Painting was something she loved. She loved envisioning what she would paint even more. Holding her paintbrush she could stare at the blank canvas for hours just imagining how she would transform it into something profound or silly or deranged. Ronique Rain had been known to provoke emotions people didn’t want to confront or even want to exist. Often viewers were brought to tears by her work, feeling something stir within them they thought long gone. It was those moments that drove Ronique to create and kept her curiosity heightened about the complexities of emotion, memory, and hidden inclinations. Feelings were forever a puzzle she would try to solve with shapes and paint strokes. Ronique sometimes felt like a detective when she worked. Each color a suspect, each completed piece a collection of their stories. The crime, the viewers’ thoughts she intentionally unearthed.
Impeachment Day 2: It Could've Been So Much Worse
Today, there were hours of even more presentations that painstakingly showed just how close the lawmakers in the Capitol were to being confronted by insurrectionists and most likely grisly danger. Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi the targets of these violent rioters ransacking the Capitol at Trump’s behest. We saw never before seen footage of the secret service escorting Pence and his family out of the chamber.
It’s truly remarkable to see the amount of evidence gathered and just how close some of these senators came to this bloodthirsty horde. The news outlets have been saying this frequently along with many other journalists and pundits, that this could have been so much worse. I’ve been seeing a lot of people online also echo the fact they were unaware of just how brutal the attack was even after knowing there were deaths. I think this is because the footage we’ve seen until this point seemed disjointed. We didn’t really understand how close these roving gangs were to actual lawmakers. The geography was unclear so the threat of danger didn’t seem as imminent. It also didn’t help how Republicans and conservative media cravenly described rioters as Americans who were just upset. There was also the constant imagery of amusing characters like the guy in the fur hat and another dressed as Uncle Sam who’s appearances diminished the gravity of the situation. After the 6th, the focus was drawn to the individuals who were getting arrested and booted off planes instead of the very real damage those people did to not just the actual Capitol but to the psyches and bodies of lawmakers and officers.
Open Letter to Creative Goddess: Michaela Coel
Dear Michaela,
I wanted to write this in an email just for your eyes, so I can more intimately explain to you just how much your readiness to be vulnerable, your impeccable word, and your dedication to the craft resonates with me. But I couldn’t find contact info and after doing more than a few minutes of Google searching, it felt weird af so I thought yes, time to refrain. Then I thought about sending an Instagram message a la I May Destroy You style, but sending it to MichaelaCoel12234 and hoping for the best didn’t seem like a super great idea, so instead I am here writing an open letter.
Introducing Fiction Friday: Clowning Around
“Hello, you’ve reached Lots of Lofts, this is Lynn. How may I direct your call?” There was a lengthy pause, “Hello, is anyone there?” Shuffling could be heard in the background and a thud. A door slammed in the distance. “Uh, yeah, sorry. I’m yes. Um.” Another pause. Lynn could almost hear him desperately piecing together his thoughts. She let him take his time before he spoke again, “Sorry, yes. Okay, I just moved into my loft today and um. I don’t even know how to say this without sounding insane. Okay. I moved all my stuff in and went down the street to grab lunch. I walked back into the apartment and a bunch of clowns in, um, varying states of dress were in here. They’ve mostly all gone, but a few of them are refusing to leave. They told me you had an agreement with them?” Lynn rolled her eyes. Not again.
My History with Black History Month
Black History Month for me just used to be a reminder of how little this country cared to actually learn about black people, our history, and how we got to where we are today. It didn’t feel like a celebration but a mockery of our greatness. It felt like we were being thrown scraps for being reminders of this country’s violent and unthinkable history. Twenty-eight days sometimes twenty-nine designated for our history while the false history of this country’s founding wasn’t constrained at all but given an entire school year. It wasn’t until I learned more about where I came from outside of the abysmal curriculum and about how systems were built to divide that I was able to not only embrace Black History Month on my own terms, but really relish in how far we’ve come and how much we can and will accomplish.
Before my invigorating revelation, when I was really young, I dreaded Black History Month. Going to a predominantly white school, it meant that all eyes were on me when the teacher would tell us to put our books away and handout a flimsy printout of one of MLK’s speeches. It was always a very small section of “I Have a Dream.”
I could feel my peers staring me as the teacher picked on different students to read portions of it. I braced myself for my inevitable turn. When I was called on to read it was like the air disappeared. An uncomfortable silence settled in the room. Kids stopped shifting, whispering conversations would halt. It was as if they thought something magical would happen when I read those words. I was a show. I would look straight at the page attempting to block everything else out and read aloud, but I still felt as if a spotlight shown brightly on me and my little desk. I wanted to speed through it to get it over with, but I didn’t want to make any mistakes, because even though I was mortified his words meant a great deal to me. This would be the new normal during our Black History lessons for the whole month. I loved learning, but I loathed being their only immediate proximity to blackness.
The subsequent few hours a week of hapless activity to “celebrate” black history was not only an embarrassing display of ignorance, but a truly insulting one-dimensional portrayal of a history of my people who literally built this country. We wouldn’t talk about slavery at all, but focus on celebrities and the Harlem Renaissance so as not to go too near the past that so many wanted to forget. It wasn’t through school that I learned about James Baldwin or Ralph Ellison. I didn’t even know collections of slave narratives existed until I went to college. No, Black History Month when I was in grade school even into high school willingly evaded how black people got here and focused on famous black athletes and entertainers in a way that made it seem they were the only people who truly contributed to society and were of note. A few authors were sprinkled in here and there, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, but scientists and certain activists were always absent. Later on, nearing the end of high school I would learn about Dr. George Washington Carver as the inventor of peanut butter, but his doctorate title and further work in peanuts being used to make different products ultimately stimulating the south’s declining economy would be left out. Par for the course.
This Black History Month I am going to lean hard into still celebrating how we as black people were able to fight through the darkest, deadliest, most diabolical institution of slavery and not only continue to live and continue to fight but continue to feel joy, continue to feel pride, continue to evolve, continue to grow, continue to uncover and discover, continue to create, continue to feel love after all our ancestors have been through. After all we are still going through.
Some of our ancestors could never even imagine where we are today and though we are still, STILL fighting for full equality, we have made leaps and strides from our painful past and this world wouldn’t be nearly the same without us. We are our ancestors and we are forging a new path for the future.
I love my blackness. And yours.
— deray (@deray) January 31, 2021