My Mothers Bookshelf

My mother's bookshelf is color coded; hues of colors perfectly falling one into another, children's storybooks next to radical black feminists; my yearbooks sit aligned with Harry Potter. The system of organization suggests a rejection of the Dewey Decimal System which lays the structure for her work as a librarian. It is also an embrace of a higher organized self. My own bookshelf at home is color coded now and I cannot imagine it any other way. This bookshelf, access to knowledge, fantasy, truth, magic and history provided me with educational opportunity in ways I am just now beginning to truly understand.

The first time I did a privilege walk was in high school (where I was one of maybe four black girls in a class of 200). The intention of the exercise was to aid us in recognizing our privilege. The impact of the exercise was to make me realize my lack thereof.

I remember being feet behind the rest of my classmates as they stepped forward at almost every question, while me and a Southeast Asian girl stood in the realization of our positionality. Together we stood in the reality that we were not strides ahead, but feet behind the rest, all because of “Take a step forward if your parents are together” or “Take a step forward if there is always food in your fridge” and “Take a step forward if you are white.” So far behind our peers for statements that felt like sheer luck and circumstance. So far behind that the placement almost felt intentional, that we belonged in the back. Then the teacher, coincidentally one of my favorite teachers, a guide and mentor for me in that year and for years to come, asked a question I could pridefully take a giant leap ahead for “Take a step forward if you have more than twenty books in your house”.