By Annie Turner

  There are so many ways I need to up my game. I hope to explore a few of them including: exercise, gardening, cooking, but the most important is digging out the deep well of racism I am confronting in my 74th year.  It doesn’t matter that I dated a Man of Color while at college. It does not matter that I had a cross burned on the lawn of my family’s home.

   When Black Lives Matter continued its passionate and wide witness this year, I became more aware of my own prejudices. It’s a hateful but necessary thing to do. I compare it to setting down one set of glasses–my white privileged ones–and picking up another; brilliantly clear with no escaping into fantasies about what this country is like, even though I thought I was fairly “woke.”

   Besides putting on a new set of eyes, I started reading “White Fragility” by Robin DiAngelo. I know some folks (thinking of a recent Atlantic article) think that this disrespects Black People. I don’t get that at all, and an experienced anti-racism trainer I know does not believe that nor do two Women of Color whom I know. It is a good place to start for us white folks who may have been walking around in a rosy cloud or thinking that we have no prejudice within. 

 Yeah, I knew things were hard for POC. I knew about Redlining, segregated schools, ghettoes being near centers of pollution, rates of disease and asthma among POC, higher mortality rates (including of Women of Color in childbirth), and daily pinpricks of micro aggressions and racism, plus being targeted and killed by police randomly. I did know that and hated it. But knowing is not the same feeling.

  That is what this confrontation with my own racism is doing–letting me see more clearly the wounded, damaged bodies and souls of Black People, going back 400 years to the first slaves landing on our shores. This means several things for me: It means that every time I see a FB post with a Person of Color featured with an article about racism and its history, my heart stutters. Literally. It feels as if I can’t suck in enough air. It feels as if a weight presses on my chest.

  Of course this does not compare to what it is like to be a Person of Color living in this country now. I would never assume that. I am just saying that–I see more and feel more.

   Then, on the recommendation of a Woman of Color I know, I ordered “My Grandmother’s Hands”by Resmaa Menakem, MSW, for my kindle. If you have not done so already, please consider doing this pronto. You can always download a sample to see what you think. 

 This author–a specialist in trauma therapy–presents an entirely convincing argument that White Supremacy and Racism are embedded in the bodies of white and Black folks.  Trauma over generations can influence the DNA of People of Color, changing how they face situations, create communities and culture, and their sense that danger is just around the corner so that many POC are in a constant state of alert. As we know, high blood pressure is a huge and pervasive health issue here. No surprise.

  So I am upping my game on trying to see with a different set of glasses: Trying to put myself more empathetically into the lives of Black People; reading more about the history of racism in our country; always being aware of the dangerous, evil attempts on the part of our government (especially the current GOP) to suppress votes, take away environmental protections, arm police with military grade weapons, screw up the food supply chain which endangers poor people, and so much more. I guess I will have to wait on the other categories of upping my game for now. This. This. Is the most important work I have done and am doing during the pandemic. 

And sure, I am not in my comfort zone, but that is okay and is right and just.  Because Jesus was always outside of His comfort zone, and if I claim to be His follower, I’d better get used to being uncomfortable.

Annie Turner is an author who lives in Williamsburg. Her places of worship include Haydenville Congregational Church. Her blog is “Faith Is My Operating System”  and it can be found at  https://faithismyos.blogspot.com