The Church of Blood

I just watched the Spike Lee documentary, Four Little Girls, and, I dunno, there was this one part -- a very quiet, subdued, unemphasized part -- in the middle somewhere, where a childhood friend of one of the girls remembered and spoke about a conversation he'd had with her afterschool the Friday before the bombing on Sunday. It was very simple and very human. That seems like the best way to put it. All they said was "see you Monday," and parted. Dr. Freeman Hrabowski III, the childhood friend, described it, laughed, repeated it again solemnly, and looked down at his hands. Something about that is very striking to me. I'm not entirely sure why I was compelled to write about it either.

The documentary is about the bombing of a Birmingham Church, the 16th Street Baptist Church, which was a kind of center for the Birmingham Civil Rights movement, and the resulting death of four African-American girls. It bothers me that this sort of stuff repeats itself all the time. We have such a bloody history. Barely even time to wash the hands.