Light in Darknes

As I sat sheltered in my home recently, fearing not only the invisible enemy of a deadly virus but also the very visible and noisy protestors but a ½ block from my house, I sank into a deep dread. My own personal reality has been dealing with my husband’s systemic illness, being admitted and discharged from the hospital multiple times over the last few weeks, and sensing that another trip was eminent as the curfew approached. My inner and outer world has felt totally upside down and at times frighteningly terrifying. For 24 hours necessary medication was not accessible because our Rite-Aid was closed due to a violent break-in and stealing frenzy in the pharmacy from desperate looters. Overwhelming helplessness began to seep into my center. In rare moments I have succumbed to such feelings and in these most trying times I sensed the pull and seduction once again.

But then there was the rage. The fantasy of standing on my front porch actually holding a gun, shouting at strangers to stay away or they would pay dearly, as I protected my home and my family. Who was this person that my subconscious released into the world. The image was almost as frightening as the reality I have been living.

The rage is real. Our enemies are both unprecedented and all too familiar. A déjà vu of sitting huddled with my then younger children and husband as fire and looting overtook Los Angeles during the last race confrontation surfaced. The Rodney King incident had unleashed the venom that lay under the surface for so many. Yet this was different. A level of maturity rests amongst much of the nation. People of all colors and religions, together, share their outrage and absolute indignity at the horrific sight of a man being murdered in front of our very eyes. Generations ago he would have been hung by a rope while white people dressed in white garb, a symbol for some of purity and goodness, stood in pride and joy at their accomplishment. Pocketed throughout the United States in rural America, these scenes were all too common but the nation didn’t have to face its reality. Today through the magic of a tiny phone, horror and nightmare are now transmitted for the whole world to see forcing every person in the world to face the cruelty and inhumanity that exists within the heart of some men (and women).

Now we say enough, is enough! One black man, a man with a family, one of God’s children, becomes a symbol, a martyr to rally all good people to demand a reckoning that is much overdo and hopefully not too late. As a child of Holocaust survivors I can only imagine what it would have meant decades earlier if all good people had joined to protest the wanton denigration of Jews. To see the officers humiliate and force the last breaths out of George Floyd’s body brought another déjà vu, of police beating and kicking unarmed men and women as they walked down the streets in Germany and Poland. Watching those in uniform yield their power is a cellular traumatic memory for many of us. And let us not ignore that our own government has set the tone for such behavior to exist and resurface, over and over again, highlighted by a president standing with a bible in hand as he permitted innocent, peace-loving people to be attacked with toxic sprays and rubber bullets.

Yes, the world is upside down, but it is the puss that comes to the surface, the fever that represents the sepsis within, that is being released so that medical attention will be addressed and healing can take place.

We all have personal challenges, we all live with enemies looming before us but we have wisdom, strength, and the ability to act. The irony for me is that our leadership has been given a strange gift – a pandemic and racial inequality, challenges that call for rising up, bringing hope, and making meaningful change; it has been squandered by our country’s leadership! I believe this darkness will invite and welcome new light and transformation to take place once and for all.