Passing the Mic

Editor’s note: For eight months, I’ve been posting religiously, every week. I promised myself that I would post weekly for at least a year, with two primary objectives: to honor a friend, and that these words would reach whomever they were meant to reach. In the process, I’ve met people, I have reconnected with people, I have laughed, cried, and I have learned.

Last week, for the first time in eight months, I didn’t post. A few of you checked in to ensure all was well, but mostly, it was quiet. There was a lot going on in the world.

I thought a lot about what to say last week. I thought people needed to know that what we say matters. What we do matters…as is so evident in the stories told here, there is no “big” and “small” in being good to each other. The small, in large doses, is impactful.

So…last week, I chose to listen. I listened to dear friends, whose black lives matter to me. And as I did, I was painfully aware of the small things I take for granted as freedoms available to everyone…and those I take for granted in my own life simply which aren’t there for all of us.

And so, I’m going to step aside for a few weeks. And I’ll step aside again, and again, hopefully, to pass the mic (er, pen/keyboard) and stand alongside my friends, whose #blacklivesmatter, and listen. And I hope, in reading, you’ll pause and reflect and act in “small” ways, exhibiting the #quietbadassery you have as loudly or quietly as you please in the limited, precious actions we have in this life. Listening, too, is one of the most impactful actions we can take.

Thank you, Candice, for your eloquent words and for stopping me in my tracks. I’m so grateful.

Submitted by: Candice, FL

The purpose of protest is to unsettle. Protest should not be comfortable. Protest should not feel normal. The point of protest is to create a path for change. I believe in the power of protest and I stand in solidarity with those protesting police brutality (in all its forms), racism (in all its forms), inequality (in all its forms), and injustice (in all its forms).

The media will lead you to believe that those protesting in this moment are protesting the murder of George Floyd and they are. But they are also protesting the murder of Breanna Taylor, the murder of Ahmaud Arbery (at the hands of an ex-cop), the murder of Charleena Lyles, the murder of Philando Castile, the murder of Sandra Bland, the murder of Eric Garner, the murder of Atatiana Jefferson, the murder of Tamir Rice, the murder of Michael Brown, the murder of John Crawford III, the murder of Amadou Diallo and so many others.

The people protesting are protesting institutional racism and systemic racism. The people are protesting the fact that white men armed with semi-automatic weapons can stand un-challenged in court houses and public spaces, while unarmed black people are consistently and routinely shot by the police. The human beings protesting are protesting that a white male murderer is taken into custody without incident and described as “scared” just 3 days ago, while an unarmed black man who is so terrified he calls out to his dead mother twice is suffocated to death by a policeman while at least three others watched.

Black people are protesting the abject fear that overcomes them every time a policeman pulls them over. Black fathers are protesting the abject fear that their black son will do everything right (obey all instructions (quickly), do their best to look non-threatening (pull your pants up), smile (but not too much), look them in the eye (but don’t stare), speak calmly (but only when directly addressed), and still end up dead. Black mothers are protesting the abject fear that their black school aged girls will be targeted and punished at rates exponentially higher than their white friends or might end up shot and killed, like Aiyana Mo’Nay Stanley-Jones, while asleep on a couch when the police raid the wrong house…again.

People are protesting the dream deferred, an American dream that has been long, long deferred. And so it is that perhaps this moment evokes Langston Hughes’ question: What happens to that dream deferred? It seems that after it has dried up and then festered, after it has stunk and crusted over, after all under the heavy load of its unrealized promise sag…yes, then maybe it explodes.

And the poem referenced, Titled “Harlem” by Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

 like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore—

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over—

like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?