Run For It.
I was living in Florida when Trayvon was murdered.
Splitting time between Sanford, where his killing happened, and where my little sister lived. And Tampa…in a swanky neighborhood called Avila.
And it occurred to me that if any of those people thought I looked suspicious as I walked the overly curious dog around the residential loop that that would be enough grounds to have my life taken from me.
I wondered what would happen, if, as a dark figure bundled up in the crisp pre-dawn morning, they couldn’t see the nearly microscopic dog I was walking: a five pound Teacup Yorkie named Bailey.
Bailey wandered through the world and people’s yards with not a care in the world, while I, manning her retractable leash, tried to not let her get too far away from the curb. I didn’t want to be seen hunched over in another person’s yard. Sure, it was with the little baggie to clean up her tiny turds.
But if that’s not what they saw, not what they think, not what they believe…then does it matter?
I was watching the coverage of the trial with the person I was with at the time. I told him I was going to stop walking the dog for a while. It always feels to me that when a tragedy like this befalls us, and justice seems like a dish left unserved it is a signal that my life, and the lives of people that look like me aren’t worth as much.
And in the world that I was in, there were few people that looked like me. And I was scared.
I’ve not only taken on the responsibilty of seeing myself clearly, but it seems like I’m being forced take on the responsibility for how others choose to see me too.
You can see how that’s a losing proposition.
I stepped out of my front door yesterday to run a mile, as warm up for my hill workout. I was using the NRC app and so I wasn’t too concerned about getting lost in the labyrinthine streets of my quiet neighborhood.
I started the playlist and took my first strides. The sun was shining down on me, I was feeling grateful. For good weather, for shoes, for friends who all but bullied me into getting out to run, for the app that essentially worked like a guided meditation for me. I was doing it, I took this body, these thunder thighs on a run and I was enjoying it.
And then I saw people outside.
And immediately, almost as if seeing another human activated some survival protocol three things happened:
I smiled my biggest smile
I raised my hand and said “hello” as I approached
I lowered my hand and shouted cheerfully “it’s a beautiful day for a run!” as a ran away.
Mission: Don’t Scare Your Neighbors- COMPLETE.
I repeated that three-step disarmament protocol every time I encountered another person. Eventually, the app chimed to pick up the pace, that I had only 400 meters left, that I should dig a little deeper and bring it on home.
I secured my wireless earphones, tucked my chin, and picked up the pace.
I could feel my skin tingle as endorphins flooded my system. The ever elusive-to-sprinters Runner’s High.
Sun on my face.
Blood in my veins.
Shoes on pavement.
Gratitude in my heart.
Back home, I unlocked my phone and I saw him, Amaud getting shot twice while on a run not too different from the one I just completed.
Fighting for life, even as he felt it slipping away. An attempt to wrestle away the gun that shot him.
Trying to run…away.
Dying.
For
Running
While
Being
Black.
And I went from excitement about getting back out there another day to try to lower my mile time to feeling dejected that my skin color gives me permission to do nothing and others permission to hurt me.
“I don’t want to be afraid” I said to Chuck as we headed back out to do the sprint hill workout.
He said I didn’t need to be.
And he didn’t mean it dismissively, or that there was no danger, he was reminding me that I don’t need to live in fear. Even if it’s there.
It’s one thing to feel it.
It’s another to indulge it.
When things like this happen, we seek solace and comfort from others, family, community. But all I felt, while looking for a way to process this murder, that I didn’t know about for two months but saw clear as day with my own eyes, all I felt was anger.
Lebron tweeted about it, and a lot of the responses to his tweet were “as you tweet this from your 25 million dollar mansion”
And my heart broke again.
And I don’t know what more to do, than what I’m doing to show and prove that my life has value.
But does it really matter that I think it does?
When I have zero confidence that there would be any consequence if someone did harm me.
I have first hand experience for exactly how little the “system” cared about me being victimized.
Yes, me. The Olympic Champion.
In my skin, I don’t hear the clinking of my gold medals, they aren’t badges of my value, or shields from racism.
I have earned the right to live because I live.
Earned the right to be authentically and fully myself.
I have earned the right to tie my got damn shoes and go for a fucking run and know that I’ll return home safely.
I have earned the right to be confident that when Chuck drives off and gets an inevitable speeding ticket that he’ll survive the encounter with the police officer that stopped him.
These are rights that I have earned, and don’t have.
BUT
all I can do is all I can do.
As exhausting as this is, as frightening as it may be.
I will keep tying my shoes.
And tomorrow I will run for Amaud.