The Elephant in the Room

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1934. My mom is seven years old. The FHA is created to insure loans for homes. Blacks are explicitly excluded from these programs.

1964: The Civil Rights Act is passed. My parents are the only black homeowners in an entirely white neighborhood.

1967: Loving vs the State of Virginia makes interracial marriage legal (which technically means my mother was born a crime).

I’m born later that year.

1971: The Supreme Court upholds school segregation. I start elementary school the next year.

I desperately want to see equity for everyone, regardless of age/gender/race/sexual preference/gender orientation. I know empirically–not anecdotally–what it is like to be the elephant in the room.

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