Memphis is Beale Street--all neon and tourists, sweet, soulful blues, a photograph of two women in the 1920s or 1930s--one in furs, the other in white--dressed up to have their portrait taken. Memphis is Jacqueline Smith, a beautiful Black woman cloaked in a black scarf that adorns her dreadlocks. She checks herself in a mirror after I ask if I can take her photograph. Ms. Smith is the first person I encounter when I walk up to the Civil Rights Museum. She is sitting at a table in front of the Lorraine Motel, the sign draped across her table reads in big, orange lettering: "Gentrification is an Abuse of Civil Liberties." She is asking for people--for tourists--to boycott the Civil Rights Museum. I stop and talk to her for a bit, ask her why she is against gentrification of the neighborhood. 
"Don't you think it provides more opportunities for people in the area?" I ask."Not when it forces out all the people who used to live here. This is for all the rich, Yuppie folk. The Civil Rights Museum doesn't care what happens to the people who used to live here. They don't represent what Dr. King stood for. They just want to commemorate his death--not his life, not what he stood for."
"I'm surprised that they don't have some kind of foundation or allotment of funds for people in the area."
She laughs, "No funds. No nothing. They forced people out of their homes."
She directs me to several pamphlets on her table, an article written about her in the local newspaper, a sign that records how many years and days she has been in protest. I read some of the article and pamphlets. Ms. Smith was one of the original residents of the Lorraine Motel after Dr. King was assassinated and before it was bought by the Civil Rights Museum. She and many other residents of the motel were forced out of their homes--the rooms in the motel--so that the museum could be built, so that I and the many other tourists who visit would have a museum to go to. I ask her to please forgive me, but that I am going to visit the museum and thank her for doing what she is doing.
"Everyone needs to do what they need to do," she answers, giving me neither judgment or mercy.
I acknowledge her with some grace and gratitude as I bid farewell, take a few photos of her and the 1950s or 60s sign that reads "Lorraine Motel." I am thankful to have met her because it gives me some insight into the plight of the people and to what is happening immediately, locally in the neighborhood despite the refurbished signs and polished facades of stores and restaurants, coffee shops, motels and loft buildings. I am a little bewildered, though, because I did not expect to meet her and I am bracing myself with anticipation for the journey through the Civil Rights Museum. As I walk toward the familiar balcony, I am filled with trepidation and fear--this is sacred ground. Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated, died, on that balcony before me.I take a few photos of the memorial. I notice a few tourists on the second floor, grazing the inside of the window--307; there are two vintage cars from the era parked below; a fresh wreath hangs at the corner where 306 juts from 307; a marble epitaph states that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., died here. I am sad. I feel forlorn, quiet, and respectful.
I go into the museum. A proud, older Black woman (hair did, make-up done, her voice easy and friendly) dressed in an usher's uniform welcomes me. I take note of it because the same thing happened to me when I visited the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock--only it was and older White woman dressed and welcoming in a similar way. Southern hospitality, I think. Ushers--people at museums--don't welcome visitors in the same way in Los Angeles... or any other big city, for that matter. Visitors are not usually welcomed by women in large cosmopolitan cities, usually they are welcomed, if that, by large men in uniform, sometimes with friendliness and hospitality, other times with a quick pat-down and order to go through the security check-point. Although, when I think about it, I did have to go through a security check-point at the Clinton Presidential Library. However, all the same, the security guard there, in Little Rock, was friendly and hospitable, not bored or distracted as so many other security guards at check-points can be.
Once I pay the fee ($13) and give the other usher or attendant my ticket, I begin to journey. I notice that all the people who work there are attentive and helpful, kind and courteous. They thank me, help to direct me, show me the way, and do it with a smile and a true feeling of generosity and spirit. I opt out of the narrated, pre-recorded tour; instead choosing to go through the exhibition myself (and also because I am cheap and trying to save money), and I am glad I did so. Narratives from the museum might give you a guided tour or insight into parts of the museum that you might know or would have known had you not heard that part of the story, but if you go on your own then you are able to have the full experience of your own insights and recollections.
For me, it was this: a broadened view, a deeper understanding, reading the fine print--the quotes from slaves and early Black politicians; examining the faces and dress of these early truth-seekers and doers, learning, trying to process and understand this history before me. Going through this time period, getting a Coke from the vending machine as I listened to a conversation between an older, White Southern woman fat in comfortable walking clothing talking to an older, White Southern gentleman thin in comfortable walking clothing:
"Oh Elvis..."
"Did you see him in those early films?"
"Oh yes, I just completely loved him in 'Love Me Tender'...."
I get my Coke, check Facebook, my email....listen, wait, the ushers announce that the film, "The Witness," is about to start. I turn my phone off, go into the theater and wait with the others as I quietly open my Coke, sip on it and wait for the movie to begin.
"The Witness" is something everyone must experience. Reverend Samuel "Billy" Kyles, probably after so many years of grappling for why he was "there," why he did not die when he came so close to sudden death, why he lasted and stayed on this Earth after experiencing such a horrendous, troubled moment in time. He bore witness. He was there. He was there for a reason; he was there to tell us--so many years later, so many generations after--to say what had happened. He, Mr. Abernathy and Dr. King sat in Room 306 talking "what preachers talk," getting ready in an expected, but natural, unknowing ritual for dinner at his house as Dr. King talked buoyant and happy with men in the parking lot after "The Mountaintop" speech almost didn't happen (bad weather, Dr. King traveling back to Memphis after the first attempt at a peaceful boycott for the Sanitation Workers Strike erupted in violence, determined to show and model what non-violence protest is all about ). Reverend Kyles stood on the balcony with Dr. King, turned for a moment, and then the shot rang out. The shot that stopped a moment in time--for ever after.
The photo of the men pointing in the distance. The image of that balcony of the Lorraine Motel. The sight of that balcony, the motel, the men pointing in the distance--There! Over there!! That's where the shot in time came from!!! Time stops. I stand later, in that same place that I saw the tourists in 307, but inside now and just feet away from the spot where Martin Luther King, Jr. died. Died. He died there. He died right at that spot, a few feet away from me, and I am filled with grief and respect, gratitude and a quiet I have not known. I can only stand there and gaze at the spot---taking it all in and just feeling the moment of being there. He died for us. He died for the sanitation workers. He died so that we could have the freedom that we all enjoy now. Barack Obama would not be in office if not for Martin Luther King, Jr. I would not be able to take this trip as I have for the last week as a single, Asian American woman. My parents--quirky and Japanese American--and then later, divorcing in the 80s and marrying a Mexican American woman and West Indian man, respectively, could have done so many years later, with such little protest or judgment. These privileges and decent, everyday experiences would not be possible if not for the life and death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
A light dies and then something opens for the others that are meant to come after them... the pathway is illuminated.
With all due respect to Ms. Jacqueline Smith, I learned more that day, going through the Civil Rights Museum and reading all the fine print, standing on hallowed ground, meeting her and listening to all the voices that came before me, than any or all of the textbooks I read or books and articles I may have come across. That land is sacred. For the people who lived in the Lorraine Motel after Dr. King was assassinated, for the people (like me) who visit from out-of-town, for the many who will come to experience and understand why they are there or what is happening or had taken place on that land, the Lorraine Motel is sacred ground. It is ground to be tread across, to be experienced, to be understood and acknowledged and shared with any or all who might be open to knowing what our history is all about. We are the Civil Rights Movement--it is still happening today and we must not forget to understand or acknowledge the arduous, sometimes horrific and at times victorious journey that our American ancestors fought for and died for.
After going through the museum, I sat for a good fifteen or twenty minutes on the curb, across from the motel, just staring, simply staring, at the place where Martin Luther King, Jr., died. That is all I could do.Do not forget him. Please watch "The Witness" if you can. Please visit the Civil Rights Museum (I think for any good American, it could be considered a Mecca or necessary pilgrimage for someone who values our history), Please speak with and talk to Ms, Jacqueline Smith... please, maybe, do more than I was able to do during my visit there.
There is still so much to do. Please don't get comfortable yet...
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