Y'all Ain't Making it Easy . . .

Today has not been the greatest. Yesterday's news was filled with headlines of another black man being murdered in the streets with thousands watching him exclaim, "I CAN'T BREATH". This forty something, black man wept for his mother, gasping and pleading to stay alive. As the story continues to unfold, evidence proves he cooperates and shows no sign of resistance. I recall the first major black man dead at the hands of policemen heading news; provoking an uproar and solitude of blackness and how we who bare the palettes of shades of brown skin matter. That was 2014. It's 2020 and the narrative, story, plot with no twist, ending is the same. His name is George Floyd, and he is dead; not at the hands of a white cop who took an oath to serve and protect, but at his knee (I could write a dissertation on this part alone).

I did all I could not to feel this one. I changed or either removed myself from conversations. I went for a ride ignoring all local radio channels by blasting the Feelin' Myself playlist on Spotify. I cooked my compliant PCOS foods and cleaned more vigorously than usual. This was intentional. I intentionally pushed down my feelings, my cry, my anger - all emotional parts of me. I knew I couldn’t handle George's news. I could feel that this would be the one.

And so it was. . .

Today I had to approach a white, male manager at a store and my choice of words weren’t the greatest. I might have gotten hood, ratchet at it's finest, real souf' Memphis like. Yea, the poor guy got all my wrath unloaded onto him as if he pulled the triggers. Stepping back to reevaluate the situation, I can say I should have been a better version of myself. However, I could have sworn that man's face morphed into Zimmerman's - which brings me to the question I am about to ask.

Are we taking into consideration the traumatizing affects these senseless black killings are having on our day to day lives and interactions with white people? We live in an integrated world which allows us now to walk parallel to those who resemble the white faced cops who take away another one of our own. I hate to say it, and forgive me if my present sentiments offend you, but all white folks starting to look real suspect.

Excuse me while I have an infamous Issa mirror moment..

Whooooooooo tf told y'all to bring this ratchet, last decade, racist, profiling police, white supremacy, kill a nigga shit to our year of 2020? This was suppose to be the start of something new, something special. Seriously, "Rona" ain't finished cutting up out here and here we go, back to the same bullshit that fuels a good ol'merica controversial feud.

Ok y'all, I'm back!

I'm thinking about the tables I sit at and the environments I am in, be it: restaurants, yoga, grocery stores, parks, Remi (jeep) parked on the river. I'm wondering if I'll be able to see my 130 white, nursing classmates for their individuality or will they too carry the faces of Zimmerman (Trayvon Martin). I'm wondering if I walk pass the white woman who too enjoys her river walks at sunset will bear the face of Pantaleo (Eric Garner). What about the elderly check out man at Walgreens, at the corner of Union and McClain, who smiles and hopes to see me again. Will he now have the face of Derek Chauvin (George Floyd)?

Y'all, some of these experiences I've been through lately with the news and media and black and kings and black and queens and death and death and more death are taunting. I feel something brewing out of all of the anger, frustration, hurt, anxiety, guilt, and other feelings I have not word for. I can say, if black symbolizes hate and white symbolizes love, I'm in the dark grey color scheme today. As I catch myself and recall who I am and who I want to be, I have to shake what feels like hate, yes hate -coming over me. I can do this, again. Well, I think I can. I mean, that's what I've been taught; rise above, extend an olive branch, turn the other cheek, forgive them cause they don't know what they do . . . eh.

Look mane, I'm really trying to give y'all a chance, yet I feel like putting my pimp hand up and cutting some of y'all loose. I know I have some work to do, because I'd hate to become you. I’m trying to heal from the deaths of Eric, Trayvon, Sandra, and Michael and the countless others. Hell, Im trying to forgive you for slavery, but y’all ain't making this shit easy... Y'all toxic as hell.

Nevertheless,

I think I'm writing this because I know I'm not the only one who feels this. I say I'm not too far gone because these feelings bother me. But, I will wallow in these feelings for a day, two, three or however many days it take.

I'm concerned about my well being and how I continue to think. Ultimately, what I think will be what I teach. So, I choose to stop this before it becomes. We talk about how our black lives matter, but no one has made a table for us to talk about how traumatizing it is to live through this and how it is really altering mental well - being and perceptions of "others". Can we talk about this? How this could make us the racists and we begin to spew prejudices? Listen I'm already black and some other things, I don't need those added labels.

I don't know. I don't know how to end this. I do know I'm tired. Tired of being the bigger person. Tired of patching unhealed wounds. Hell, tired of being tired. And, I also know, y'all ain't making this shit easy . . .