The "Joy" of being Black in America

It’s happening all around my home right now...Men with baseball bats and hammers, walking around freely, “defending THEIR neighborhood” against PEACEFUL protesters... against people just living here. Against people like me, a person that the neighborhood also belongs to. I no longer feel safe taking afternoon walks with my two black boys without Reggie. I’m now conditioned to look at every white woman in my neighborhood as a potential, “Karen,” and every white male as a potential threat to Rocky and Russell, because I JUST DON’T KNOW, and I’d rather be safe than dead (and I said what I said...”dead” not “sorry” because for blacks, today’s “sorry” means “dead”) *
Whether good or bad, most of my community’s true feelings are currently on display. I often think about moving to the suburbs, a place I know well. But then I think, how would moving back there help? What is better...living around blatant racists that spit on you during a pandemic and call you a nigger to your face (yes it’s happened), or ones that hide behind their pretty doors, say a happy hello as they grab their letters from their mail boxes...but secretly physically and metaphorically wear their MAGA hats inside, praying that their kids don’t want to play with your kids, or that you eventually just move away.
Uhhh, the joys of being black. Subconsciously calculating your every move for your children, because of the regular bad people in life, blatantly racist people, AND secretly racists people. Where to move? What schools are safe and have a fair amount of diversity, but are still good schools, because we all know how the funding is distributed when it comes to inner city schools typically with higher percentages of blacks. ...It’s so exhausting. And sad because I know I can’t put my kids in a non racist bubble. I KNOW they will experience it in some form some day. I DREAD the day. And hope and pray that all that I teach them now about the beauty of their own skin, will help lessen the blow a little, when racism and the results of white privilege finally rear their ugly heads.