The Argument on the Side of the Road I watched an exchange between a driver and a Border Patrol agent that reminded me how easily people can talk past one another when constitutional rights are involved. The driver kept insisting that the agent had to articulate the reason for stopping him right there on the
You May Not Have to Tell Me, But You Still Have to Have a Reason Read More »
When Somebody Plays Both Sides Listen to me, because this is one of those lessons that can hit your spirit if you have lived long enough to recognize it. One of the most dangerous people in your life is not always the person who openly dislikes you. Sometimes it is the person who claims to
Love Everybody, But Watch Who Gets Access Read More »
Seeing Through Somebody Else’s Eyes One of the hardest things to do during disagreement is to genuinely try to see the situation from the other person’s perspective. A lot of people hear that advice and immediately think it means giving in, but that is not what I am talking about at all. Listening to somebody
Listening Without Surrendering Yourself Read More »
Carry Your Own Light Here is something from American history that ought to make us stop and think about what surveillance really means. In 1713, New York City adopted a law regulating the nighttime movement of enslaved Black and Indigenous people over the age of fourteen. The ordinance said that if they were outside more
From the Lantern to the License Plate: A Long History of Watching Who Moves Read More »
A Tampa Story Hiding in Plain Sight You want to know something remarkable about Tampa history that many people walk past every day without ever knowing. A woman who was born enslaved went on to become a landowner along the Hillsborough River, right in the heart of what we now call downtown Tampa. Her name
Madame Fortune Taylor: The Black Woman Whose Name Tampa Almost Forgot Read More »
The Vote and the Consequences There is an old saying that elections have consequences, but sometimes folks do not understand those consequences until they come knocking at their own front door. In the case of American farmers, that front door may lead straight to a barn, a soybean field, a cattle pasture, or a tractor
When the Vote Comes Home to the Farm Read More »
Self-Love Has to Become a Practice The older I get, the more I understand that loving myself cannot remain something I merely say. Self-love has to show up in the way I actually treat myself. I can tell myself that I matter all day long, but my habits will eventually reveal whether I believe it.
You Cannot Keep Pouring From an Empty Cup: Learning to Care for Myself Read More »
Humanity Has to Come First The older I get, the more I believe that being human has to mean something deeper than belonging to a particular race, religion, culture, or nation. Those identities matter because they help tell the story of where we came from and what shaped us. I am not interested in pretending
Beyond Race, Culture, and Belief: Learning to See the Human Being Read More »
A Queen Powerful Enough to Make Kings Pay Attention Every now and then I discover a piece of African history that makes me wonder how I went so long without hearing about it. The story of the Rain Queens of the Balobedu people in South Africa did exactly that to me. For roughly two centuries,
The Rain Queens of Africa: When Kings Sent Gifts Instead of Soldiers Read More »
Thirteen Lines That Refused to Leave Me Alone When I first started digging into the Emerald Tablet, what caught my attention was how much meaning people had pulled from such a small piece of writing. The text is traditionally associated with Hermes Trismegistus and became one of the foundational writings of Western alchemy. Depending on
Becoming Through Doing: What the Emerald Tablet Taught Me About Change Read More »