In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr.’s words spoke truth to a country in desperate need of change and equality. They still do.

There’s something deeply uncomfortable about civil rights—not only that there is need for them in the first place, but the divisions that are unthinkable now happened not long ago. It wasn’t “way back then”—it was in the 1950s and 1960s! 

Separate drinking fountains seem unconscionable and shameful now, but those distinct thirst-quenchers existed, particularly in the South. The ones that dispensed cold, filtered water were labeled “White Only.” 

Those for Blacks were not maintained well and often found in basements or outside—if they even existed at all. These discriminatory fountains were curtailed by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, shaking up the status quo.

Racial division extended to segregated classrooms, restrooms and sections on public transportation. While visiting family recently, I saw the bus on which Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Again, that wasn’t centuries ago. It was 1955. 

This bias continued even in death, as people were buried according to race in separate
cemeteries.

Travel: Historical civil rights sites

Travelers can relive history at sites recounting pages from the fight for freedom and equality. Read More » 

As a child of the ’60s, I knew with certainty that racism was wrong. Society was beginning to have its collective conscience pricked by a new perspective of justice. But it was more than that. 

In 1973, my family welcomed Sheila, a Black student, into our home for a semester of her sophomore year. Sheila was from Chicago and wanted to experience a smaller, private school in a rural area (or maybe her parents wanted that for her). The drastic change in setting must have been like that of a foreign exchange student, except in her own country. So much smaller. Quiet. With all new faces and places.

But Sheila was funny, kind and exceedingly thoughtful, with a beaming smile and a great ’70s ’fro. She had impeccable taste in music and clothing and even let me borrow her clothes sometimes. I had always wanted an older sister, and for one wonderful semester, I got one. Sixth-grade me felt a little less awkward when sporting her cool big-city fashions. 

She knew I dealt with some mean-girl drama at the time, and I remember a letter she sent to our family when she was back in Chicago. 

“I hope Rhonda finds a friend who is a friend,” she wrote. 

I’ve tried to find Sheila to discover where life took her and thank her for the special spark she brought to our family, but she eludes me.

What doesn’t elude me is the intrinsic worth of every person. No distinctions. We’re improving, but we still have work to do.

In King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, he spoke of the fierce urgency of now, with no time to waste on apathy. 

“Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood,” he said. 

Though he spoke courageously, it was a non-violent gesture of “meeting physical force with soul force.”

King’s dream was that people “would not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character,” and thus be freed from racial division.

“Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado,” King exhorted. 

May the work of unification continue right here, right now.