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“You really couldn’t see me, could you?” “It doesn’t matter if I saw you or not,” his father said. “All that matters is that you felt safe.”
“I just wanted you to see me.” That’s a beautiful thing to say to someone. I mean, don’t we all want to be seen? Before I leave, I lean in close and say, in my sincerest voice, “I see you.”
“Do I have to write about being Black? What if I were an artist that only drew White characters? What would that say about me?” “What?” “I mean, White writers don’t have to write about being White. They can just write whatever books they want.
can only ever write about Blackness? Am I allowed to write about other things? Am I allowed to be something other than simply the color of my skin?
“Treat people as people. Be color-blind. Love openly. Love everyone.” And then, in the same breath, he would have to say to his son: “You will be treated differently because of your skin. The rules are different for you. This is how you act when you meet the police. This is how you act growing up in the South. This is the reality of your world.”
in this world that we live in, the fact of the matter is that it’s hard to think of anyone as being real. Everyone is just an image on a screen
The past, the present, the future. They’re interchangeable when it comes to bad news. Tragedy and trauma are the threads that weave generations together.
My old man told me about real people. People with Social Security numbers.
that all of us people are wandering the universe together as one.
Most of them will think that everything is okay and that you’re being treated well enough and that everything is beautiful. Because, I guess for them, all they can imagine is a world in which things are fair and beautiful because, after all, they’ve always been treated fairly and beautifully. History has always been kind to them.”
“It’s not all bad. But that’s not the same as it being good.
it’s only a fall if you think about the ending. Otherwise, it’s called flying.
Pain makes people selfish. We only have so much so I can’t take yours too. I can’t carry your water, Kid.” “I’m not asking you to carry it,” The Kid says. “I just want you to see it.
What matters is the fact that if it wasn’t my dad that got shot and killed it was somebody else’s dad. What matters is that if it wasn’t you or me that got shot and killed, it was another kid.
