Reckoning. That is the word that’s most often applied to this time we’re living in. It began with the confluence of COVID-19 and the racial uprising after the killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd in 2020. Two years later, it continues. As a fiction writer and former television producer, many of my ideas for stories are influenced
“Verdict watch . . . one guilty but this is stressful.” I fired off that tweet after Travis McMichael was found guilty of all charges for killing Ahmaud Arbery. I watched the judge read the verdict as my gumbo simmered on the stove for Thanksgiving dinner. A spoon in my hand, my daughter on my lap, and my clothes covered
I wanted to write a response to the recent stories about housing: one in this newsletter on the plan to plug Jacksonville’s “missing middle” in the housing crisis with townhomes, as well as a Times-Union piece on the decline of the Black population in historically majority-Black neighborhoods. Reading those stories triggered an annoyance in my spirit I tried to ignore.