Today is Juneteenth. It’s a day of celebration and cultural awareness for black people in the U.S.A. It’s the day we recognize when the last slaves were finally set free two years after the Emancipation Proclamation.
While I will be celebrating with friends and family today, I will not be spending much time in the blogosphere. The blogging community has been a mixed bag for me. Some of the communities have been extremely supportive and served as a safe space for me as a writer, but the jury is still out as to whether it’s a safe space for me as a black woman.
Someone recently took it upon themselves to open up old wounds of racial trauma for me without considering how it might affect me. While I’m sure hurt towards me wasn’t their intent, that’s how it turned out.
I’d like to say that’s the most negative thing I’ve encountered lately, but it’s not. People seem to enjoy reaching out to me to share all their weird, twisted, and sometimes, oppressive views with me and don’t seem to get it when I don’t agree with them. I’m too old to be justifying the decisions I make to preserve my mental health and racial dignity. Other people can either accept this or not.
I will be taking a break from blogging until August.
Wherever you are in the world, hold tight to those who accept you as you are and that are willing to hear you out, even if they don’t agree with you, and you don’t agree with them.
Stay safe and be blessed.