Facing the past

The one thing about researching history, if you are (a) of African descent, and (b) ended up a descendent of victims of the Diaspora, looking back into the history of how you came to be forces you to face some horrible truths.

I did not learn about African / African American history indept until graduate school. That says a lot about this country. But even then, learning the history then never put such a spotlight on the origins of slavery and the blight that slavery was, and the destructive consequences it had on all Africans and descendents of enslaved Africans.

The worsts part of all of this research and study is realizing that we are not united as a people, even now, and not knowing how to even begin remedying the problem.

I often write to a cousin of mine, and when I told her about the history and the information I have been finding and talked about the state of Africa today; I questioned whether we would have been better off there or here (the descendents of the enslaved). She definitively said, we would have been better off there, because then the people would nto have been slaves. It was so simple, and so true. And we wouldn't be exiles. And the language that I struggle to learn today, would be a language that I would speak easily and freely. I feel as if I have missed out on so much, but sadly, I don't really know all that I have missed.