Personal Responsibility
Today a powerful white man in Houston suggested to me that if Black people want to improve their circumstances it’s all about personal responsibility. And that race is an issue only because we keep bringing it up. Everything was fine and we were all getting along before some people made an issue of race. I was […]
2016
2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 One of our early Houston founding families supported the creation of settlement houses and community centers, because, as he said, “neighbors should live as friends”. I just recently returned from Germany. A country leading the struggle to welcome newcomers, to make a place for over a million Syrian refugees. German […]
You know those thoughts and feelings:
“I didn’t do enough. I should have done more. Tried harder. Listened better.” When we feel those feelings – we don’t console ourselves with platitudes. Understand that we are exactly right. We did not know enough. Do enough. Stand enough. March enough. Vote enough. Listen enough. Fight enough. We may have missed the last hundred […]
VULNERABILITY
Please note: If you’re going to go on and on about vulnerability please make an effort to distinguish between A. and B. A. I might die. Get beaten. Have my liberty taken away. Lose my family. Have my child stolen. Go hungry. Lose health care. Have my pain ignored. Get bombed. Tortured. Need “self care” […]
WHAT WE KEPT SILENT ABOUT
I recently spent a few days with four white women friends. A real vacation of the kind I rarely take. No plans except to do whatever we felt like — or nothing. After 24 hours we fell into an accommodating rhythm. The coffee and plans got made every day. We ate. We walked. We talked. […]