On one side of the seesaw is my education. My nursing certification. My twenty years of service at the hospital. My neat little home. My spotless RAV4. My National Honor Society-inductee son. All of these building blocks of my existence, and yet the only quality straddling the other side is so hulking and dense that it tips the balance every time: my brown skin.
On the day before classes were supposed to start, Mama took me out to dinner. “You’re destined to do small great things,” she told me. “Just like Dr. King said.” She was referring to one of her favorite quotes: If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.
My high school guidance counselor, Mrs. Inverholl, once had me take an aptitude test to figure out my future. The number one job recommendation for my set of skills was an air traffic accident investigator, of which there are fewer than fifty in the world. The number two job was a museum curator for Chinese-American studies. The number three job was a circus clown.
Because that’s what stories do. They help you escape, and they give you the chance to do things you never imagined you would or could. They let you feel heartbreak you’ve never had and experience adventures from the safety of your own room. They are dreams for those who are still awake. They.
What if we did get so lucky that we’re due for something terrible?
Where there is support, there is no grief.
Unlike the characters in the book, however, these different sorts of people don’t seem to mix well. It is like the salad dressing Jessamyn makes: a little bit of olive oil, a squeeze of lemon, and some red wine vinegar. If whipped, they combine. But leave them to their own devices and they will sort themselves out again. I don’t really understand this. When you have so many people, each one inevitably fascinating, why would you limit yourself to only those like you?
The moral of this story is that sometimes, you can attempt to make all the difference in the world, and it still is like trying to stem the tide with a sieve.
It’s no small feat, finishing a journey,” I tell her. “But no one ever mentions that once you get there, you will have to turn around and head all the way home.
Outside, the moon is a silver sliver. Every night, the shadow eats a slice of it, until it’s nothing but this hollow rind. I feel the same way; with each day, I lose a little more of myself.
Is it better not knowing the ugly truth, and pretending it doesn’t exist? Or is it better to confront it, even though the knowledge may be a weight you carry around forever?
I smile. But like anything you wear that doesn’t fit, it pinches.
There is a fire raging, and we have two choices: we can turn our backs, or we can try to fight it. Yes, talking about racism is hard to do, and yes, we stumble over the words – but we who are white need to have this discussion among ourselves. Because then, even more of us will overhear, and – I hope – the conversation will spread.
I wonder how much the general population of this country know that the legal system has far more to do with playing a good hand of poker than it does with justice.
You told me this lawsuit isn’t about race. But that’s what started it. And it doesn’t matter if you can convince the jury I’m the reincarnation of Florence Nightingale – you can’t take away the fact that I am Black. The truth is, if I looked like you, this would not be happening to me.
It was a hell of a lot easier to be silent and overlooked than to be constantly shut down.
Is there any place on Earth that smells better than a laundromat? It’s like a rainy Sunday when you don’t have to get out from under your covers, or like lying back on the grass your father’s just mowed – comfort food for your nose.
It is amazing how you can look in a mirror your whole life and think you are seeing yourself clearly. And then one day, you peel off a filmy gray layer of hypocrisy, and you realize you’ve never truly seen yourself at all. I.
There are just some feelings, I’ve learned, for which we never invented the right words.
What is interesting is that elephants can accurately and reliably figure out who is friend and who is foe. Compare this to us humans, who still walk down dark alleys at night, fall for Ponzi schemes, and buy lemons from used-car salesmen.