April 4, 1968

[LenaBaby61]

30. Your welcome my friend 💖

I was a younger, but I knew who Dr. King was, as my late parents bought several books and had a few magazines that they read to me about who Dr. King was. The Archdiocese closed down our school K-8, and the all girls Catholic School grades 9-12 across the street until the following Monday, and then we had mass on Tuesday. Everybody in attendance was crying and still in shock. In many ways even at 60 I'm still in 'shock.' Shock in that I wonder what our lives would have been like as a world community throughout the last 60 years if Dr. King & Bobby were allowed to live. When I say allowed, I think you know what I mean. My older siblings who are all deceased now met John and Bobby Kennedy at their Jr. and High schools. They ALL shook hands with both Kennedy brothers and Bobby hugged my late sister. She told me that she still could feel the warmth of his soul and body up until she passed away a few months ago.

I look around at today's events seeing just how dark and dire things are. We're having our rights literally taken from us, where Jim Crow is packaged differently but still very much with us and worsening, and even though we're living through some harsh times (war) as a world community, I can't imagine what on earth it must have been like for my late parents growing living in their world, a world where they had very few to NO rights --struggling to live basic, decent lives as human beings in their own country, and hearing from them both accounts of the lives from real life slaves that each knew. By the way, my Aunt--Mom's younger sister--knew the same slave my late Mom knew when they lived in Louisiana when young. She's in her late 80's, sharp as a tack and I plan to start recording her memories of the slave she/Mom knew. I spoke with my cousin who my Aunt/her Mom lives with, and she said her Mom was really crying knowing that Judge Jackson would be taking her place on the High Court. My cousin said my Aunt's been pretty quiet today, no doubt thinking back 80 years to what she'd been through all those years ago even as a child growng up when we were still barely treated like human beings.

Hey, you have a great rest of your week and weekend