The woman’s answer was, “I’m his aunt.” I had no words.

As my Lyft driver pulled up to the storefront where George Floyd was murdered and houses the memorial that we have all seen in pictures and the news, my pulse quickened. It was surreal to see the space that I had watched on the news for weeks on end. The world knew what happened on that corner, where the driver let me out so nonchalantly on a gorgeous Sunday morning a few weeks ago. You know the feeling you get when the air thickens because you can feel the history of a specific place? That is what it feels like when you pull up to the intersection of 38th Street and Chicago Avenue in South Minneapolis. On one corner a church was meeting outside. In the center is a steel fist calling out notice that we were entering a place of action. Across the way was a gas station, abandoned. What were bus shelters now housed signs and books and art. But there, in front, was the market. And laid out in front of it were hundreds and hundreds of small individual memorials.

This is not the George Floyd Memorial. It is so much more than one man’s memorial. This site has become a memorial to everyone and anyone who has faced violence at the hands of authority figures who should be protectors. It is a memorial to people who carry the emotional weight of not feeling safe themselves and being concerned about the people they love. It is a memorial to the people who laid witness to the moment of George Floyd’s death, but also its aftermath.

This is not a memorial built by mason and carpenters. It is a memorial built of love, individual stories, and people’s need to call out for justice, compassion, and understanding.

I am a middle-aged, upper middle class, white woman living in the suburbs of Long Island. This was not my story, but I felt a sense of responsibility to honor those whose story it is and to try to learn more about why my story may be feeding the oppression that created this space.

And so, I came to see and to listen. I met two young men who explained that they were there on that fateful day and in the aftermath. One had added an X Men figurine to the memorial. Why? Because this was his story and a memorial to his story too and X Men was important to him. They suggested a few restaurants nearby and we talked about food. They invited me to join them for lunch, but I had limited time before I needed to catch my flight home.

With the time I had left, I walked around. I read the messages. The gardener in me paid homage to each of the planter boxes that had been painted with messages and filled with life that outlined a perimeter on one side of the memorial so much more gracefully than the concrete road blocks did on the other side.

I read the spray-painted notes that were on the bus stop near the gas station, and the posted cards and letters that hung there in a space that was now designated as more of a community board than anything else.

And then I saw a woman placing several hand painted cards inside of the memorial. I was drawn to her, so I approached and asked if she had painted them herself. She explained that she hadn’t, but they had been gifted to her by students and she felt they belonged here. It was hot that day and she stood underneath an umbrella that made me jealous because she was not melting, and I was. She asked who I was, and I explained that I was just visiting and wanted to come to learn. I asked who she was, and she said she was Angela Harrelson, and George Floyd was her nephew.

I froze. Because in all the stories and news, when we saw her and her family, they were calling out for justice, speaking out as his voice, and playing such a public role, most especially rallying for the preservation of this very memorial. Now, here she was, with her stunning bleach blonde hair under an umbrella, and she was just a person who was mourning the loss of her nephew.

And so I asked the most important question I could. “How is your family doing?” Because before they were GEORGE FLOYD’S family, they were George “Perry” Floyd’s family. And George “Perry” Floyd died at the same time that GEORGE FLOYD did.

Her answer was honest. “We are learning to grieve.” She explained that they had publicly grieved for so long in such a hurried unprepared way that they were finally having the chance to grieve privately, and they were all doing that differently and in ways that were meaningful to them. She talked about how grieving publicly provided them with a level of community that they never would have had and purpose that provided solace to some, but that it also stole their right to just plainly mourn the man that was George Floyd.

I offered her my condolences. I am not sure I could offer more.

My Lyft returned. We hugged. And I got in the back of the car. I drove away.

And that is the crux of this. I drove away. I came to learn and to honor what I don’t know, but I am not of community and I am not of the lived experience. This is not my story to tell; it is my story to read, learn from and work to digest. This story belongs to Angela and her choice to elevate her grief into helping to lead a movement. This story belongs to two young boys who were going out to eat tacos and invited a white middle-aged woman to join them. This story belongs to the front desk attendant at my hotel who spends an hour navigating poor public transportation to get to work despite the fact that her home and workplace are a mere 12 minute drive away from each other. This story belongs to the people who chose to attend church outside on the corner across from this memorial.?

So then what is my story? This exchange with Angela has replayed in my mind over and over these past few weeks, as I work to answer that question while I try to frame it in the context of her work and life and her story. I do not have an answer yet, but I’m pretty sure that the key is not to have the answer, but to being willing to commit to learning, growing, and being a part of the solution that I recognize is not my story.?