Over the course of this trip I have been re-examining. There are things I knew. But as it turns out, I didn't really know.
I, like most American school children, learned about Rosa Parks in school. However, the story I was taught was so simplistic to the point of omitting crucial details. Rosa Parks was a stalwart of the efforts to help the Black community in Montgomery, particularly Black women. When she refused to get up, she was not only standing up for her human dignity, but it’s most likely that she wasn’t even actually breaking any laws.
I also didn’t quite fully understand the march cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The most famous picture shows a march covering the span of the roadway, but what I didn’t realize is that the first time they went they just walked in pairs on the sidewalk.
They weren't blocking traffic or anything that should've been deemed problematic. But they were still stopped. Stopped and then surrounded with police and state troopers both in front of them and behind them on the bridge where they had nowhere to run or escape, and then they were beaten.
Sometimes it feels like too much to take in. Sometimes these re-examinations leave me questioning the future and the past and even when it's uncomfortable, it's important because in the re-examination we discover more about the world and ourselves.
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