falling in love: an intro.
Written for Smart Girls by Brittany Packnett. Packnett is an educator, activist, writer, full-time proud black woman and 90’s R&B connoisseur based in Washington, DC. She is Vice President of National Community Alliances at Teach For America and Co-Founder of Campaign Zero. She recently taught herself how to design a few things. Find her apparel at buildloveandpower.com, and her musings on social media @MsPackyetti.
My whole timeline knows I’m in love.
Anyone connected with me on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook (I’m a sporadic Snapper at best) knows that I’ve fallen head over heels in love with a man who is as brilliant as he is kind, makes my belly ache with his 90s sitcom humor, is patient with me during my consistent overreactions and unnecessary stress, and never lets me settle. Falling in love is the most glorious, magical, spectacular feeling on the planet, and my partner reminds me everyday of exactly why all the love songs are true.
And none of this is about him.
Someone asked me about the last best choice I’ve made. As a black woman, activist and professional, recently taking on the journey of unexpected national visibility at what I hope is still a relatively young age, (I’m 29. Nah, I’m really 32, but I hope you believed me), she wasn’t just asking me about which new restaurant I had fallen in love with (a wonderful little chain called & Pizza) or if my fitness regimen had changed with the new year (It didn’t. See: & Pizza).
She was asking me, as a fellow woman of color, how was I handling it all? How was I dealing with the risks of choosing to have scary conversations about race and justice in an even scarier world? How was I not blowing a gasket with every troll?
How was I not beaten back everyday when black women get insulted everyday just for doing our jobs- even when our jobs are in the House of Representatives or the White House Press Briefing Room?
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