I was so proud on the morning of Tuesday, May 28, 2013.

I was sitting in the Harvard Club, awaiting the beginning of my very first influencer event, sponsored by Siemens for environmental influencers.

My cousin called, and I hit ignore, making a note to call him back and get a vibe check on the music scene here, since he was a budding producer at the time and he would know.

Then, his parents called, and one of my Dad’s neighbors called.

When the neighbor called, she told me Dad was hurt- murdered, actually.

My aunt and uncle confirmed the news.

The crimson red of those walls closed in on me rapidly, and I was never the same again.

Fast forward to May 25 of 2020.

We all have restrictions on how much we can go outside because the air is poisoning us in a way that can’t be controlled. And then, in the midst of all of that, somehow, a man was outside on a block in Minnesota that I’d come to love when I was representing what I thought was just my race in an urban planning room just six years earlier.

Instead of COVID killing him, the cops did.

I’m feeling even more grateful that, despite how tragic my Dad left this Earth, at least we know it was a person who did it, not the air.

And certainly not the cops, who at least in Greensboro, were doing their best not to live up to the stereotype and the system, at least when it came to taking care of my dad, despite the many times 911 was called to his home in those three years.

But, something else died that week in 2020.

And it was similar to the thing that died besides my dad in 2013.

What died, was just being a Black urbanist.

What came alive, was the notion that being queer, neurodivergent, radical, feminist and unapologetically Southern, didn’t need to hide.

In fact, it’s the fuel that’s kept me even writing on this platform.

Even through the breaks and the feelings of it not being good enough or worthy of being listened to.

And now, 13 years of my Dad being an ancestor, and six years of the response of George Floyd and COVID (and Breonna Taylor and so many others), I feel more settled in the body and platform that has emerged since then.

Radical doesn’t scare me like it used to. Being rejected doesn’t either. Being multifaceted and realizing that it’s ok to have this space as a hobby and to not know all the answers is also easier.

Now that I know that colonialism has tried and is failing to make me not love myself and my people and my ancestors.

That defying gentrification is what makes life, life for me.

And with that, next week, I’m bringing back something I started six years ago, but in a way that feels just as grounded as this space is now.

You don’t want to miss that!

Until next time,

Kristen

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