She said "We are undaunted in our belief that we shall overcome, that we will rise up". It was inspiring. It was uplifting. But, I have not been undaunted, I have been afraid.
I always live in a state of anxiety. I’m always concerned about something. Worried that some bad thing will happen. It’s not always front and center, but it is a constant.
Last March, that anxiety reached a fever pitch. I was paralyzed by it. I stopped going to work. I stopped going to the store. I stopped getting the mail. I just stopped. Over time there were mitigations. My family pitched in to help. My job authorized work from home plans. I started using delivery services. But I was afraid of everything and everyone that crossed my threshold. Until I wasn’t.
I could have talked with a licensed professional. My daughter who is a licensed professional suggested it multiple times. She’s seen an increase in people seeking counseling this past year. She has her own therapist. She says she can’t be mine. I was eventually able to talk myself off the ledge every day until I no longer needed the talk. Anxiety reset to my normal on most days.
But that normal anxiety is a daily experience for Black people. It’s there, under the surface, held in check by the day-to-day activity. We can’t focus on it, or we would all just stop. We still have to get up, get to work, take care of our families, try to enjoy our lives in ways big and small. All of it under the threat of some crazy white supremacist who might decide on any given day that because my life is worthless it could and should be ended. For us there are no safe spaces, no places to hide, no places to shelter from the storm of an incited mob. I talked to a friend and a relative the other day who said they were afraid of what would happen during the days leading up to the inauguration. I was surprised. These are people who have never talked of being afraid of anything before – not like this. They have never talked to me or anyone else about staying inside because of that fear. I have another friend who has been stockpiling supplies for months so she would not have to leave her house until February. After 1/6, we saw that uncontrolled mob of crazy white people was a real threat and no longer a hypothetical what-if. We hunkered down, followed the stories of people being arrested. We watched the days pass with increasing trepidation, afraid for ourselves, afraid for the President and Vice-President elect. Afraid of and for our country.
Not long ago I watched the movie Harriet. It was amazing and I loved every minute. But the scene that keeps coming back to my mind is the one where Harriet is holding her former master at gun point. She says “You tried to kill my family, but you didn’t. You tried to kill my people, but you won’t.” The insurrectionists are like that quivering slaveholder. In the end, they will not win, because those who are unafraid, and those who stand in spite of their fear, will have the courage to ensure their defeat.
Mark Twain said, "Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear." Being afraid does not remove the threat because it is there whether you fear it or not. I’m not saying I am courageous, obviously I’m not. But we all have had a moment when with heart pounding, palms sweaty, and knees knocking, we have stood up to the fear and beaten it back so that we could get on with the work at hand. And for four years, many of us withstood all that the previous administration could throw at us. Some did not make it, but many of us did. “You tried to kill my people, but you won’t”.
As I watched the inauguration of a Black woman, Asian woman, woman, Kamala Harris, I saw a testament to the courage of generations. Women who have been enslaved, women who have suffered physical and emotional harm, women who have been pushed aside, women who have known fear and mastered it, so that one day, this history making woman could stand unafraid with one hand on the bible and the other raised in the air as she become Madam Vice President of the United States of America.