“A white blank page and a swelling rage.”
I needed to write after the words “not guilty” splashed across my television screen and Don West reveled in the glory of his knock-knock joke. I needed to write, or scream, or cry…I needed to release.
But I wasn’t exactly sure what to do. I was frozen. Couldn’t make a sound, couldn’t muster a move and I couldn’t will my typically overactive tear ducts to react.
This was way more personal than I expected it would be.
The story is a familiar one to millions across the nation: Trayvon Martin was gunned down by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman on a rainy February night, but at the GlobalGrind offices, the story was bigger than that; it was our beat. Trayvon’s family became our family and we knew that collectively as a team, our job was to ensure this young man’s name be emblazoned in history. Our black mothers needed to stop planning their son’s funerals.
After the verdict was read, I remembered a visit that Sybrina Fulton made to our midtown offices, where one of our staff members asked Ms. Fulton where she acquired the strength to fight for her son’s justice.
Her eyes rapidly darted at the bare walls surrounding us and she took a deep breath and spoke to the room, “This is not me. I was living a very average life and if you would have asked me if I would have the power to do this, the answer would be no. This is God working through me.”
We all stifled our emotional reactions and reveled in Sybrina’s strength. I believe I can speak for every single one of us in that room when I say we felt the power in her answer. She was the example of the worn line that reads: “You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have.”
—–
The verdict was read on the night of July 13th. I spent an entire day dwelling in the sorrow that came with remembering a dear friend who would have celebrated his 28th birthday that day. He never lived to see 26.
Five years prior to his death, on a fateful night during a drive home after a midnight shift at work, he was involved in a tragic car accident that left a teenage girl dead and two other teens injured.
The accident didn’t kill him, but it took his life.
For months after the incident he would echo the haunting thought: “I wish it was me instead of her.” For years following the incident, I watched as the local papers painted his kind heart as a monster who was drag racing and driving with reckless abandon, resulting in the death of an innocent girl.
But nobody turned an eye to examine his innocence. Black men don’t have room for errors. There is no room for accidents in a country that subconsciously deems you a problem. The skid marks were tested; he was within legal speed limits. His only fault was simply being a black man, which translates to some as a menace. He was simply a menace who tore apart a family.
But nobody thought about his family. They too, in the metaphorical sense, had lost a son as they knew him, and later, under the weight of an irreversible guilt, would again suffer loss when he too would die in a car accident.
When he did pass away, the first line of the newspaper stories didn’t list his accolades; instead it highlighted his life’s low with the first line:
“A man who five years ago struck and killed a teenage girl with his car was himself killed early Saturday morning.”
His memorial, set up by the hundreds who love him, was frequently vandalized. Commentary on his obituary was riddled with racial slurs and posts that implied “he deserved his karma.”
His life wasn’t respected, even after death.
I watched the light leave his mother’s eyes just as Sybrina’s eyes had dimmed. Her youngest child and only son was not only taken from her, but his memory was haunted with negativity by those who knew nothing about him. Just like Trayvon’s.
Throughout it all, she chose to be just as strong as Sybrina was. It was her only choice.
To thousands of mothers of black men in America, this is their only choice, to be strong when the grip of society yanks their baby boys out of their grasp.
The resounding “not guilty” that rightfully shocked a nation tells these mothers of black men that their pain is in vain, their conversations about what it is to be Black in America and a law abiding citizen fall on deaf ears because the justice system sometimes is their biggest enemy.
Our black women are losing the light in their eyes. Instead of reserving play dates with their grandchildren, they are lowering caskets and arranging memorials. Yes, we are all Trayvon Martin, but with an army of Trayvons come a fleet of Commanding Generals that are all Sybrina Fulton with one option: to seek their strength through God as they grapple with raising a man, whom no matter how gentle his heart, will at some point be faced with opposition because of nothing more than pigmentation.
To be a mother is to forever have a part of your heart walking outside of you…to be a mother of a black son is clearly to live in constant fear of your heart being taken away from you.
This is just my story, I am sure you have yours. Feel free to share it, because as Maya Angelou once said, “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
Let the world know.
Rachel is the Style Editor for GlobalGrind.com, proud graduate of a SUNY school, and as sarcastic as they come. Follow her on Twitter for random daily ramblings @MiissHislop and on Instagram for as many puppy photos and selfies as you can handle @AmazingRach
