A 12 Year Old Reclaims The Dream
Today it is Thursday August 26 ,2010 and I am expecting 13 YIA members to spend the night. As I leave school and mommy starts her van pick up from Gwinnet to morrow in one evening with stops in Stone mountain and Atlanta . I start to go down my check list Posters Markers T-Shirts and plenty of excitement. After all the teens are picked up we began talking about how excited and happy that we will be a part of the 4 7th anniversary of Dr. Kings march on the Lincoln memorial and how we are truly stunned that we will be apart of history.
As we walk through the door and everyone is making my living room basement and bedroom look a slumber party. Then you could her my mommy “Ok now everyone do your home work . because education come before changing the world”. Then we hear a knock on the door and my daddy comes home and lays down the law about the house. Then he begins to cook out on the grill and tell us all about the Arkansas Nine that were beaten and jailed to end segregation. Then we all stayed up late talking and comparing ourselves to civil rights leaders. My best friend got voted Hosea Williams and Bashel was voted Andrew Young . They told me I was a cross between Huey Newton And Dr. King. I was honored. Then my daddy told everyone lights out boys went to the basement with him.
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Today is Friday August 27,and we have all just woken up and did I say we are late. My mommy began cooking and then into the van. My heart began beating so fast I started to thinking about my speech and my introduction of United States Secretary of Education Arne Duncan . What if I mess up? What id I let my peers down. Then I quietly start to mediate and remember that I was born to be the voice and no matter what I must always remember that. As we arrive at school everyone is out side hugging parent’s and listening to them tell us to” be safe and stay together‘.
My granddad told me he marched as a child and he was so proud of me. The charter buses pull up and we say a prayer and we are off. We began to watch movies and sing. As night falls I say to my best friend just think it was a bus like this 47 years ago with a group of teens with same dream for our world. The difference was no dogs, no hoses ,no danger of being lynched and jailed. Yet the teens still traveled. How brave they were . That is the kind of stuff that gives me my drive. It is now! 1 o clock in the morning and were just arriving at the hotels. We begin to plan what to do if anyone gets lost. Then someone says I am scared I then tell her there is nothing to be afraid of . She say’s what if the Tea Party attacks us. Mommy told her that would not happen. Time for sleep.
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It is now Saturday the day of the march and everyone is excited we are now dressed in our Youth in Action T-shirts and ready to march. First we stop at 7 am to eat at a local McDonalds and are met by a Tea Party group getting ready and just as excited to go to there rally. I am so ready to be apart of history. I’ll never forget the sound and the feeling of victory . It felt like the first day of school.
We all jump off the busses yelling Youth in Action we take action yelling ,chanting and with excitement that we finally made it to the march safely we got there one of the first youth groups there. We all looked with amazement in our eyes
