The Late Arrival

When I came back from our family trip to Pierce City, Missouri a few years ago, my dear friend wanted to know all the details. We met for lunch and I told her that, yes, my daughter, my husband and I stood at the graveside of my third-great grandmother who was born in 1795. That we even took pi ctures of the expansive greenspace where my second great-grandfather’s house once stood before he and his step-son had a firefight with an angry mob who torched the place with them in it. It’s quiet, pastoral and unassuming. That we stood on the land my ancestors used to own before they were driven from it. And that, yes, we held vigil with a small group from the community on the very ground where an ancestor was lynched that night in 1901. You should really write a book about this , she nudged. Maybe if I can sort it all out in my head. It’s just a lot.   I mean, I wished I had a picture taken of my daughter and I by our maternal ancestor’s grave. I can still feel the rugged rock and rough...

Sometimes, you think you've lost something and it turns up. Such was the case with a post I wrote for another site way back in 2015 around the Michael Brown verdict. I remember the night I wrote it: the split screen of President Obama addressing the nation on one side, while the other side recorded a town on fire. I felt sick in my soul, while my husband didn't feel or understand what I was feeling, and why I was feeling. I sat there on the couch confounded, sad, demoralized, weary and angry. I poured it all out on a national platform, not caring whether my words were measured or light enough to be palatable to the white folks in my life. Months later the post was recognized with an award. We went to New York and everything to receive an award along with a lot of other amazing writers. I thought the post was lost in the takeover of that site, but 2015 me must've been thinking ahead to this day and saved it on a thumb drive way back when. Yesterday, I stumbled upon these wor...