A guest post by Nick Woods

My son surprised me with some thoughts he posted on social media last night … not because of what he wrote but, rather, because he chose to share them in such a public way. Nick plays his cards pretty close to the vest when it comes to social media, so I was caught off guard by his vulnerability. Graciously, he’s allowed me to post his thoughts here; they are worthy of so much more than this landing spot. When I asked him for a title, he wasn’t particular – said he wasn’t really thinking about one when he wrote words down. So I’ve been thinking…

about Nick’s first, best friend. His name is Joseph, but we called him Jo-Jo. I dug through some photo boxes to find this one. It was their last visit together before we moved from KY to NC, a dreary day for both of them. When I asked them to smile, this was the best they could offer. Hugs were given, tears were shed, and then, we all moved on. That was June 1998. 

Fast forward to last night – June 2020. The boy who wrestled with his emotions twenty-two years ago, is the same boy who penned these thoughts last night. And I can’t help but wonder if those three years with Jo-Jo didn’t serve as a solid foundation for the years that have followed … the heart that’s been shaped into the man who is now willing to “climb into” another man’s skin. I don’t think it’s the first time you’ve done it, Nick, … climbed into another man’s skin … but it probably will be the most important time you’ll ever do so. I love you, son. Thank you for this gift. 

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A guest post by Nick Woods (6.01.2020. Allrightsreserved.)

Sharing this on social media, an ouroboros of demagoguery, name-calling, and general lack of good-will, may not be a great idea; but I am not posting for likes, I am not posting as a performative exercise. I am not sharing any crazy radical ideas or thoughts that you haven’t already heard before. I am simply writing as it helps me to organize my thoughts and posting in the spirit of feedback and accountability from those who would read and engage this post in good faith.

OK, here goes…

One of my earliest and more formative experiences engaging with “race relations” on an intellectual level was in reading and occasionally re-visiting passages from To Kill A Mockingbird. If you are like me or grew up in the South, it is likely you also had this as required reading in school.

I have been thinking a lot about the book recently. It is certainly an old text and dated in many regards. And I know many folks roll their eyes when you bring up this book – and I will certainly acknowledge there are many problematic elements with the “who” and the “how” of the storytelling mechanics. But there are also broader themes of empathy, courage against difficult odds, and fighting for justice in impossible situations that ring eerily true in contemporary America. I am struck by a couple of the more famous lines that Atticus delivers to Scout and Jem: (1) “You never really understand a person…until you climb into his skin and walk around in it” and (2) “simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win.”

I have tried to climb into others’ skin and walk around in it in recent weeks. We have seen the very public outpouring of anger, frustration, grieving, and confusion in the wake of the injustice with George Floyd and so many others. We have seen COVID-19 disproportionately impact the health of minority Americans and their families, to say nothing of the disproportionate economic destruction of their livelihoods.

Someone once half-joking said to me “I believe white privilege is real, and I’m sure glad I‘m benefiting from it.” A lot of truth in that statement. Whenever I see a police officer in a public space, I feel a sense of security, that I have someone who is watching my back and looking out for me. I will never know the feelings of fear, worry, and pain that same situation elicits from a person of color. I will never know what it’s like to be born into the wrong ZIP code. I will never know what it’s like to be denied access to educational attainment. I will never know what it’s like to search for a job as a person of color. I don’t know how we fix all that, but that has to be the goal. And even though it may feel like we “were licked a 100 years before we started,” we still have to keep trying to fix it. We can probably start by shutting up and listening to the folks who face these barriers and challenges each day.

But I also hope as we grapple with these important ideas and fight for a more just society that we can also find a lot of common ground – I happen to believe we as Americans have far more in common than things we disagree on.

I believe 99% of the protestors we have seen this week are peacefully, admirably exercising their First Amendment right to call attention to an important problem (the other 1% are simply losers who are breaking things and committing crimes on account of drunkenness, media attention, and a real distaste for capitalism). I believe 99% of our law enforcement officers are operating with the best intentions to protect and serve all people in their communities. Like George Floyd’s brother, I believe that riots, looting and property destruction has to stop if we ever want to build some consensus and not turn off folks who would be allies. I believe that if you want to solve these problems, you can’t count on the folks in White House, and you can’t count on the folks in your Statehouse. Vote however you’d like, but politicians aren’t fixing this mess – and I have a sneaking suspicion many of them don’t want to.

As a Christian, I also think we have to recognize that we are not fighting against each other on this. This isn’t a Left-Right issue. This isn’t an Us-Them issue. This is a fight against Satan and his kingdom of spiritual darkness. As many pastors are fond of saying- racism isn’t a skin issue, it’s a sin issue. The Bible talks about the story of a man named Saul, who had a great deal of experience with leveraging his position, status and legal authorities into a vast number of injustices before he encountered God and changed his life. He later wrote “do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” What a turnaround! What wisdom!

This week, I encourage each of us to climb in someone else’s skin for a bit and walk around some. How does that walk compare to our typical one? What burdens do we discover along the way? What can we do to help remove them? Maybe, just maybe, this will be the time we as a country can come together, listen to each other, ally with each other, and overcome evil with good.

I just want to close by saying how unsettling and heartbreaking this week has been, on so many levels. The amount of pain, anger, and broken-heartedness in the United States is incalculable. Seeing all the riots and broken windows and destroyed property was horrible – but those things can be replaced. Human life cannot. I want to extend my deepest condolences and prayers for the family and friends of George Floyd and to all who have experienced pain in the aftermath of his death. And I also want to think about and pray for the more than 100,000 who have passed away from COVID-19 – a disproportionate majority of whom are black and brown. These folks didn’t just lose one life, they lost two: the ones they were living and the ones they still had to come.

The poet Philip Larkin once wrote “the first day after a death, the new absence is always the same. We should be careful of each other, we should be kind, while there is still time.”

Indeed.