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Over the course of the last two weeks, I’ve had the privilege of traveling to San Juan, Puerto Rico and Tulsa, Oklahoma. While, these two trips were vastly different (although I did plan them each and felt a very real sense of responsibility for the experience of others), both trips reinforced the sanctity and importance of community- and community that is willing to challenge your thinking and hold you with accountability. For me, that is *almost* exclusively rooted with other Black folk.
Traveling to Puerto Rico with my very Southern, older cousins, was a moment in time that I was unaware I needed. Five of us traveled to San Juan from Boston, MA (me), Atlanta, GA and Spartanburg, SC. These are the roots of my family. My embodiment of the diverse tapestry from the South Carolina countryside to the vibrant bussling city wrapped in Black upward mobility of Atlanta are what makes up my understanding of the world around me. My roots run deep in the antebellum South - my ancestrial blood is in the land, and in the evolution and, subsequent, commodification of southern Black culture via music, food, fashion, and popular vernacular. I KNOW these things about myself, but sitting across from my cousins for three days, and listening to and absorbing the stories of our family history, solidified the ways in which, being Black and Southern in this country is reliant on strong community bonds.
And the same is true about my time in Tulsa. While I was not with blood relatives during my time there, I was with a community of Black folk that embraced me and one another with the softness and care of a cherished loved one. The re-illumination of the soft nurturing nature of Black folk, Black men, in particular, highlighted how media and public portrayls of our people are simply wrong. Our (Black folk) strength lays within our natural instinct towards care, protection, and love.
There’s a saying, “what’s understood doesn’t need to be said,” and this perfectly encapsulates how so many Black communities come to be in our care for one another. WE have our backs, and the only thing that will get us free is US.
Both of these moments in time of strong community reinvigorated my commitment to building the ‘big C’ Community for us as Black folk by reminding me of the beauty in being held with grace and accountability. Each trip offered me moments of challenge, as new perspectives were presented to me regarding how each of our Blackness can show up in real time. We are often relugated to our trauma and pain and grief. Popular stories of Blackness often center around our ability to ‘overcome’, to ‘survive’. And while we definitely have resillience that our white counterparts cannot fathom, our magic comes in our community’s ability to create, find, share, and elevate Joy.
Since we were stolen, trafficked, and enslaved for this country, Black folk have always held the coupling of our pain and joy - but our joy sustains. And I fully believe it sustains because we are willing to be in community with one another and hold a mirror up to each other and say, ‘is this really who you want to be in this world?’ That question is KEY when it comes to community. Fear of open conflict continues to be a beacon of white dominance. We miss our chance at evolving into a better form of ourselves when we ignore the conflict of wrestling with who we want to be and who we actually are. I see this in white people all the time. Lack of willingness to ask hard questions and challenge long held assumptions and ways of operating. Lack of willingness to be uncomfortable and ask other white people hard questions that lead to hard truths. A seemingly innocuous complicity that lays the groundwork for unchecked whiteness to persist.
I continue to be proud of how we as Black folk show up in community with one another. Nothing is ever perfect, but when the binds of community are rooted in a genuine guardian and stewardship of OUR people, we have far more than can ever be stolen from us. The binds that tie us are US; and it’s ok to acknowledge that, maybe, they not like us….