I woke up this morning with a headache. I don’t know why. I went to bed relatively early. I had not been drinking. Perhaps my head had already intuited that the cycle of horrible news followed by terrible news followed by awful news would not be broken today.
I woke up to news of police killed in Dallas, follow ups on the killings of two dead black men, and violence across the world. There was so much news of violence and hate to report that there was no mention of overnight shootings in Chicago, although I’m sure there were some. There are too many shootings to be newsworthy.
Getting ready for work, I put on gray pants and a black shirt. This is not strange for me. I often wear gray and black, but today those dour, somber colors felt wrong.
To be accurate, they felt too right.
There are too many people dead from hate and guns, guns and hate. We should all be in mourning. We should all wear black. But I already feel enshrouded in darkness. The news smothers me with it.
I hope we can work together to change the world, but this morning I changed what I could. I changed my clothes.
I took off my gray pants and black shirt and put on a purple skirt and the most cheerful thing I own: a pink blouse with a floral pattern.
I am not a Pollyanna. I am not ignoring the news.I have not stopped caring about the too many people killed by hate and guns. I am simply protecting myself. I am protecting myself from being destroyed by hate and anger as society is being destroyed by hate and anger.
I retweet the words of others because I don’t know what to say. I am wearing pink because I don’t know what else to do, but I don’t want to give up.
I didn’t know how to change the world, so I changed my clothes.
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Kim Z. Dale 