I’ve been quiet for the last week because I didn’t know how to speak up. I felt guilty for my white privilege and had a million things to say but it all felt trite, unimportant, or inappropriate.

But here goes. I grew up in a middle class white community. Great people, farm people, salt of the earth. But no diversity.  Two black kids moved into our town when I was in high school, and that was the first time I saw color before. They were fast football stars, and I think they were treated okay, but with admitted ignorance, I can’t be sure.

I left for college when I was 17 and that was the first real integration I ever experienced. I didn’t know I was supposed to sign up for a “freshman seminar” and ended up getting placed.

I was the only female, and the only white kid in my freshman seminar, entitled “Reflections of Thug Life in America.” I was terrified in my first class. I was still channeling farm life, and showed up in bib overalls with a pink tank underneath (I can still picture this like it was yesterday). I walked in with my backpack filled with notebooks and felt tip pens to find a group of football sized black guys sitting in a circle to welcome me. Our first book was “The Clockwork Orange” and we discussed black beatings and rape for a good 8 weeks. I quickly adapted and tried hard not to be visually afraid of the conversation, but I was an easy target, and they made me dress up as Eazy-E for one of our “performances” on campus.  It turned out to be one of the hardest and most rewarding classes of my college career. It opened my eyes to the privilege I wasn’t even aware of, and the hard lives of others at the young age of 18. I swore I wouldn’t take my situation for granted again.

A few years later, I fell in love with a very tall, handsome black Jazz singer on campus, who I was sure I’d marry.  I loved him with reckless abandon, and wasn’t aware of the impact my actions had on anyone else. After a few months, black girls on campus confronted me to say that I took “one of the few good ones” and hated me for thinking I could just have anyone I wanted. I didn’t get it. I thought I understood the plight of black folks (from one college class) and genuinely didn’t understand why they hated me. I wanted him to meet my family, and I’ll spare the details for my family’s sake, but a visit to the farm didn’t go well, and after his family said they didn’t want him to marry a white girl, I knew we weren’t going to make it.  As fate would have it, he broke my heart, left one summer, and came back to campus engaged to a proper black girl who his family approved of.

Fast forward…I spent most of my teaching career in integrated schools, and thought, again, that I understood some of the hardship and how much I should be grateful for my white privilege. I’ve always been grateful for the way I was raised, the gifts and blessings I’ve been afforded, and always thought I was a pretty balanced and aware person.

Turns out, I’m pretty wrong.

The reality is that I’ve never understood how hard it is to be a target. I’ve never been a target. I’ve never known what it feels like to be treated less than human, be questioned in moments that are entirely inappropriate and have a harder path to education.

I’m another white person who tries to treat people equally and generally be a good person, but I don’t really get it.  I want to though.

I’m horrified by the news. When I see the message about “not being able to breathe” I can’t even imagine, because I find it hard to breathe right now, too, and I’m white.

I don’t have an answer. But I’ll speak up now. I’ll stand with you, however that looks, and whatever that means in the future.

(I mean, I just had knee surgery, so give me a minute, but I’ll be out on the streets as soon as I can!)

So this is all to say, I’m sorry for not speaking up sooner, and I’m sorry for the ways our communities haven’t been fair, equal, or even attempted to do either.

Here’s hoping this current turmoil will change the future climate, as we have to rise up from here.  Regardless, I’m here to #standwithyou in any way I can.