My cup of beads: A reflection on race

I sit at a table looking at a cup and a pile of colored beads.

“Picture your doctor,” the instructor says. “Pick a bead that represents their race and put it in your cup.”

I drop a white bead in.

“Think of the people at your church,” she says. “Pick a bead that represents the majority race there and put it in the cup.”

I drop another white bead in.

“Now think of where you work,” she says, “and do the same thing.”

The questions continue, and I keep adding beads to my cup. Until the questions stop.

“Look into your cup,” the instructor says. “You’re adopting a child of another race. The world you’re living in right now is white, and this is the world you’re bringing your child into. Now is the time to think about how to change that world for your child.”

Think about how to change the world for your child.

Every day beads drop into our cups. News stories. Conversations. Scenes in our daily lives. Videos on our social media feed.

Children separated from their parents at the border.

A student’s braids being sliced off by another student in a college classroom.

A horrific act of police brutality.

Think about how to change the world for your child.

I think of the cup of beads and the realization that it represented a bigger problem—within me, within my community, within my world. So much I feel I cannot fix. But I have to believe transformation is possible for me, for each of us, for everyone.

“Not everything that is faced can be changed,” said James Baldwin. “But nothing can be changed until it is faced.”

And so we continue.

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Last week I was asked to read a prayer or reflection to open a meeting of the President’s Council for Equity and Inclusion at Loyola University Maryland, where I work.

I looked for something to read, and I couldn’t find anything that felt right for the moment. I asked my sister Shaileen who is a librarian for help. She sent me a few great options, but nothing felt quite right.

Shaileen mentioned that maybe I should try to put something into words myself. So, I did. Perhaps because our adoption agency had recently announced it was closing, this experience was on my mind. These were the words that came. I shared them at the meeting last week, and I thought I would share them here, too.

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