It’s Exhausting Being Black in America

This post is for any black person going to work still and their employer and co-workers expect you to act like everything is normal. We are in the middle of a pandemic that is affecting black people more, we have witnessed Ahmaud Arbery’s murder, Breonna Taylor has been murdered by cops without being charged, George Floyd was lynched on video, Rayshard Brooks was gunned down and the list goes on. Now they tell us blacks are “hanging” themselves from trees. We are not required to operate as normal. Too often blacks have had to remain professional at work to spare white people from being uncomfortable. This stops now. I saw George Floyd’s murder while at work. I cried. Many times. I complained to my company that our feelings are being ignored and not acknowledged. We are dealing with trauma. Real trauma. We are left to wonder if we will become the next hashtag while others wonder when they can visit the salon again. We are running on fumes. We are angry. We are sad. We shouldn’t have to hide these feelings to make others feel comfortable in the office. This is not new. This trauma is re-occurring like a nightmare except it’s real. Since when does being professional mean not having feelings or people displaying humanity? No, I will not have that presentation to you by 4pm but you can acknowledge the hurt and pain I have right now. Don’t ask us to lead meetings. Instead open a meeting by denouncing racism and providing us support. Give us time off to grieve and/or protest. We see ourselves and our family with each killing. You don’t see us crying in between meetings. We are mentally checked out and exhausted. We are tired of putting on the performances acting like we aren’t hurting. You should be hurting too because you also witnessed a lynching. I can say my company is listening to me and I’m not accepting normality. It takes one person, one complaint to leadership to put them on notice. One person to influence change. One to lead and I gladly accept that challenge. I took this photo in 2016 and since then nothing has changed. Until now…