Captain on the Picket Line

I’m sorry. I apologize. Currently I’m picketing for my job.

It’s been a lot these past 4 months walking back and forth. In some cases, dancing and yelling for people/cars to HONK their car horns. To say that it’s been a lot, throw in me volunteering to captain at Paramount three times a week and go to themed pickets on my days off..yeah, you could say I’m a little worn out. But above all that, I’m starting to focus on what’s really important. My health. My writing. Me.

I’ve started slowly getting back into my writing, the thing I’m fighting to keep and receive a livable wage. To be honest, I never thought I’d be here. My mom picketed for her job as a teacher in Oakland. I was even on the picket line with her. For me, I didn’t understand what we were really doing but I knew it was important. My mom did double duty of picketing half the time and teaching the other half. A year ago she showed me her paycheck and I couldn’t believe it. She made $1200 in a month in the 90’s. ‘Like mom, how did we survive?!’ Laughing, my mom said she had my dad who also worked, and that’s why she did summer teaching and led training classes for teachers.

My parents raised me to be such an independent woman. To see that paycheck, the stories behind it, I was proud but also, I really didn’t understand her buying me Nike’s was really out of her budget smh lol. Still, she reminded me: this strike is important. Stay strong. You’re not fighting for nothing. You deserve to be paid and live well, not be paid to survive.

I was recently interviewed at a Howard Alumni picket with my fellow alum, check it out: Black Writers Talk WGA Strike’s ‘Trickle-Down’ Effect