February 29, 2020 In Pursuit of Happiness Every year around this time instead of being filled with feelings of nationalism ( I still don’t have an American Passport) I am filled with angst of recurring dreams, recitations around recycled speeches, the “almost” that still eludes us, and that feeling of waste. Wasted running, hiding, whipping, bucking, swallowing of pride, lynching, and the spilling of blood. All of this because we still have a system of racism. Some might say why look at our strides from the point of a victim, “look at all the strides that African Americans have made since slavery” - and my answer to that is, I have never known anyone except Steven Segal who looks down the barrel of a gun and says, “We’re outgunned, and undermanned. But you know sumpin’? We’re gonna win. You know why? Superior attitude. Superior state of mind .” in his movie “Hard to Kill.” Over just the last decade, black lives have been easy to kill - so no this is not a stroll in victimology but rather a stretch in what is for some a reality. There are dates on calendars that to some, are more important that black history month. They mark the days where they lost loved ones to violence of all sorts. So each year that another black history month comes and goes, I think about things like how reassured and indifferent other people walk around in the comfort and splendor that was afforded to them by the continued expression of angst, the recurring nightmare, our recitations around recycled speeches, the “almosts” that still eludes us and that feeling of waste. Wasted running, hiding, whipping, bucking, swallowing of pride, lynching and the continued spilling of our blood. #whenlivingisaprotest #leicamonochrome @leicacamerausa (at Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn) https://www.instagram.com/p/B9KnS_nlfXd/?igshid=1rfid7npv0c00