Careful When Stepping Outside

A and Apapa earlier this year

Last week, Bill's lovely parents were here to help me with the boys while Bill was away for six days.  After lunch one day, I was cuing up "Diego" for A while K slept so that we adults could take a break.  I was using Netflix's instant play feature and it was taking a while.  I needed to make a quick trip to the bathroom, so I asked that A wait for me at the computer.  Quick trip to the bathroom finished (sorry, there is a point to this) and I go back to find A right where I left him.  Netflix is actually instant this time and he starts watching his beloved Diego.  The doorbell rings almost immediately.

At the door is a policeman.  He asks if I am alone.  I am so confused and a bit scared something has happened to Bill.  I tell him my sons (A runs up behind me, checks him out and then runs to the window to check out his car) and my in-laws (whom I point to - they are sitting down in the living room) are with me.  He tells me there has been a report of AN OLDER WHITE MALE DRAGGING A YOUNG AFRICAN AMERICAN MALE INTO THE HOUSE.  The words don't even register, I am confused.  I tell him Bill's dad (whom the officer can see) might have brought A back inside.  The officer asks, "But DRAGGING him?"  Still perplexed, I say that I am sure he was not dragged and that all is well.  There is a bit more to the dialogue, but not much.  He leaves and I try to understand what has just happened.

I realize that in the five minutes or less that I was in the bathroom, my wonderful father-in-law goes out of the front door to check the weather outside.  A being A hears the door and runs out to see what was going on.  My father-in-law is ready to come back inside and A being A is not.  Now I truthfully don't care what happened next.  Did he DRAG him?  Did he pull him?  Did A being A resist and exaggerate?  Did my father-in-law, who is 80 years old with severe back problems, grab A before he got too far away and into the street?  I have complete and utter trust in this man, so I want it to be understood that what he did or didn't do to A is not at issue.  Within those five minutes, A makes it back to his chair to watch Diego and he is completely unscathed.  AND all of this happened in front of Bill's mom.

What is at issue, is how I felt afterwards.  I felt completely confused, sad and intruded upon.  I realize that no one did anything wrong in this scenario.  Not A.  Not my father-in-law.  Not the officer (though the more I think about it, the more I am unsure of this).  And not the person "reporting" this (though we really think the officer saw it himself and came to investigate as the police never respond THAT quickly to anything around here - all I did was pee).

There are so many lingering thoughts.

• Had A been white, I don't believe anyone would have thought twice about it. 
• Had an elderly black man who really intended to harm my child done this, I don't think anyone would have investigated the scene.
• What if it had been me?  And it has been so many times!  Are we going to have to answer to the police every time we pull our children away from danger?
• I really thought I was safe from being the conspicuous family within my own house.  Lesson:  don't step out of your house!?
• What if the officer was not satisfied with me saying A was my son?
• I felt hurt, having the loving relationship of A and his "Apapa" boiled down to: "AN OLDER WHITE MALE DRAGGING A YOUNG AFRICAN AMERICAN MALE INTO THE HOUSE"

*******

I have just now rehashed this AGAIN with Bill (who is trying to sleep).  We realized that this incident is perhaps the first time we were actually being treated like everyone else in our community.  I was feeling sad for myself, when really the officer was treating us just like our neighbors are treated.  We live in a low income, primarily African-American community.  It is an almost daily occurrence to see a black man pulled over by the police (usually by SEVERAL patrol cars), spread eagled on a cop car.  Our friends and neighbors (men and women) get pulled over and questioned for much lesser things than the five minute scene at my doorstep every day when they are completely innocent (don't get me started).  We have lived here almost nine years in complete privilege and this is our first negative encounter with the police.

And for my sweet K (and A), this is likely just the first of many times the cops will intrude on their lives because they are black.  I realize that this is why I am sad.  I am sad my neighbors, for my boys, for the immense injustice of it all.