Dear Martin

Dear Martin by Nic Stone
2018
Weight: 6. 4 oz
Method of Disposal: Leaving in Lending Library

Harriet bought me Dear Martin as a surprise, and I am glad she did.  It is a young adult book about racism, being a teenager, being a black teenager among white teenagers, and police shootings.  It is important that we have books like these for young adults.  Young people are seeing young black men being killed by police in the news.  Black teenagers are in between being kids and adults, but they are so often seen as adults by authority figures and not just adults, but also as a threat just by being in a random place (their home/the sidewalk/the train station/the car/etc) at the wrong time (a time where someone with power is feeling scared or angry). 

Today, I watched "When They See Us."  I think I have written about the Central Park Five here before.  It is a story that never gets less heartbreaking and, honestly, just gets worse the more you know.  The people who made this series did a great job.  For any white people who cannot see black teenagers as children, you should watch this and do not look away.  I do not even have children but, if you do, can we please all just open our hearts to what it would feel like to be the parents of these boys?  For everyone else, the siblings, friends, girlfriends.  Whiteness has been constructed.  There is no going back.  We can only go forward. We do not want to keep ruining lives and embracing an embarrassing and incredibly cruel history or acting like it did not happen.  That helps no one.  We have got to do the hard work.

Do Not Deny Me

Do Not Deny Me: Stories Jean Thompson
2009
Weight:9.6 oz
Method of Disposal: Left on Bainbridge Island in front of the grocery store

I want to write this whole blog about how amazing Do Not Deny me is, because it is so very amazing.  The first story brings you in strong and the last story ends strong.  You are not flipping any pages trying to see when it will end.  I am in love with the way she presents American dysfunction, and I cannot wait to get my hands on her book, Throw Like a Girl.

Unfortunately, that is all I can say on that right now.  I am far more focused on the fact that two black men were shot dead in the United States in the past two days.  Philando Castile and Alton Sterling.  Two more names to add to an incredibly long list of black people killed in this country unjustly.  Two more human beings with family, friends, loved ones who are most likely mourning, scared, and confused right now.  How do you make sense of a death like that?  Some of us can turn it into a cause or movement, some of us will be debilitated from it for some time, and some people cannot risk doing either of those things.  Some people have lost the people they love and they should not have to fight this fight.   We need to stand behind them, support them, affirm that black lives matter.  Don't be quiet in your discomfort.  This has got to change.  

Special Units: Assault Police

Special Units: Assault Police  by Octavio Diez
2001
Weight: 1.1 lbs
Method of Disposal: Leaving in Joe's in EAV

In my first year of college I had a roommate that volunteered for CASA, a child advocacy group in the area.  She had to be sworn in by a judge incredibly early in the morning, but she did not have a car.  She would need me to give her a ride.  Again.  I woke up early.  I cannot remember exactly when now.  Maybe she had to be there by seven?  We drove around, looking for the courthouse to no avail.  We saw a police officer, and she asked me to pull over and ask her for directions.  I did and immediately she wrote me a citation for trespassing on government property.  I had no idea where I was, what I had done wrong, or why I had to wait for her to run my license in her database.  Because I was waiting in the car for such a long period, I was able to look around and note that I had pulled into DeKalb County Special Operations.  I had to go to court to appeal the decision, and then I was told I would have to come back again--same time, same place.  My teacher told me she would fail me if I missed the class to go to court and that I should just pay the ticket.  It sounds extreme, but she had a very strict policy for her class Women, Islam, and the Qur'an (which was very interesting by the by).  I paid the ticket.  My roommate volunteered for CASA. 

Atlanta Special Forces are featured in this book.  That is why this story is relevant.  It still pisses me off to this day.