Last night I went to see the film 12 Years a Slave. Some friends invited me to see it with them a few weeks ago but I politely declined because 1) these friends weren’t black and 2) I knew it was something I needed to do alone. You might think it’s pretty terrible that I told my non-Black friends that I wouldn’t go with them, but this was personal. I wanted the freedom to explore the meaning and complexity and beauty and pain of my Blackness without feeling the additional pressure of checking in on how my non-Black peers were handling it. For once, I wanted to watch something without feeling like I was also being watched or that I had to watch out for someone else; I wanted a cinematic experience that I could claim for myself and call my own. So on a Saturday night in a suburban DC theater, I sat alone in my row, wide-eyed and heartbroken for two and a half hours before going to meet a friend in a cafe nearby.

“How was the movie?” she asked. “It was great. Really intense,” I replied before breaking down into tears. Not just any tears, sobs. I sat there for a minute or two just weeping into my hands and trying to catch my breath. My shoulders shook violently and the waiters walked by, trying their hardest not to stare. It took five minutes or so for me to mentally time travel out of 1841 back to 2013 and regain enough composure to make the drive home.

What makes this story relatable to a modern audience is that it’s told from the perspective of an outsider/insider, someone who isn’t supposed to be there, who is able to see and experience everything with a fresh pair of eyes. What makes this film extraordinary is the people Solomon Northup meets along his journey, the slave-philosophers as I like to think of them, each with their own theories of life, death, survival, reward, and punishment. They weren’t supposed to be there either. Being born into slavery merely complicated their visions of freedom; it did not take away from them understanding that they had a right to it. There were some who were angry and defiant, even at the cost of their lives. But you couldn’t blame them for wanting to die, given the horrible circumstances. There were others who chose to survive and believed that God was a kind and merciful one who would grant them the best of the next world for the pain that they went through in this one, even though God was being used to justify their enslavement. These were incredibly hardworking, profoundly intelligent, complex people. And despite being told they had no place or purpose or power in this world, they decided, against all evidence and odds and logic, to wait it out and see for themselves.

Survival required faith in something that had yet to come to pass. Faith in a life to come that would be unlike anything they had known. Faith in comfort and opportunities and respect and a sense of belonging beyond even their wildest dreams. Faith in the life that I live today. The thought of one of my ancestors choosing to live and choosing to endure tremendous hardship because of the possibility that their children and grandchildren would live a better life shakes me to the core. They couldn’t have possibly known for sure, but they fought to survive anyway. And because of every single day that they woke up and decided to live, I am here.

It’s no secret that the living and working conditions of the slaves were miserable and inhumane, but watching this film reminded me that my existence is nothing short of a miracle. Would I have survived under the same conditions? Or would I have just given up and died? Of course there’s no way of answering those questions and luckily I will never have to. But since I am here, the least I can do is honor the legacy of those who came before me.

I’ve been struggling to write a paper for school for the past few weeks, feeling too tired or too uninspired or too busy. My trip to the movie theater last night was my present to myself for making decent progress. In the 12 years that Solomon Northup was a slave, he remained focused on a single goal: to find a way to write a letter informing his family of his condition so that he could regain freedom. He had a story to tell but had no access to a pen, ink, paper. Needless to say, I finished that paper today, with a real sense of urgency and shame.

People don’t like to think about slavery because they’d rather avoid the darkness and the difficulty and the pain. But for some of us, it’s the only history we have. If we choose not to remember, what’s the alternative? To forget? To feel detached from any history and any place of belonging? I am not ashamed to be a descendant of slaves; I am ashamed that far too often I forget what that means.

My younger brother once said “Slaves were some of the most enduring survivors and creative geniuses to ever exist. To think that we as a people have moved from being property to leaders in every aspect of the word with almost no help is truly amazing. Although we have a long way to go, I’m proud of how far we have come, especially since we essentially had to do it on our own, in a society that for the majority of its existence refused to recognize our humanity.” I love the thought of that. But I’d like to make one friendly modification to his statement— we didn’t do it on our own. We did it with the help of each other and with the help of our parents and our parents’ parents, and their parents too.

I am proud to be a part of such a strong legacy of faith, hard work, innovation, leadership, community, and of course perseverance. And I hope to remember that legacy every morning when I look in the mirror.

12 Years a Slave is out right now and I encourage you (all of you) to go see it.

@MsMakkah ‘10