The Goings On of George Floyd

I'll preface this by saying I have 3 blogs, and haven't used this one in six years. But I wanted to make sure, for the people in the back, that they knew who I was and that no one was confused by my Way.Ward or Where the Drywall Ends blogs. This is Melanie A. Howard. I've written 10 books. I've written 9 books for children. I am white, chubby, and a disabled American due to Mental Illness. And I have things to say.

I grew up in a town that is probably quietly famous for its racism. It is a town of about 20,000 people. There were probably a grand total of 10 POC in my school, and only one black girl. The year before I started high school, the white supremacists in my high school threw a black boy out of the lunch room. I know this because the day I went to set up my locker with my dad the janitors were sitting outside on a smoke break and talking about the "coon" that was thrown out of lunch. My dad, a Minneapolis native, squeezed my hand so hard I thought it would break, and explained racism to me on the way home. I, of course, had learned of racism in school by that time as something that people marched about in the past, but in Minnesota, we were progressive and liberal and "nice" and didn't have such problems.

As far as I know, that poor black child had to leave school. Probably to save his life or his sanity or both. Black people simply didn't come to my town, or stay in my town. I was a child, so I didn't think anything of it, except when I saw actual black people every once in a blue moon and just stared. I think everyone just stared. As I became more aware of the quiet, rage-filled racism in my town, I began feeling very concerned when I saw black children playing. There are more of them now, which is good for my town but has to be horrific for them. I remember just at the cusp of my home town becoming more integrated that there were five adopted black children being sent to the school where my mother was a nurse and I frequented time to time, and I remember being angry. I was so angry because I knew they were going to be facing the full force of the most racist community in Minnesota, and didn't their parents know that?! Shouldn't they be taken somewhere safer? It's not fair that they have to be the poster children for integration in my town when they could have a better time somewhere else.

It never occurred to me that "somewhere else" didn't exist. I thought Minnesota had dumped all of its racists into one happy little town where they could talk about going "coon hunting" on the high school news channel, then laugh their way through an apology later. I was positively certain there was this Minnesota outside the borders of my town where black people were safe, and equal, and not stared at as though a wild turkey had wandered through a herd of hens.

My family started going to church in Minneapolis, a small, tight-knit church of many colors. This, I was certain, was the way the real world was. Except for a few outlying assholes, everyone was congenial, brought food to potlucks, sang and laughed loudly, held hands without wondering if the color would rub off, and created community where everyone was equal and nobody stared. When I left home for school at the U of M Twin Cities, I was certain this was how I was going to find the majority of the world.

I expected college was going to fix a lot of things - it didn't - but what surprised me most was that, while things were better for minorities, we weren't all one big happy family singing kumbaya. Everybody found a group, and stuck with that group. I found a group at the Loft Literary Center. At college, I was very much a loner (some things never change), but that gives one more time to observe. I took the bus from the U of M to my grandparents' house in South Minneapolis (yes, very close to the riots). I passed through a Somali community and a Hispanic community, then the area around Franklin that was a very poor community (mostly POC, I know, I should have told you to sit down first, I'm sure you fainted with surprise). All of these communities were in Minneapolis, and it wasn't as though they were integrated. I once had a social studies teacher who told us the United States isn't really the "melting pot" everyone says it is. It's a tossed salad, with different communities generally sticking with their own. It only occurred to me later that this was for safety from "us."

I saw "us" on one of those buses. I had evening courses, which I liked better because they believed in working Americans who didn't have time for extemporaneous fluff. The moment I stepped on the bus, I knew something was wrong. There was a young white man towards the middle of the bus just staring ahead of him, and a young black woman towards the back with her forehead pressed to the seat bar in front of her. It didn't take me long to find the problem. At the front of he bus, an Asian-American man was being harassed by a group of older teenage boys (white), asking him if he knew Jackie Chan and trying to incite him to talk back to them. It was the worst 45 minutes of my life, sitting there at the very back, wondering why the white man didn't do anything, wondering if the black girl needed a hug, enraged that the bus driver wasn't throwing these assholes off. I thought of going to the front and asking the Asian-American man to sit with me, but the boys were drunk and there were more of them than I thought could reasonably be handled if they decided to be unruly. I will forever regret not doing something anyway. I was completely unafraid when I actually got stabbed on a bus in Guatemala years later, but I was terrified of these white yahoos. The best I could get myself to do was to call them assholes as I disembarked the bus.

I've seen "us" in other places, but never like that. Mostly I see "us" unconsciously exercising our privilege. Even out of the country, I was a white American and that seemed to mean something, everywhere I went. I'm never afraid of the police. I doubt I will ever have to be. But the more I observe, the more I know I'm very lucky that way. But, I was sure, I was absolutely convinced, until a few days ago, that this was still Minnesota, and we still believed in Minnesota nice. I don't believe that anymore. I remember the children at my mother's school and think to myself that they probably weren't safe anywhere and might as well have gone to school in my home town. I will still hold my breath every time I see someone Somali walking through my home town because I am absolutely terrified for them, but I won't think they should go somewhere more "kind" and "understanding."

I think maybe this place only existed in my mind.

So, as Minneapolis is burning, I can only hope that it will cause change. Statewide change. Country-wide change. I don't care about looting or fire. I care that my nephew is half Filipino and someday he has to go to school. Lord help the school system that does not protect him, because I will not be silent anymore. To the George Floyd protesters, I see you. I can see you now. I am not blinded by the white any longer.