Over the years, I have observed and recorded what the world does to people who look like me and my ancestors. The factories shut their gates. Redlining drew its maps. The schools were underfunded, and the police were not always kind. Despite the adversity, every spring, they continued to turn the soil, plant seeds, and look forward to a harvest from their backyard suburban garden. It was a small act of faith that the future would arrive, that warmth would return, and that something green would push through the dirt they had turned.
I had learned many enduring truths from my grandparents. They buried children and still set out tomatoes. Landlords cheated them, and they still swept their porches. They were told they were invisible, yet still dressed in their Sunday best for a photograph someone would one day scan and upload to the cloud.
My grandparents had bequeathed me a faith that could absorb the worst the world had to offer and still find reason to hope, love, and dream. Their legacy of faith has become something that could hold in balance the lynching tree and the cross, the closed factory gate and the open church door, and the long walk North in search of a better life.
