Last night, the privileges of whiteness encouraged hundreds of delusional white supremacists to storm our center of government with guns, while facing absolutely no resistance from police who kill Black and brown people with impunity. This is something I’d have strong feelings about under every circumstance; after all, it is sedition and treason.

But I also feel personally attacked. I’m a native Washingtonian and my family actually lives on Capitol Hill.

My Experience

I’m a news junkie, so I had CNN’s live stream on while I fed Three lunch and Baby Girl napped. I heard Pence’s hot mic when he asked if his statement went out. I saw Mitch McConnell and Ted Cruz’s speeches live. Suddenly, coverage of the boring speeches of sycophants switched over to the grounds outside. Now I watched live footage of Trump’s sore losers pushing past Capitol Police and their plastic barricades onto the steps of the U.S. Capitol. The on-air hosts said that crowds forced their way inside, but initially there was no interior footage.

We live a few blocks from the Capitol. The whine of sirens quickly grew overwhelming. Friends and acquaintances sent a sudden barrage of kindly texts to check on our safety. CNN reported bombs at the Capitol and both parties’ headquarters. That’s when my husband and I made the call to leave. We tore through the house, quickly packing a go-bag with enough clothes, diapers and wipes for 48 hours. Then we wrestled shoes onto our very confused toddlers, loaded them into the van, and began the drive to my parents’ house in Maryland.

I quickly realized that we couldn’t take our normal route, because of the crowds and security around the Capitol. So we headed north and tried to exit the city via H Street. After fifteen minutes stuck in traffic there, we peeled off to take a detour past RFK Stadium. This took us directly past the DC Armory, where we saw the National Guard gearing up to mobilize to the Capitol. Eight to ten Guard and MPD buses sat idling out front, ready to load up with soldiers to take back the Capitol.

We made it safely to our destination. There, we spent the rest of the evening glued to the television and our phones (shout out to Black Twitter for keeping me sane, and press corps Twitter for keeping me well-informed). My kids don’t sleep when they’re not in their own beds, so between the anxiety about the Capitol and my toddlers partying their tiny asses off, I didn’t really sleep. Would our home be safe from the terrorists? Some parked on our street the night before. We should have brought the cat with us. What about the bombs?

My Initial Reflections

One thing you won’t hear me say is how surprised I am. This is exactly what I thought would happen when America elected Donald Trump in 2016. Except I thought it would happen then, not now when we finally voted to get rid of him.

No, the only part that shocks me is that they got into the U.S. Capitol so easily. Not because I’m naïve about white privilege; I’m never surprised when delusional white supremacists storm a state capitol. It’s that they successfully invaded the U.S. Capitol, where we know people have been shot and killed for far less serious perimeter breaches, in MY city, where we have two dozen police forces. And now these traitors were gently escorted away with no arrests?! Deon Kay didn’t get a damn escort.

The part that offends me? Well, other than the infuriating, disingenuous conflation of BLM and an armed insurrection to overthrow the duly elected government? I lived here most of my life and never visited the U.S. Capitol until 2016. That’s when I took my government students on a field trip, on what turned out to be the day Hillary Clinton won the Iowa caucus. Much to my student’s amusement, I bawled through the entire Capitol tour. I cried when I stood on the place where Abraham Lincoln’s desk sat. When I saw the door to the Speaker’s office. When construction meant that our tour had to take a detour, and I got to walk up the very same staircase the President-elect ascends before she or he takes the oath of office on Inauguration Day.

I never felt like the U.S. Capitol building was meant for me, even though I drive by it every day and I’ve wanted to be a Congresswoman since I was a little girl. So it really meant something to me to enter the Capitol, to stand in those places. Maybe one day, I will again. I’m angry and sickened that these seditionists walked so disrespectfully and carelessly in the places I wanted to be my whole life. These places I revere because they’re where Lincoln walked, and where nervous men enter to say magic words then leave as presidents. This mob threw beer cans and scribbled on the walls like it was a dive bar bathroom stall. Those racist, traitorous terrorists didn’t deserve to be there. But they just casually strolled and acted like they owned the place. It might be the people’s house, but these people went in, put their dirty feet on the furniture like Rick James, and said, “Fuck yo couch.”

The part that hurts me? These Confederate flag-waving people set up a gallows on the lawn of the Capitol, along with a large cross they no doubt planned to burn. On the lawn of the U.S. Capitol. In my hometown. In my neighborhood. That’s not something I’ve ever experienced. Not here.

And I’m not OK with it. My family and I might be safe. But I’m not OK.

Tierra

A malcontent with a heart of gold, Tierra is a first-year medical student, former high school teacher and history PhD candidate, plus mom to four of Bebe’s baddest kids. She curses a lot. Tierra is a DC native but lives in southwest Michigan and will happily exchange writing (hers) for cash (yours).