Quiet Should Never Be Confused With Weakness I heard a saying that stopped me for a minute: “Just because I’m laid-back doesn’t mean I won’t lean forward.” There is a whole lot of wisdom packed inside those few words. Some people have a habit of mistaking a calm personality for weakness. They see somebody who
Just Because I’m Laid-Back Doesn’t Mean I Won’t Lean Forward Read More »
When History Is Written in the Body The more I learn about African American history, the more I realize that some of our story survived outside courthouses and history books. For more than two centuries, slavery controlled where millions of Black people lived, worked, and raised their families. It also separated families and forced people
What Our DNA Remembers: Slavery, Ancestry, and the Great Migration Read More »
Coming Home Is Not the Same as Being Free One thing people do not always understand is that walking out of prison does not mean prison immediately walks out of you. A man can come home, hug his family, sleep in his own bed, and still feel locked up somewhere inside his mind. I heard
Prison Does Not Always End When the Gate Opens Read More »
The Date Is Only the Doorway When people hear the word Juneteenth, many immediately think of June 19, 1865, and that date absolutely matters. That was the day Union Major General Gordon Granger announced in Galveston, Texas, that enslaved people were free under General Order No. 3. The announcement came more than two years after
Juneteenth Is More Than a Date Read More »
When Artemis II Came Home When I watched the story of Artemis II unfold, I saw more than another successful NASA mission. I saw another reminder that Black achievement in science and technology did not begin yesterday. Artemis II carried four astronauts around the Moon and safely returned them to Earth on April 10, 2026.
Black Excellence Was Never a DEI Experiment Read More »
The Warning That Caught My Attention When I first hear somebody say, “Goodbye Zelle, goodbye PayPal, goodbye Venmo,” I understand why the message gets people’s attention. Money is personal, and anything involving the federal government and our bank accounts deserves careful examination. The claim is that FedNow will eventually become the funnel through which practically
FedNow, Digital Money, and the Fear of Losing Control Read More »
The Numbers Made Me Look Twice When I hear somebody say the Latino vote is moving toward an almost even political split, I understand why that gets people’s attention. But before building an argument around those numbers, I have to make sure the numbers themselves are right. George W. Bush did not receive 44 percent
When Black Political Power Is No Longer the Only Prize Read More »
When Life Seems to Line Up There are times in life when something happens so perfectly that I stop and wonder whether it was really just a coincidence. I may be thinking about somebody I have not spoken to in months, and suddenly the telephone rings with their name on the screen. I may be
When Coincidence Starts Feeling Like a Message Read More »
The Experiment That Still Disturbs Me The Milgram experiment is one of those psychological studies that stays with you because it forces an uncomfortable question about ordinary human behavior. Psychologist Stanley Milgram began the research at Yale University in 1961, and the first major results were published in 1963. His work was influenced in part
How Far Will Ordinary People Go When Authority Says Continue? Read More »
The Question Behind the Wealth There is a question about American history that has stayed with me because it sounds simple until I really sit with it. If Black people contributed so much labor to building America’s wealth, why did Black families end up owning so little of that wealth? The answer does not begin
Before There Was a Wealth Gap, There Was an Ownership Gap Read More »