Woke to Blackness (Origin Stories part 2)

What is this hand holding onto?

 From the earliest time that I can remember, there was an understanding that I had to be careful. My parents taught me to look sharply at my surroundings, at the media that I encountered--mostly on the television--and to act accordingly. On one level, I understood that when I went out into the world, I  represent my family name; it was important that I held that name in honor. But it wasn't until later that I began to put the pieces together--that one of the major reasons I had to be careful and do things differently was because I was a black person.

I wasn't given "the talk" per se. There wasn't a specific moment in my teens where my mother and father pulled me to the side to remind me that, because of the color of my skin, if I were stopped by the police, there were certain strategies I needed to employ to get home alive. Honestly, I didn't have a lot of friends growing up and the opportunity to use the family car was limited (where would I even go?). I was a homebody. Many folks in my church and life were police officers, so I grew up seeing them as heroes rather than something negative. (Living in New York and now Massachusetts as an adult has changed that a little). No, "the talk" was my life.

 Every commercial where a brown person was spotted my Dad would say, "Do you see how they are treating the black person there? Why is that? You never see them do that to the white person," helping me to identify stereotypical treatment of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color). We grew up learning and writing about great Black Americans who pushed the cause for racial equality (Marcus Garvey, Fannie Lou Hamer), demonstrating their ingenuity as they created varying inventions like the cotton gin (Eli Whitney), the three light traffic light (Garret Morgan), Laser cataract surgery (Patricia Bath) and the home security system (Marie Van Britten Brown). So we were pretty deeply indoctrinated with a keen awareness of our blackness...but not of being a minority.

In Detroit, most people I saw were black. And it wasn't often that we ventured outside of the city, nor did we have much reason to. What was noticeable was that there were very few Black families who were comfortable; many of the families we were in relationship with were struggling in some form or fashion. I suppose that's true with people in general. We went to predominantly black neighborhood schools. If there was a white person in my classroom, that was a bit peculiar. But we had something in common: in most social circles, we did not see ourselves as "normal". So it was often the case that I befriended many of them. My eyes opened more in college, where I went to a land-grant university. 

While there were many different ethnic groups represented at the school, it was painfully obvious that BIPOC were in the minority. This was the first time I'd truly experienced this. It made me fearful. I got the sense from many of the spaces I was in that I didn't "belong". My natural inclination was not to stick close to "my people" in terms of those who looked like me, but "my people" as it pertains to those who shared similar interests and beliefs. This meant that the church I attended in college was predominantly white...and a little uncomfortable.

Have I been stopped by the police? No. But I have noticed some white brothers and sisters move away from me--or to the other side of the street altogether--when I approach them. I've been talked down to, with the assumption that I don't have knowledge about a subject. At the time, I didn't know what microaggression meant. Now that I do, I realize that these incidences fell into that category. Time does not permit to mention my time in the South Bronx (where hip hop was born) or Harlem (Black brilliance and beauty on display), which really brought to mind a deep reality of God's blessing upon all people and particularly facets of his beauty displayed in Black people and the Black experience.

Being black is multi-faceted. There is a deep love that I have for my people and yet there is a frustration with

MSJ a beautiful group

our activities that, though often traced back to the way we've been treated as a whole in the country, continue to propagate negative stereotypes that impede upon our inherent dignity. I've learned to combat the general dis-ease that I often have in my own skin. God made a point to making me Black and allowing me to live in this time. There are things that I get to do and show to those around me, particularly the loving-kindness that I may not have received. I get to represent possibilities to young black and brown children, while also reminding them of their beauty and worth. I get to show all children no matter their ethnicity that they can achieve great things without the need to denigrate the "other". Because the reality is, there is no other. It is a joyful wrestling to get this right...and sometimes I still wondering if I'm doing more harm than good in a given moment. The journey to grow and improve as a person, citizen and member of the Black community however, will not end for me until I do. So we keep moving.