George Floyd.

I told my mother about George Floyd. Since mom has been living with us, she hasn’t really been keeping up with the news or anything, honestly. So, I told her about this man who was murdered for being black.

I could barely get two words out of my mouth before I started crying. I realized that it was the first time I had actually spoken his name.

I told her about the outrage over this man’s death.

I told her about my outrage over this man’s death.

I told her about the Black Lives Matter movement.

I told her that every black person I know has at least one “story.” A story where they were threatened, persecuted, discriminated against, targeted, suspected, belittled solely based on their race.

I told her the stories of my friends from school that she can remember – Lecolion and Andrie and Adrian, just to name a few – so that she could see that it is real and it is happening to people she knows, people she cares about, people she knows I care about.

I told her how it destroys me to see, even just to know, that people are filled with such hate.

When I had reached the point of crying that kept me from being able to get words out of my mouth, mom told me a story.

When I was in Montessori School, there was one black child. That little girl’s father picked her up every day from school. Every. Day. On time. He never disappointed her. Apparently, at one point I told my teachers that I wanted a daddy like hers. They came to my mom after school that day, concerned but somewhat amused, because “Missy told us she wants a black daddy.”

Mom said they were so stupid. She didn’t elaborate or tell me what she thinks it means but what I took out of it was that in the white suburb in which the Montessori School was, the white teachers could not see that man as anything more than black. They could not see that he was a good father, reliable, consistent, always there for his little girl. They only saw his race.

My mom taught me not to see color. I was always proud of that. I was proud of her for her constant fight for fairness.

I had no idea that not seeing color was actually the problem.

By not seeing color, we have been denying our black friends, neighbors, associates their experience. I actually had this realization before George Floyd was murdered. I had it when talking to my friend Lecolion when I went to visit him in Memphis for his 40^th birthday. He was telling me one of his many stories and it hit me. Not like it dawned on me all peaceful like. I felt like I was punched, like where you feel your insides shrink, you double over and all of your blood ignites.

Because as much as I love Lecolion, and I love him a lot (if Paige and I had gone the route of being walked down the aisle at our wedding, Lecolion is who I would have asked to walk with me), I had been blocking out an enormous part of his life, his experience, I wasn’t acknowledging him and his life in its entirety.

For example, Lecolion used to come over to my house. My grandparents were frequently there for doctors’ appointments in Dallas (they lived in East Texas) and when renovations were being done on their home and for holidays. Essentially, they were there a lot. So, there were times when Lecolion’s visits and their visits would overlap.

Now I love my grandfather. I do. But he was a racist man. I used to justify it with his age and the culture he grew up in. But let’s not dance around it anymore. He was racist.

And when he would see Lecolion, riding his bike up to our porch, he would say, “There’s a colored boy coming up the walk.” I would laugh and say, “That’s not a colored boy, Pawpaw. That’s Lecolion.” I know I told Lecolion about this and I’m sure I laughed about how ridiculous Pawpaw was.

And I never once thought about what that must be like for my friend. How must he feel to be in the house with someone he knew thought he was lesser because of his skin color? How must he feel when his friend finds this racism something to laugh about? How must he feel to know that, while his naïve friend sees no color, there is a man in the other room who sees only color? How must it feel to never feel 100% safe?

I will never know. I will never know that fear. I will never have a story. No one should ever have to know that fear. No one should have a story.

I look forward to the day when I can tell my mom that the fear is over.

 

* I must admit I have been hesitant to write this and make it public. I know that I almost certainly have made errors in writing this, statements based on ignorance and clearly living in my world with my white privilege. I know I have a lot to learn and though I will never truly understand, I know that the first step to making change is through education. And I am here to learn.