It’s taken me a while to figure out how to approach writing about the two days my cousin and two friends spent at the Smithsonian’s newest Museum. There’s no easy way to parse out my impressions and how it felt be so immersed in history that is, by and large, an abstract to me because I grew up as a third generation Canadian, in a loving family, more or less sheltered from the racial ugliness that permeates American life. Have I been untouched by it? Not completely, but the impact has been muted. I was never diminished by what other people thought of me because of the colour of my skin. I don’t recall being denied service or housing. Perhaps it was because we…

+Read more