I have been feeling as my young clients often say, “some kinda’ way.”
That phrase makes more sense to me now as I am struggling to understand what is going on with me. I have often encouraged my clients to be more specific… articulate…draw a picture…connect to a song or poem. And I feel a bit of a failure as a therapist when those interventions fall short. But I am aware now as I grapple with my emotions and feelings that there is actually space for feeling “some kinda’ way.”
I feel angry… but not quite, sad…not exactly, hurt yet numb to pain. There is this space in me where my usual expressions of emotions cannot be articulated in my normal way. And it has intruded in my familiar way of being.
I share this with you my friends because you have been witness to my “ feeling some kinda’ way.” You have been patient, compassionate, respectful and caring. You are my friends. I love you. And this is the difficult part for me. I find it difficult in this “some kinda’ way” space, to connect with and be with white people. You my friends are so important to me and my life. You are people that have taught me, and have been willing to learn from me. You have been generous and loving and respectful. And so it is difficult for me to sit with this…to have these ”some kinda’ way feelings” that makes it difficult to be with the people I love and deeply respect.
But I have been reflecting on this “some kinda’ feeling.” And I want to share with you what I have discovered thus far. I am sure there is more to come.
I am… we are living in an extraordinary time. I don’t think any of us expected to see a global pandemic descend on us and literally change our way of living; and it has taken scores of American lives in the process. And at the same time we witness, what seems to me, a monumental shift of consciousness in how we consider our most profound question as Americans. Who are we to one another?
The fact that we are considering this questions at all is in itself extraordinary. And yet I believe it should not be…extraordinary I mean. We in the Black community and other communities of color have longed and yearned for the time when enough white Americans would recognize our suffering and be moved to respond. We have cried, prayed, marched, begged and pleaded for some recognition by mainstream America that Black communities and other communities of color are living in a state of terror. And that our lives matter. There has been too much pain suffering and loss.
I have been thinking about the casualties, the lost ones, dreams deferred, the brutality and terror, the generational trauma. We as a people have for decades simply asked you white Americans to notice our humanity and to be accountable for your own. The vast majority of white people have failed at this task. And the clearest emotion I am experiencing in this moment is outrage and indignation. Why did it take so long…the loss of so many lives… men women and children to get here?
I live in a state of terror that has become a core part of my existence because I am a mother and grandmother of Black children and grandchildren. I want to say ‘what in the world is wrong with white folks?’. I am convinced that if police were killing innocent white men and boys at the rate they are killing innocent Black men boys and women, white people would probably have burned downed the Capitol by now.
The majority of white people have hidden behind the immaturity of ignorance…”I didn’t know” or the immaturity of innocence…”I didn’t do it.” And that immaturity has led to the literal annihilation and genocide of people of color and their communities. There are too many to name…to many bodies…too much poverty. But the suffering of my community is my suffering as well.
I am aware that in many ways I am blessed. I have a comfortable place to live, food to eat. I have the privilege of social distancing and the capacity to do my work from home. That is not true for my clients, or even some in my family, certainly not for the communities in which my clinical practice exist. I am a three dimensional upfront witness to the ravages of Co-Vid among suffering struggling and marginalized communities. I can’t let go of them. I can’t “misremember” them. They are me. That little girl who grew up in a poor Black community in Spartanburg South Carolina still lives in me. And right now she is feeling ”some kinda’ way.”
I don’t need a response. I don’t require your sympathy. I know you care about me. I will get through this. And will be the better for it. Here is is my request of you. Create a time line that begins on the day that you came into the world to now. Do a fearless inventory. Document as much as you can on your timeline the names of innocent Black people and other people of color who have been killed or maimed and abused at the hands of the police and/or white supremacist. Read about them, their lives, the people who loved them, who suffered when they were lost. And as you find these martyrs and acquaint yourself with them, I ask that you become accountable for your own humanity.
Lutricia