The genie grants you a wish. What is it?

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I can’t find my ID, and I have been tearing the house apart since yesterday. I’ve called every place I’ve been and still nothing. It has been a relentless slog and I am still no closer to locating the origin of my dumbass attack… the moment when I didn’t put my ID back in my backpack.

I’m supposed to go and meet friends in Richmond later today, so I’m hoping that I can pull it out of the fire. If I cannot find it, I cannot leave the state because I cannot get medical care. Maryland already has all my stuff on file. If I forget my ID, it’s no biggie because they can just say, “hello computah? Give me Leslie’s ID.” Speaking of which, I was supposed to call them back yesterday and I was so overwhelmed I forgot. It’s not okay, but it is ADHD. I just have to hope that my neurology is forgivable. When I am this scrambled, I go mute.

I have torn apart the whole house and am in the process of putting it back together now that I am not in “whirling dervish” mode. I realize that my ID hasn’t been found yet, but I find that the process of cleaning often reveals what I’m trying to find. I have crawled through every inch of my apartment and my car. Now, it’s time to start the process of elimination. I started yesterday with the car because my friends don’t drive and I need to make sure that it’s cleaned out. I drive a 2019 Ford Fusion, which means that it’s just big enough not to feel compact, but not big enough that I feel like I’m driving a land barge. I love it because it’s the kind of car that’s comfortable for long distances, and Richmond is three hours from Baltimore.

Three hours of drive time is enough to feel like you’ve really gotten away. I have only driven through Richmond, never explored it, so I’m looking forward. From what I have seen it is a beautiful old city, progressive in some places and still struggling with all the -isms in others. Richmond is a city where I am programmed to watch my back because I do not know how queer it is up front. Generally, the mid-Atlantic is full of queer people and it is not a problem. But Richmond is like Houston in that acceptance inside the city is different than 25 miles out.

This is leaving out Richmond’s history with race, which is an encyclopedia all unto itself. Richmond was the capital of the Confederacy, absolutely supposed to feel threatening to DC at the time. Richmond and the surrounding areas still struggle, but not in a way that is wholly other from the rest of the South. Richmond and Baltimore are just the architects of the current system….. the Confederacy started it. Baltimore improved upon the cruelty with redlining (segregation ordinances) exported to the rest of the South. Racism is everywhere in the United States, but Richmond and Baltimore are the architects that built cathedrals to house their bigoted feelings…. only Baltimore responded with dynamite.

White elites tried to stop Black Baltimoreans from realizing political power, and they built it, anyway. Once Black leadership became durable, the entire city changed.  That shift didn’t erase the city’s struggles, but it permanently changed who holds the microphone, who sets the agenda, and whose interests define the future.

Richmond…………….. has not done that.

And I will be able to tell you about it in more detail once I have found my ID and I’m on the road.