…you brought me in this world Happy Ancestral Birthday, Mom! As I celebrate your 95th year—only 68 on this side of the plane, way too short—it’s hard to say I miss you because, although you’re…
Category: Blackness
Because I am!
Happy Ninety-Ninth
No paper trail.No midwife’s mark.No certificate to prove the day. Just Marlboro County fields,tobacco barns breathing their smoke,and the cry of the first of twelve —a Black child under Jim Crow skies. If he went…
A Night at The Aux
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I never thought I’d be thankful that our washing machine broke. Truth be told, I hate laundromats. I’d rather walk barefoot down a gravel alley than sit under those flickering fluorescent lights, waiting for my…
Integration Was the Fire
“I fear I am integrating my people into a burning house.” – Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Integration – the act or process of integrating.A: Incorporation as equals into society or an organization.B: Coordination…
Part 2: The Recovery
The work begins after the funeral Grief has a strange rhythm. First, you deny. Then, you bargain. Then, if you’re honest, you get angry. But eventually—if you’re strong—you begin to recover. Not forget. Not excuse.…
Better (not) Call Tyrone
This one is personal. I’m sharing it here because I know some of y’all will feel this too—maybe too well. I’m not writing him off, but I had to write this down. As a form…
The Ghost in the Mulch Pile
Originally written August 2022 This weekend I had an “ah-ha” moment—one of those realizations that many Black people may already know deep down, but I hadn’t fully connected the dots until now. I now have…
Chosen Few ’25
For the second year in a row, I made the pilgrimage to the Chosen Few Picnic & Festival. Last year I didn’t know what to expect—other than the music. House Music. The soundtrack of my…
Black Joy – Chosen Few ’24
Getting ready for Chosen Few 2025! Post to come later… House Music! As soon as we hit the parking lot, we could hear it. The beat, uniquely Chicago, so familiar to my ears, so nostalgic…
Independence (Day)
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I used to be a flag-waving, fireworks-shooting, parade-attending, cookout-going patriot on the 4th. Proud African American. Two things changed that.Knocked that patriotism shit right out of me. The first happened pre-pandemic.(It’s funny how we’ve started…