How often, during my Omaha days & nights in the late '90's/early 2000's, did I get a late-evening hankering for some Lay's Sour Cream potato chips and Ben & Jerry's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream? Too many times to count, and no I wasn't pregnant. I'd slip on my boots and walk many, many blocks to the heart of my downtown existence...The Old Market. There was a little market/gas station that I frequented because it was closer than any larger grocery store. I would purchase my unnatural, but tasty, junk food combo cravings and traverse the night back to my apartment. And don't get me started on the countless times I put on my boogie shoes, walked to the clubs, and danced the night away. Stumbling through the streets at 1 or 2 in the morning to crash into my single occupancy bed was a sometimes chaotic, but good time in my younger life.
Flash forward to the last few years and I'm still walking the streets at night. No, I haven't started my post-pandemic career...yet. When my sister and I were delivering two different newspapers, she would drive to a nearby town to retrieve one, while I sometimes delivered the other. I can't drive, so I would lug two grocery bags of rolled-up newspapers through the dark, early morning streets of my small town. In the winter, with my heavy coat, stocking cap, and a scarf wrapped around most of my face, I looked like a tick about ready to pop. Sometimes I would walk on the sidewalks, sometimes in the streets, but I kept my damaged eyes as peeled as possible for unexpected obstacles such as tree branches or rocks. When one of the newspapers switched to mail delivery, my walking after sundown decreased, which has given my half-blind eyes more important things to focus on.
In August 2019, a young man named Elijah McClain was walking home from the store one late-evening in Colorado, a state adjoining mine. Someone called the police to report a person behaving suspiciously. The police arrived, immediately confronted the young man as if walking down the sidewalk with a grocery bag was a felony, and then used excessive force to restrain him. A few days later Elijah McClain died as a result of this assault.
How often did I walk down sidewalks in the dark while carrying a grocery bag? Why did I never get reported as a suspicious individual when I behaved far more suspiciously than Elijah McClain? Why didn't the police stop me to see what I was doing walking in the dark? Why am I not dead after a confrontation with police?
Comparing my experiences with his, the answer to these questions is obvious to me. It's because I am white and Elijah McClain was black.
Elijah McClain should still be alive but the system meant to protect and serve killed him because of the color of his skin. Until the system is repaired, the healing of this country cannot begin. This is one of many reasons why Black Lives Matter.
Thank you for reading or listening to my half-blind words.
Freak Out,
John L. Harmon
