A meditation on "woke"

Every year at this time I stop and have a long think about my experience with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Sometimes I write about it and this is one of the years I do. This year my thought turn to the supposed insult of being woke.

I was 11 years old and just a few weeks from my 12th birthday when my mom decided it was time for me to meet my dad’s relatives, including my grandmother (this is a story in itself, but for a later time). We traveled by train from Oakland, California to Memphis, Tennessee, pretty much non-stop and then to my grandmothers in West Virginia by car for another five hours. It was exhausting but I got to see then Sierras for the first time, the expanse of then Great Salt Lake, the Rockies during a thunder storm and Chicago by night before I finally fell asleep on our luggage (we traveled in the commuter cars because we could not afford sleeping births.)

In our lives in California we were pretty inclusive before the term became popular. We lived in a Latino neighborhood, had friends of every major ethnicity and the concept of racism was just unknown to me. But in that marathon trip I saw subtle changes the further east we got. When we left, everyone running the train, from the porters to to conductors were black. When we left Chicago, however, management became white while the workers were still black. I remember the lack of respect the conductors had for the porters but wasn’t quite sure what I was seeing. As we entered into the south I saw fewer black people, no Latinos and no Asians. It’s not they weren’t there, they just seemed to be on the periphery. I’ve come to understand this was my first encounter with institutional racism.

In Memphis I needed to go to the restroom so I went to the first one I saw at the station and was stopped by an official who just pointed to a sign that said, “Blacks only.” He directed me to the sign that said “Whites only.” I asked my mom what that was all about and she just held a finger to her lips.

We stayed in West Virginia for six weeks while I got to know my dad’s family but at the end of the six, mom said. “It’s time to go.” We were driven to a train station in Huntington which took us to Richmond, Virginia with a three-hour layover so we decided to get some breakfast. As we walked to the restaurant, I saw a very old black man in a white uniform and cap, pushing a wheeled trash can, just like I saw a Marx Brother’s movie. He was sweeping the street and having a hard time bending over to pick up the dirt. As a polite young man I went over, held the dustpan for him as he swept the dirt into it and put it in the can. He tipped his cap and said Thanks. Then we turned to go into the restaurant.

Apparently, everyone in the place saw me helping the old black man and the waitress yelled at us as we walked through the door. “We don’t serve (n-word) lovers here.” So we left. I didn’t need mom to explain what just happened.

We moved from Richmond, by train, to Washington, DC where we were to spend three days before heading home again. On the first day (God, it was hot) we visited the Smithsonian, The National Archives, walked by the White House and a few other spots. That was when my passion for US history began. The second day was very different. It was the reason mom chose this time to take the trip.

We walked from the Washington Monument toward the Lincoln Memorial and stopped midway beside a reflecting pool in the shade of some trees (because, God, it was hot). We could go no further because of all thee people there. It was just a sea of black people. More than I had ever seen in my life. We were greeted warmly by people,surrounding us.

Far in the distance, I heard a familiar voice. Mahalia Jackson was singing. Mom always listened to her show in the afternoon and now I got to hear her in person. Still impressive with a 1960s sound system from about two football fields away. It made me a little homesick.

When she was done, a bunch of people came up to speak. I remember some of them, but after a dozen or so I was really bored. And hot. Then someone introduced the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

What a speaking voice. Clear, sonorous, impassioned. It compelled my attention. And I heard the words. “Now is the time” again and again. As he talked every instance of overt and systemic racism I had experienced over the past few weeks back to my mind.

By the time he got to “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the judged by the color of their skin but the quality of their character,” I was in tears and sobbing. I remember the faces of our new friends around us looking at me soberly but slightly nodding their heads. Today I know what thy were thinking. “Young man just got woke.”

That was a seminal moment for me. I got woke and I don’t think I’ve gone back to sleep. I see both chosen and systemic racism and I do what I can as an individual to not participate in it.

Don’t get me wrong, I know I still benefit from it, even when I try to reject it. But it grates on my soul.

This is not a whitewash of my life. There is nothing I can say or do to make up for this except for be aware of what is happening. It isn’t my right when confronted by someone whose life is degraded by racism to point out that I’m not like the rest of white people. It is my privilege to listen to their pain and acknowledge it’s reality. Everyone realizes it is insensitive to tell someone who has just experienced a devastating loss to tell them “God only gives you as much as you can handle.” We need to apply sensitivity to the loss of others.

I had a very dear friend in high school. We were inseparable. But he went to college in a state where the KKK was still respected. My friend, who had never experienced overt racism, came back a changed person after an encounter with that vile organization. Eventually, the experience ended our friendship. I was insensitive to his complaints by always reminding him that it wasn’t me. He didn’t need to hear an excuse. He needed a friend to say, “I am so sorry” and really mean it… because I did. I really am sorry. I really do understand. But saying it and showing it are two different things,

I’m still on this journey. I still want to do something. But the most important thing I can do is be aware, to support anyone struggling with the concepts and the reality of racism.

Racism robs all of us of a richer life by putting walls between us. Rejecting our own participation in it makes the walls thicker and more impenetrable. As Dr. King said, “Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation into the sunlit path of racial justice… to the solid rock of brotherhood.”

Now is the time to wake up. To be woke means your eyes are open, your ears are listening, you are aware of the reality of your surroundings. It’s not an insult. I wear the title proudly whether it comes from someone who rejects that reality or from someone who lives it.

I am woke. God help the sleepers.