But Where Is Safe?
A Brooklyn Mother Reflects On Living In New York During The Curfews
By Tedecia Wint
Over the last week, I have been wrestling with one question over and over again, why am I here? The “here” I’m referring to is the United States of America, a country I moved to a decade ago.
This morning I received a message from my Uncle, “Come to Scotland,” he says. “They have accepted me here…” And I think about it…
When I was eight, I was moved from my home in Jamaica – for me a literal paradise – and taken to Cambridge in England; a stunning college town that required, amongst other things, that I erase all aspects of myself to…not, “fit in”…it was constantly made clear in both subtle and not so subtle ways, that I would never be accepted as truly “English.” But if I played nice I might be tolerated. I have spent my entire adult life building back the parts of myself belittled and devalued through that process when I was a child. America has been a huge part of that healing process. And I realize now as I write this, that here is where I must stay, because it is worth fighting for, for myself and my son and for all of us, that old American proclamation, “that all men are created equal.”