You know those people who forget everything? Those people you can’t take anywhere because you’re constantly turning the car around at every corner because they’ve just remembered something they’ve forgotten? That’s me. I forget my phone, phone-charger, keys, debit card, and my jacket. I even once forgot my shoes (don’t ask). The other day due to some severe gum pain, I forgot my wallet at home. I grabbed my purse but left my wallet on my kitchen counter. I’d only discovered my missing wallet when I’d went to purchase myself something to drink and alas, no money. A friend of mine bought me something to drink, but the fact that I’d forgotten my wallet still nagged at me.
Later, after crying over poorly made tea, I made a joke to a different friend who’d also forgotten his wallet that we were both “too brown” to be so forgetful. Gallows humor. He laughed and so did a couple of our friends who were also standing near us. But after a few moments, suddenly forgetfulness didn’t seem so funny; I’d have to drive home without my driver’s license.
Fear griped me as I extracted myself from my friends. My heart beat fast and my palms felt clammy. I already felt like hell thanks to a mouth infection finding its way into my bloodstream, and now I felt panicked. I wouldn’t have to drive home for another two hours, but the anxiety coiling around my body like a snake around its prey just wouldn’t go away. My mind began to run through the names I know so well as if they were family members (and in a way, they are):
Sandra Bland
Reika Boyd
Tanisha Anderson
John Crawford
Dontre Hamilton
Freddie Grey
Laquan McDonald
Vonderitt Myers
Natasha McKenna
Ezell Ford
Akai Gurely
Mike Brown
Walter Scott
Alton Sterling
Philando Castille
Amadou Diallo
Korryn Gaines
Tamir Rice
The lone part of my brain not in a panic tried to quell my fears. “Don’t worry, just don’t do anything wrong. Drive within the speed limit. Signal. You have your registration. You are a licensed driver, you just forgot your driver’s license. You’ll be okay. It’s not as if driving without a license is an offense punishable by death.”
But neither is playing with a toy gun in an open carry state. Or forgetting to signal when you turn. Or sleeping on your couch in your own home. All simple offenses that somehow ended in closed coffins, childless parents, and parentless children. Could my forgetfulness lead to the same? Would an officer mistake my swollen jaw, mumbled words, and bronze skin as an implicit admission of guilt? Would my constant nervousness and anxiety rear its head as I reached for my glove box, inciting fear or even contempt in the officer at my perceived attitude?
And what would the media say about me, a Summa cum laude college graduate with two jobs taking care of her disabled mother full time, if I ended up dead? How would they discredit me? Would they bring up the physical fight I got into in the seventh grade? The parking ticket I got five years ago when I forgot to move my car for street cleaning? All of the plastic gloves I’ve stolen from various doctor’s office throughout the years? What about the full bottle of painkillers in my purse that I refused to take for my jacked up jaw? What hoops would they jump through to blame me for my own death? Who would take care of my mom?
She didn’t comply. She resisted arrest. I thought there was a gun. I feared for my life.
Would I be another hashtag? Another name? Another viral video of Black death? More importantly, will anyone even care since I am a Black woman and not a Black man?
I forgot my driver’s license the other day, a simple offense punishable with a fine, and I feared for my life.
Tyree King
Terrence Sterling
Oscar Grant
Bettie Jones
Nicholas Thomas
Tony Robinson
Yvette Smith
Jerame C. Reid
Kaldrick Donald
Kendra James
Sean Bell
Samuel DuBose
Bendon Glenn
Christian Taylor
Ramarley Graham
