A virtual run with Ahmaud Arbery

I participated in a virtual "Run for Ahmoud" virtual race today for the murdered runner Ahmaud Arbery. I heard through The Day newspaper that Southeastern Connecticut local, Donny Davino was putting on the event and decided to incorporate my weekend long run. My entry was a donation to Black Lives Matter affiliated charities. Per race instructions, I have posted the 13-mile course I ran, and a photo I took of myself out on the course and tagging my course.

I also thought it would be appropriate to add a couple of thoughts about what Arbery's death means in America today, and what my thoughts about it were as a runner.

Running appeals to me because it feels like freedom. It's self-propelled. Unlike, other sports, it requires a minimum of gear. You don't need to get a team together; you just get out the door and go.

But throughout my years of running, there was one thing I always carried with me without thinking about it much: whiteness. Because of my skin color, I've never felt that anyone was going to target me on the street or mistake me for a fleeing criminal. I  can jaywalk fearlessly, run on the wrong side of the road, or even cut across private property, expecting no consequences worse than getting yelled at. I leave home expecting to get my daily miles of chill and exercise. I certainly don't expect to lose my life.

Unfortunately, Black runners and other runners of color do not run with the same privilege that whiteness gives me. They may love running as much, or more than I do, but worry that racist violence, even death might be waiting around the next corner.

Such was, tragically, the case for Ahmaud Arbery in what is now a well-known story. The 25-year-old was  jogging through a suburban neighborhood when three white men immediately decided he was a criminal and pursued him with trucks and guns. Within minutes, Arbery lay murdered. The perpetrators emerged unpunished. The system that would have protected me, did not apply to Arbery. Fortunately, video has brought a day of reckoning to the killers. 

We are all reckoning, however, and looking at the failures in institutions and in compassion throughout this country, looking within ourselves for work that still needs to be done. There are long miles to go yet.