I stopped on the exit ramp. Emergency lights on. I never once thought about the dangers...

 
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I stopped on the exit ramp. Emergency lights on. I never once thought about the dangers if my skin were dark. Or if I were a young man in a hoodie doing the same damn thing. That that would totally change the equation. I jump out and photograph and jump back into my white car. Into my white privilege.

I remember swirling a skirt just so. I feel it in my body...

 
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I remember swirling a skirt just so. I feel it in my body. That time when that was a movement full of freedom. As a child. And I find myself recognizing I have not made that movement in my body. When was the last time? I am filled with an old lady's nostalgia. These embodied memories.
I think about a friend who has had to teach her dark skinned children what to do in a car when stopped by the police. Where to put their hands. How to make eye contact. What movements to make. Don't put your hood up. No hoodies walking home. Embodied memories required to keep them safe. I have not had to teach this to my children.

Resmaa Menakem on the embodied experience of race. So grateful to encounter his words...

 
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Resmaa Menakem on the embodied experience of race. So grateful to encounter his words. He had me when he asks about diversity. What are we building diversity from. And that question was worth agonizing over and an answer worth owning.

https://onbeing.org/programs/resmaa-menakem-notice-the-rage-notice-the-silence/

Monument Square. Portland, Maine.

A beautiful day in the neighborhood. If I had had a baby pool...

 
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Dear Anonymous,
A beautiful day in the neighborhood. If I had had a baby pool we may have all invited one another to roll up our pants and stick our feet in. And I would have loved that.
Another man living rough out here mentions that the BLM protest on Commercial Street last night was the most moving thing he had ever witnessed. Silent, he said.
'It was amazing....' as approximately 2000 people layed themselves down on this street we stand on.
'Amazing...' he says, gently shaking his head and walking his bicycle away.

He stands waiting. Cold. Hungry. Struggling. A pair of pants are clutched to his chest (thank you Dear Anonymous)...

 
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Dear Anonymous,

He stands waiting. Cold. Hungry. Struggling. A pair of pants are clutched to his chest (thank you Dear Anonymous). He comments on the protests and broken windows of storefronts. He has nothing, he says, but what I see. His voice barely audible.
I am thinking about this phrase WE ARE ONE. And I think yes, yes, we are one. As long as this WE includes the staggering 'drunk' on the corner who has just vomited on my shoes, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand black with grime. And the young kid in active addiction behind my back desperately trying to steal my wallet or run off with a friends' backpack. As long as it includes the ragged and drawn woman selling her body because that's the condition for her survival. As long as it includes her pimp. And her children. And those that may decry her behavior. We are one as long as it includes that politician that turns my stomach or yours, whose voice comes on the radio and we slam the radio off. As long as it includes people who praise him or her. Yes, as long as it includes that 'idiot' on the highway who cuts me or you off, or gives us the finger for our latest transgression per them. As long as it includes me having the word 'idiot' even flash across my mind. Yes as long as this includes those that will mock mask wearers. As long as it includes the mask wearers. Yes as long as this includes that exasperated man infuriated about getting his coffee order wrong. And that barista just trying to make ends meet struggling with two young children at home without childcare. If it includes her critics. As long as it includes that cop who intentionally kneeled on a mans neck for 9 minutes, killing him. As long as it includes that man who is now dead and as long as it includes his entire community. And the people who are angry about that. On both sides.
We are one. But I sit with those words a bit. If we are one, I don't think we get to select what makes up ONE.

There were flowers laying amidst the signs. Bouquets of roses, tulips, lilacs. They were limp. Some were trampled...

 
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There were flowers laying amidst the signs. Bouquets of roses, tulips, lilacs. They were limp. Some were trampled. I think of those that thought to bring flowers. And of those that no longer can. Of the candles I see lined up here and there. Of names written out, George Floyd the most prevalent amongst them. But there are many names I can't even remember or recall, all dead. They are not on the tip of my tongue and have been lost down a congested sewerage like newsfeed. And how miserable is this? Thank you to those that wrote those names. Who removed silence.

Outside Portland Police Station. All is quiet at the moment. The sun has just risen...

 
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Outside Portland Police Station. All is quiet at the moment. The sun has just risen. There is a bit of trash on the sidewalk. An overflowing trash can. A ripped open package of water bottles near the steps. A news team just finishing taping a segment across the street. And RIP GEORGE FLOYD spray painted on the brick wall of the station.

They wanted to be photographed. But I don't have direct permission to reveal their identities. They were unable to attend the protests yesterday. The feeling, and it is feeling based only on a few sentences of communication, that they wanted to be part of this moment. Wanted to be seen. A certain pride in making this stand, perhaps? An urgency to speak up? A mix of deep distress and relief, like an exasperated unspoken 'Finally...'.
Speculation on my behalf?

I leave their faces blank. Not to rob them of their identity but maybe as a space for us to place ourselves. A space to place ourselves in if we have not already tried on the cloak of our injustices. Our uninvestigated racism. I leave the space. White. Open. Making a stand.
Strip away the privilege. The entitlement.
There is no where to go back to. We are all from away excepting the Indigenous community that has survived our genocide. Yes, genocide. Only here to go from. I wonder and implore, how will we be? 

I thought when I was 10 and struck in the chest by the grief of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination that we'd get somewhere in my short lifespan toward holding the truth of our racism.

 
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I thought when I was 10 and struck in the chest by the grief of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination that we'd get somewhere in my short lifespan toward holding the truth of our racism.