At the Crossroads

I had to go.

It wasn’t a question of “Oh, do I think that I should drive over?” or “Is it safe for me to be there?”

No. It was “I’m going. Let’s work out the logistics.”

There’s a “fight or flight” quality in all of us. We either choose to go into the firestorm or get the hell out of the way.

This feeling is ten times stronger for journalists … and when it pertains to a major news event, my desire is to go in and perform to the best of my ability.

This was the case last year, when we saw reaction to the death of George Floyd at a Minneapolis intersection on Memorial Day. In the days that followed, we witnessed images of parts of the city being torched and looted. There was one night I saw it live in our control room and we took those images during our late newscast. I was left in complete disbelief.

Through it all, my thought was “I wish I was there to tell that story.”

Starting Monday (March 29th), opening statements will begin in the murder and manslaughter trial against former Minneapolis Police officer Derek Chauvin, charged in Floyd’s death.

Since the Memorial Day incident, the intersection where it happened - E. 38th St. and Chicago Ave. - is where the nation’s pain with civil rights has centered. Even though racial tensions in the Twin Cities remained at a boiling point and the world was in the early throws of a deadly pandemic … I had to go.

Boarded-up store fronts near E. 38th St. & Chicago Ave.

Making the 90-minute drive to Minneapolis was easy. Dealing with what I would see next was the hard part. As soon as I hit the Twin Cities, I could see all of the businesses which still had plywood on their front doors and windows. Reality began to hit me.

As I pulled off the interstate and onto the streets of Minneapolis, the charred shells of stores were now more visible. Here were the places of commerce a community needed to keep going, reduced to blackened beams and mangled metal.

Finding the intersection was not hard. I knew the neighborhood well. My uncle and his husband live a mile away from where Floyd’s death happened, they got married in nearby Powderhorn Park, and I’ve enjoyed a good slice of pizza and fine beer at Jakeeno’s - two blocks from E. 38th. & Chicago.

Reporting from E. 38th St & Chicago Ave. in Minneapolis.

Arriving that Saturday morning, it looked at first like a block party. There were kiosks set up, a nearby barbecue joint was cranking out all the flavor and aroma my senses could ever desire, and plenty of people milling around.

However, it was when you looked into the eyes of these people when you knew this was different. Of course, all you could see from most people were eyes, as the masks were thankfully out in this pocket of congestion. It is a pandemic, after all. Yet, the emotion in the eyes showed sorrow, anger, puzzlement, and pain.

I knew my choice to go was the right one.

One of the many signs left at the spot where George Floyd died.

The actual site where George Floyd took his last breaths while saying “I can’t breathe!” had been filled with flowers, trinkets, and offerings for justice, peace, and hope. The signs left behind said statements like “Dark Skin is not a CRIME” to “WHITE SILENCE IS WHITE VIOLENCE” to “Justice For George Floyd.”

Across the street from Cup Foods - the shop at the genesis for Floyd’s death - there was a small gas station. The sign showed unleaded gasoline was $1.89 a gallon, but no gas was being put into cars, trucks, or SUVs on this day. Below the price for fuel, in the spot which normally tells people to buy a candy bar for 79 cents, was a hand-written proclamation for “George Floyd Square.”

The scene was amazing, beautiful, sad, and disconcerting. There were young parents bringing their kids while a reporter from Al-Jazeera was describing the intersection to his world-wide audience. People were making their way across the street to get a free cup of lemonade, while hymns were sung and marchers shouted “What do we want? JUSTICE! When do we want it? NOW!” There was a certain sense of macabre over it all - a genuine and heartfelt outpouring of emotion at the place where a man died less than two weeks earlier.

But, I get it. We needed to be here. I needed to be here.

Grant Sparks, in the purple hat, receiving a much-needed hug.

Grant Sparks from St. Paul needed to be here. He was there in his Vikings apparel - right down to the purple mask - searching for compassion. He found it, when one member of a visiting church congregation talked with him and gave him a hug. Capturing that embrace was amazing. I know this was in early-June of 2020 and hugs were strictly out-of-bounds … but, I think we all needed that kind of familiar humanity at this critical moment in time.

“This is my backyard,” Sparks said. “This is my community. This is all of our community. We have to be here. I have to be here.”

… and again, this veteran journalist needed to be here, as well.

Marc Lundquist was here. The high school history teacher and his wife were also from Eau Claire and made the short road trip over to see this place.

Lundquist described how this focal point could become an epicenter, saying: “You can go back to Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Alabama with the bus boycotts, Emmett Till, the young man who was murdered in Mississippi, the bombing in Birmingham, ‘I Have a Dream’ - these are all historic, huge events that people remember. This could be one of them. People might remember someday what happened at 38th and Chicago. They might remember the name of George Floyd and that finally something changed.”

Calls for justice filled the intersection during my brief visit.

Not even a full year has passed since George Floyd took his last breaths at this intersection. Has something really changed? Has the dialogue on civil rights positively shifted?

In some ways, it hasn’t - and has been actually made worse. The recent attacks on the Asian-American population in this nation are just appalling. You have to think that this isn’t representative of our society, as a whole.

For anyone who has lingering doubts, a trip to E. 38th St. and Chicago Ave. in Minneapolis will hit the point home. My time at the intersection was rather brief - just two hours. I went in having some sense of what it was like.

It’s one thing to see it. It’s another thing to feel it.

On that day, I felt the pain. I felt the sorrow. I also felt hope for all of us that we shall overcome.

I had to go.