According to an article in Newsweek, 181 black people have died at the hands of police officers since George Floyd’s death less than a year ago. One hundred-eighty-one! And six people have died at the hands of police officers since Derek Chauvin’s guilty verdict last week. It’s as if the verdict provoked White officers to assert their force and power even more in retaliation for the verdict and in support of Chauvin. Their feet are on our necks and their bullets are in our chests, and still we see no light at the end of the tunnel.
My aunt lost two of her sons to gun violence. I remember when the first one was killed. I was 9. It happened on our street. I remember waking up to the loud screams, the cries, the anguish, the despair. Her life was never the same after that. She left his room the way it was the night he died for years. No one was even allowed to go in it. It was almost as if she was still waiting for him to come back. Time went on, but it seemed like she never did. It was years before I ever saw her smile again, and even when I did, there was just so much pain behind it. She could only smile with her face, but her heart wasn’t in it, and you could tell.
Losing a child goes against the natural order of things. Our parents are supposed to die before us, not the other way around. Losing someone you carried in your entire physical existence and in such a horrendous fashion is unimaginable. You feel lost. Empty. Robbed. Like someone stole the most important thing from you that you are unable to get back because it’s simply irreplaceable.
The very thought of losing a child is unbearable. Just last week while driving, the thought crept into my mind, and I cried and cried. I felt the pain of all of those mothers all at once, and it was so deep and heavy I almost had to stop and pull over. My heart ached for them all, and then I became angry — furious even. I couldn’t understand how this just keeps happening. How many Black lives have to be taken before the world decides that enough is enough and that Black lives matter? I wondered how these mothers wake up every morning and face the day without plotting revenge. I was curious as to how their relationships with their remaining children (if any) were affected. I commended them for their strength, hope, faith and bravery for pushing forward when I know they felt like giving up. But, more than anything, I was truly saddened by it all.
Over the next few weeks, rolling out will spend some time with some of the mothers of the slain victims to create a safe space, lend an ear, hear their stories, and offer some love and support. We will do this in an effort to let them know that, even though their loved ones are gone, we understand that the pain that lives on in the hearts of the ones who loved them the most is definitely not forgotten.
