Blinded by the White

Several weeks ago, I wrote some whiny drivel about how every visit to the grocery store felt life-threatening, because of COVID-19. What a thoughtless, cocooned, privileged, white thing to write.

For Black people, every damn minute of every damn day is life threatening. For Breonna Taylor, sleeping-in-her-own-bed-in-her-own-home-while-Black was fatal.

I knew that when I wrote that moronic, self-indulgent sentence about the grocery store. I just wasn’t thinking about it at the time. And that’s the problem. That’s a very big problem. That has changed. I think about that all the time. But what I think about doesn’t matter. What matters is what I do.

A blog like this written by a person like me in times like these is irrelevant and trivial. Ridiculous on a whole different plane. The only reason I’m writing this today is so that the most recent post won’t be all sunshine and lollipops, failing to acknowledge the gravity and the enormity of what is happening all over the world.

Think globally, act locally, right? Personal remorse and private outrage are useless. I’m going on hiatus, to shut up and listen, work on my behavior, and figure out something positive to do.

So far, I donated food through my church to an organization distributing food to people who lost their local grocery store to looting after otherwise peaceful and necessary protests. One tiny little thing. One small step. A journey of a thousand miles begins, etc.

With the hope and belief that the paradigm shift that will finally and permanently dismantle systematic racism has begun, I remain, your

Ridiculouswoman