Look at the Stars

I think I have shared this memory many times with you all, but one of my best memories in life is seeing stars for the first time. Growing up I was a blind baby. I would always sit too close to the TV, read with books covering my entire peripheral view, and would always trip because I could barely see in front of me. I remember when I got my first pair of glasses at seven it was completely mind-blowing to me. I remember I looked at my hands, and they weren't blurry. Instead, I could see every wrinkle and detail on my hand. I remember walking out of the glasses store and being able to read every sign. I kept telling my mom everything I saw and I'm sure I was annoying her, but it was a world I was essentially new to and it was exciting for me! The thing that completely blew me away were the stars. It was a cold pale sunset. First I saw the moon and I never knew it had some many craters and holes. For me, it was always a bright fuzzy circle in the sky, but what I saw was beautiful and I couldn't take my eyes away from it but then I saw one star poke out next to the moon and then and another and another and before I knew it the sky was sparkling with a bunch of stars. I remember seeing them and saying "Look Ma I can see the stars!" It was absolutely breath taking.

I feel like there are a lot of things I take for granted, but the sky will never be one of them. I look up at it and I'm amazed every time. At Smith, I get sad because I can't see as many stars as I do at home due to the light pollution, but some days I take a step back from all the stress after a long day and stare up the stars. It has a way of centering me. It's nice to think that the stars I'm looking up are the same ones that people in the past used to look at, the ones that people around the world today look up at, and the ones that the people in the future will also look at. It's one of the few constant things in my life and it's truly amazing.

Honorable mentions: I feel like today I don't see as many celestial events as I used to growing up, but those too are some of my fondest memories. Like my first meteor shower, my first lunar eclipse, first solar eclipse, and the lunar eclipse in the freezing cold at Smith. Horror movie nights in 207, first winter weekend, my mom visiting Smith College, summer movie nights with Rachel, my surprise trip to Georgia, summer of 2017, all the Smith excursions, my trip to the Bahamas, Switzerland, France, New York, and Canada, and more!

To be honest ever since I got out of my depression life seems so much happier. I appreciate every day and I believe that every day is an amazing gift. There are so many things that love about life and don't want my life to end early because of some racist. I feel like our blog post isn't usually political, but I think that it must be said that what's going on in today's society with racism is unacceptable. I hate that people saying that these protests are "riots."

These aren't riots, but instead an accumulation of anger over years of generational trauma, mistreatment, and murder. I'm tired of seeing death every day on the news due to some unsupported racism. The part that annoys me the most is that these incidents are only the tip of the iceberg. I have had people growing up that have been murdered for no reason. I face racism every day no matter where I am. And just because I don't talk about it all the time doesn't mean I don't feel the effects of it in every aspect of my life. At one point of my life I didn't feel beautiful because of my natural black features, I didn't want to accept my culture, and have felt out of place due to many stereotypes. Speaking of stereotypes. I believe many people like to joke about it not realizing that they are only perpetuating them. So many people joke about how I'm not black because I'm at a PWI (perpetuating the idea that black people can only be in designated spaces), joking that I'm a French major because I love white people (perpetuating the idea that Francophones are white when a majority of them are actually African) and so much more. I may laugh, but I always write them off as racist (even if it isn't malicious). I hate racism and I look forward to a world where it won't exist, unfortunately I'm not hopeful. So many people benefit from this system that more radical measures must be taken. I believe that these protests are important and like MLK and Malcolm X it will (it MUST!) bring about change eventually, but I can't stand the surrounding rhetoric. I hate that Trump is choosing to militarize his response to these protest rather than evoking actual change.

And so many performative actions from "allies." The Instagram blackout did nothing, but allow people to feel like they made a difference. Things like protesting, donating, and sharing information is important. Also, I hate this new talk about how others need to be an ally to black people. Like this is what y'all should've been doing from the beginning. I know that I'm bitter and enraged, but if people were more allies than bystanders then the treatment of black people would be so much better. Like I see post like how Asian-Americans can help black people, how Latinos can help black people, how white people can help black people. As if black people are a different species. We are always ostracized and othered. The best thing to do is treat us like human beings and everything else will follow, you know?

(Side note I'm not going to name names, but some of these white hoes at Smith have messaged me about racism and stuff and I'm low-key annoyed because I'm like the media coverage should demonstrate just how racist America is and how sheltered these "woke" hoes are. Like I feel like many use the fact that they are LGBT+ (or allies) as an excuse for why they aren't knowledgeable about racism or why they relate to black people. Like racism and homophobia aren't the same things and instead ignorant to even relate the two. Race is something people will judge before someone even speaks to you. Anyways that's my rant.)