FIFTY YEARS

Fifty years ago today Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. Fifty years. That spring I had met all of the school’s graduation requirements and only needed one class to get teacher certification. A teacher in the local district had died and they offered me his job. All I had to do was drop out for the semester, teach his classes, graduate in May then go to summer school and be done. Ten years earlier as I was getting ready to graduate from high school, MLK Jr. was organizing a bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama. Most of the decade in between I was safely tucked away, immersed in White Privilege either in the U.S. Army or at a small, Baptist, Liberal Arts college. I knew racism was bad but then as now, White Privilege lets you off the hook. If you weren’t lynching black men or preaching hate you must be alright. I wanted equal rights for everyone but it was their fight and my plate was full. 

He died on a Thursday. Three days later on Sunday evening my wife and I attended a memorial service on the square, next to the court house. The crowd spilled over in all directions with mostly preachers on the makeshift podium. Blacks and whites leaned on each other, arm in arm with common cause, maybe the first time ever in that town. My mother in law went out of her way to vent her dislike for Dr. King but when she told me, “Good riddance”, I was shocked and began a slow but profound introspection. From the Sermon on the Mount Jesus did not mince words: “Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then thou shalt be able to see clearly to cast out the mote, out of thy brother’s eye.” It had never occurred to me that I was part of the problem. Sins of omission are no less sins than those of commission. We held hands and sang, ‘We Shall Overcome’ and I cried real tears. 
Fifty years. 

This morning as my bacon-egg sandwich was coming together and the coffee pot chirped for the last time. On the radio a preacher from another time was pouring out his soul. He was preparing his followers for difficult days ahead. He knew his detractors would kill him, told his closest confidants but they weren’t ready to hear it. On the radio I kept hearing clips from his “I Have A Dream” speech. They played Peter Paul & Mary’s, “If I Had A Hammer” and Dylan followed with, “We Shall Overcome.” I didn’t cry but certainly there was a lump in my throat. 

After half a century I would like to believe that America has overcome racism but we have not. It has been swept under the rug and watered down to an acceptable level. People of color have options that were unavailable in 1968 but his dream is still just a dream. That privilege, the one extended specifically to white, Christian men in particular and after that to their women, it is still entrenched in American culture, institutionalized in policy and practice at every level. I could rant about a reprobate demagog in the White House or his narrow minded followers but they are just symptoms of a deeper wound. A subtle message has been spread that it’s alright again to vent hate and retribution against people of color, people who are different, that all that matters is what I want; ME, ME. Like schooling fish, moving to a collective conscience. My culture is turning back to a selfish, self righteous, dark side. All it needs to rise up again is a narrow seam and a crack in time. It resonates naturally to “Make America Great Again.” Like we were great when beating your wife was a man’s right and people of color knew their place. Was it great when children went down into coal mines instead of to school or when sexual assault only happened to women who asked for it? When people who have lived with privilege are forced to practice equality/equity, they feel like they are being punished. They push back with a self righteous zeal that makes religion pale. Change is the nature of nature and the “ME, ME” fixation will run its course. I’ve clung to a piece of wisdom for most of my adult life that says; Change comes slow, one funeral at a time. At first I thought it was clever irony but now I think it’s a simple truth. The way we vacillate between ME and WE, one lifetime may not be enough to see the change. If you want to make the world a better place, raise your children well. 

MLK told his followers, “I may not be there to see it with you but I’ve been to the mountain.” His way of giving them courage. He was shot and killed the next day. I’m still here, putting one foot in front of the other. I live a charmed life, not that I deserve it any more than Dr. King deserved to be murdered but that’s the way it turned out; and we sang, Here in my heart, I do believe; we shall overcome some day. 

Fifty years.