This weekend I experienced overt racism in Arizona.
400 years after the first African human beings arrived in shackles to the shores of the then English colony, Virginia.
162 years after a Chief Supreme Court Justice informed the plaintiff, a free Black man, that he could not try his case as he was not considered a person in the eyes of the American legal system.
72 years to the day after Major League Baseball allowed the first human with Black skin to play a professional sport in Brooklyn.
51 years after a reverend with a peaceful dream was gunned down on a balcony in Memphis.
2 years after sixty-three million Americans got dressed, left their homes, and cast a vote for the sitting President.
1 year after a Lynching Memorial, The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, opened in Alabama.
I, a Black American, experienced overt racism in an upscale Arizona restaurant in the year of our Lord 2019.
I’d love to tell you the full story but I refuse. Short of being referred to outside of my given name, the story unfolds in just the way you’d imagine it would.
I shared the story with my Black friends and they responded with a Bran Stark level of surprise.
I shared the story with my White friends and they responded with a Jaime Lannister level of shock.
It’s a tale as old as time. One that Black folks are all too familiar with and one that White folks are all too unfamiliar with.
As if I had forgotten, I was reminded that my blackness is still not welcome in American dining establishments. As the incident was unravelling, I quickly assessed what was happening and it felt like time began to slow down. The moment Black folks fear on a daily basis was actually happening.
This was not a drill. Man your battle stations. We are under attack.
I remained calm, composed, and graceful in navigating our group out of the situation. Not because of anything that I actively train for but because my DNA is hardwired for survival in these moments.
I always walk away from these incidents feeling like I cheated death. Like a victorious warrior in the Roman Colosseum, you almost want to let out a primal roar. However, I moved on clutching to my dignity, my pride, and knowing that my ancestors are always guiding me.
Then minutes go by, then hours, and then days and you struggle to breathe because you still smell that foul odor all around you.
It’s like stepping in a massive pile of dog shit. You look to wipe your shoes in the nearest puddle of water. You find a stick to pick out the particles of shit that are in the grooves of your shoes. You slide your shoes back and forth on the pavement hoping to remove any last bits that remain. You ask people around you if they smell anything funny. But everywhere you go all you can smell is that lingering smell of shit following you everywhere.
Major League Baseball celebrates Jackie Robinson Day on every April 15. Every team and player that plays on Jackie Robinson Day has to wear my favorite number, 42. I always try to attend a baseball game to see all the jerseys adorned in that beautiful number and honor Jackie’s lasting impact on my life.
It’s not lost on me that today is Jackie Robinson Day.
22 years after the inaugural Jackie Robinson Day and I am still yearning for the day that Langston Hughes once wrote about in his classic poem I, Too in 1926. The day that, “They’ll see how beautiful I am and be ashamed.”
Because, honestly, I’m tired of this shit.
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