprouts for sale in local grocery stores and restaurants. In January 1989, Susan left her position at the Red Cross to open the “First Steps Child Development Center” with her Liberian friend; sadly, due to the impinging civil war, the school was closed in May of 1989. Using her inner voice as a north star, Susan traversed some of her most enriching life opportunities in Africa.
Rael Jackson, a leader on the MOBE Symposium team and with Real Men Charities, presenting Real Men Cook nonprofit, said he grew up in the business with Susan who is more like family.
In August 1990, Susan reluctantly left Liberia and returned to the South Side of Chicago. New challenges presented themselves in this familiar concrete jungle. Susan taught her five children how to navigate their new home in America, where the masses often question the idea of freedom and human dignity.
While parenting and holding down a fulltime job to earn her bachelor’s degree, Susan learned that her employer was downsizing. Being forewarned, she decided to visit the south side office of a friend in business; a marketing firm with a national commitment to Black health and fatherhood connected her education and passions.
Her leadership helped build Real Men Cook into the leading multi-city Father’s Day celebration it became, but placed her in a position to help manage a highly successful national marketing conference, the MOBE (Marketing Opportunities In Business & Entertainment) Symposium.
Susan learned to plan conferences in
leading hotels and conference centers,
including promotions to open Walt Disney World prosperities such as Disney Sports. Under Susan’s management, Real Men Cook went from being a local event to a Father’s Day tradition in a dozen cities. In addition, a major RMC book deal with Simon and Schuster was closed locally. At the same time, the RMC nonprofit Real Men Charities was a top results-driven success working with the Illinois Department of public health to fight prostate cancer and focused on extending the life expectancy of the Black male. Susan’s excellent organization and the opportunity to train young adults. engage children in travels, employment, and Black excellence celebrations, and always return benefits to the community, prepared her for leadership after seven years with the firm.
Susan received the Black Excellence Award for Non-Fiction from the African American Alliance of Chicago and the
Mate E. Palmer award for Non-Fiction from the Illinois Press Women’s Association. Stolen Rainbow is a short story focused on the post-combat recovery of a beautiful marine captain after a devastating combat injury. Broken Dolls represented Susan’s foray into mystery writing and was the first series featuring the flawed Detective Joi Sommers as its heroine. The second Joi Sommers mystery, The Iron Collar, is a riveting story with multiple ingenious twists. Slay the Dragon, the third in the series illuminates the sexual exploitation of children in expected and unexpected ways. Her most recent novella, The Chef’s Choice, is a delightful holiday romance. Susan’s work is highlighted in numerous anthologies. Susan was also currently writing articles for the magazine Garden Spices.
Please consider purchasing or donating
some of her books:
https://www.susandpeters.com/. Susan
always wanted her literature to make a
lasting impact.
Susan impacted the University of Chicago Medical Center and the South Side community surrounding it. For over a decade, she worked with a determined and creative spirit to help build a comprehensive and well-traveled pathway between the Medical Center and the community of almost one million people, organizations, congregations, and publicly elected officials. Working closely with a team led by Michelle Obama, Susan was a continuous source of ideas about ways to communicate and connect with the Southside and use the Medical Center’s deep resources to improve health and wellbeing.
Susan with daughter-in-love Chartay Robinson
Her brilliance in event planning and building connections helped the new Office of Community Affairs establish an unprecedented presence beyond Hyde Park. Susan created and launched the weekly Community Health Focus Hour on WVON. She built a community connections database of almost 10,000 Southside stakeholders. Susan increased visibility and faculty/staff participation in long-standing community celebrations (Real Men Cook, Bud Billiken, Black Women’s Expo, and more) by more than five-fold during her tenure. She also increased Day of Service & Reflection to 300 plus participants in twenty-six communities, established a Diabetes Education program, launched bilingual community health education pieces, and increased the local economy with diverse businesses. Susan also built UCM’s fitness prog ram into a model of Southside/civic partnership to improve the health of our community.
In addition to her busy career, Susan raised five children and was the proud grandmother of thirteen grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
Susan enjoyed swimming; she was part of a swimmer’s group at the Kroc Center, where she enjoyed the fellowship. The community garden was another one of Susan’s favorite pastimes. She loved spending hours in the garden exercising her green thumb.
Susan was a caring and thoughtful person who always made space for those closest to her. She was a courageous, enthusiastic, critical thinker who would blaze a trail with grit and gumption. Susan was loved and adored by so many people as she was a friend to all but most importantly, she was a friend to those who had none. Her absence will be felt by many for years to come. As her loved ones, we lift our heads, finding comfort in the Truth of the rest and wholeness she now finds embracing the Eternal.
Roberta Jackson (who preceded Susan in death), Susan and Diane (Thembi) Jordan
Kilolo Moyo, Susan and Yvette Moyo, August 2022
Susan with the women of Sisterbration.
Susan, posing proudly with her Five children.
Susan with daughter-in-love Chartay Robinson
She leaves to mourn, her father in love Wayne Lambert; Sister, Yvonne Bond, Sister in-Law: Danielle Crawford; Brother: Gregory Crawford, Brother in-Law: Jay Bond, Daughters: Tonya Peters, Zevah Johnson and Hope Peters Daughter in-Law: Elizabeth Katie Mwewe, Daughter in Love: Chartay Robinson, Sons: Gyasi Mwewe and Muasa Mwewe, Son in-Law: Doreon Johnson and Corey Tilly, Nephew: Andrew Crawford, Grandchildren: Yahanna, Ronda, Ryanne, Kalazeh, Kavon, Kamari, Taryn, Karon, Khalil, Kira, Kaleb, Kaniyah, Kaimyn, Kameryn, and Karlee; Great-Grandchild: Kaliyah, Cousins: Devon Anderson and Ariel Anderson; her beloved girlfriends, Joyce Brown, those in her Sisterbration circle including special friends. Diane “Thembi” Jordan, Kimya Moyo and Yvette Moyo; and host of family, friends, colleagues, and admirers.
Susan was preceded in death by her parents: Sarah Lambert and George Peters, Brother: Godfrey Sinclair Peters and Grandson: Kaiden Sommer -Allen.
Susan authored a number of best-selling books, and she also wrote articles for publication.
In March, 2022 she wrote the following article for Garden Spices Magazine, an online magazine published by Vicki Basley Goldston.
INSIGHTFULAGING
“ living a vigorously physical and intellectual life…”
By Susan Peters
Originally published in Garden Spice
Magazine in March 4, 2022
“Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced” James Baldwin.
I am in my seventh decade. A former runner, my sprint through life, along with that of other baby boomers, is more mental than physical now. Boomers are living longer, with fewer children to care for us. A Google search reveals that the average life expectancy of a woman born in 1925, the year my mother was born, was 60.6. She lived to be 96. The life expectancy of a woman born in 1949, the year I was born, is 73.2. So modern science offers us longer life, though not necessarily better-quality lives than the generation before us. A painful conundrum.
I binge-watched Frankie and Grace, the Netflix series starring two of my favorite actors, Jane Fonda and Lillie Tomlin. It oers an intelligent, funny, bittersweet view of the lives of two aging women who learn that their husbands are gay and in love with one another after decades of marriage.
While the men’s “coming out” is a central theme, the aspect of the series that resonates with me is the representation of the issues of aging my generation faces. Ageism, joint replacement, dementia, the desire to age in place are all themes we encounter as our bodies betray us.
We often hear the term “age gracefully.” I believe aging gracefully is an oxymoron. Getting older is an increasing state of rigidity. Although a tree’s young, green limb is soft and bendable, a mature branch breaks when bent. It is hard to accept and adapt to our physical and mental changes. Recently my forty-year-old son said, “The need for security conditions us to resist change, causing suering, even as the Universe shows us that change is the only thing that is permanent.”
At seventy-two, I am grateful to be living a vigorously physical and intellectual life, aging is the farthest thing from my mind, yet I see and feel the changes coming. It starts with an ache that visits regularly until it becomes permanent. We notice thinning hair and skin that becomes so dry that constant moisturizing is essential for comfort.
The intervention products get thicker and smell worse. Personally, the skin on my back is so sensitive that I cut or rip the tags from all my shirts and tees lest they irritate me to the brink of insanity. Sensitive skin is real.
So…how do we face the reality that we will leave the spring of our lives, move into fall and finally face the cold winter? How the hell do you do that gracefully?
As gracefully as possible, passing the baton and accepting our transition from invincible youth to vulnerable elders distributes the reins of accumulated power and leadership. Thus, allowing the next generation’s heroes to move forward, as we accept a role as mentors and knowledge giants.
There is a lot of juice in us still! Planning for others to take the lead is necessary.
Here are my thoughts on preparing for the ungracefulness of aging.
- Design your best-case scenario while you have the time. For example, do you desire to live at home with paid support join a retirement community with graduated levels of care? Move in with your family?
- Hold the Line. Exercise, eat healthily, and develop a partnership with your doctor.
- Access your finances realistically. That includes social security earnings, pension, investment, real estate, and savings.
- Evaluate your possessions. If you love an item and want it to live beyond you, give it to people or organizations that will value it. Or be okay with survivors tossing your treasures into a dumpster.
- Access your support system. Do you have trusted persons that can share in your care? Have you invested in long term care insurance that will finance your lifelong care?
- Plan your happy ending. Yes, you can Pre Plan your funeral, homegoing, or whatever your tradition is for the resting place of your mortal remains. Write your obituary. Tell your story your way. That way, there are no unintentional omissions.
- Put your power of attorney in place. A power of attorney is a person, or persons, that you legally empower to make decisions about your health and finance s in the event of your incapacitation. Make it clear who will make those decisions. Confusion can rip a family apart.
Plan for an elderhood that honors you and those who care for you.
Susan D. Peters, aka, Ahnydah (ah-NIE-dah) Rahm, brings a wealth of experience gained as an expatriate living in West Africa. Her memoir Sweet Liberia, Lessons from the Coal Pot, received the Black Excellence Award for Non-Fiction from the African American Alliance of Chicago and the Mate E. Palmer award for Non-Fiction from the Illinois Press Women’s Association. Stolen Rainbow, a short story focused on the post combat recovery of a beautiful marine captain after a devastating combat injury. Broken Dolls, represents Susan’s foray into mystery writing and is the first of a series featuring the flawed Detective Joi Sommers as its heroine. The second Joi Sommers mystery, The Iron Collar is a riveting story with multiple ingenious twists, and Slay the Dragon the third in the series, illuminates the sexual exploitation of children in expected and unexpected ways. Susan’s work is featured in numerous anthologies. Buy her books online and at www.SusanDPeters.com.
