First of all, I didn’t write this yesterday because the weight of the world on my shoulders was particularly heavy yesterday and I just shut down.

Yesterday I was getting ready for my workday and as usual I turned on the radio (NPR) just in case the world blew up overnight. I am not on top of the news and I figure if I need to know then it will bubble to the top.

As I was preparing my Bullet Proof Coffee, I could hear that the story had something to do with race and then my ears perked up just in time to hear a sound bite of a woman saying…

“There’s only one thing worse than a fat-ass empowered black woman. That’s a fat-ass empowered black woman who’s got public reins in her hands. If we’d known you all were going to be this much trouble, we would’ve picked our own fucking cotton.”

I felt a shudder and a chill at the same time. I knew this story was about a black prosecutor in St. Louis and my mind started racing.

“I was thinking about going to St. Louis. Do I want to go now?
“Who was that?”
“How could she say that on a recording?”
“How could she say that at all ?”
“What else does she think?”

Then my mind settled on this..
“You know…white men don’t have to worry about casually listening to the radio and having hateful remarks directed at them reminding them that this one ignorant woman’s statement is indicative of countless others who feel, think, and act in a way that reflects this sentiment.”

I have heard so many people say that they don’t get this whole privilege thing.  Well it is so many things but basically it is the ability to walk through much of life unscathed and fearless.  When you have no fear and your mind is unencumbered and free to dream, hope, and think without interruption then you have the potential to go that much further and that much faster.  That is a privilege.