"The placid teal-and-brick ranch house exterior of the Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument, where the civil rights martyr and his family lived before he was gunned down in his driveway in 1963, belies the danger that lurked inside, where children's mattresses were laid on the floor and window heights raised to avoid bullets. It is painful to be reminded of the ways African Americans have had to adapt in the face of threats both unseen and expected—a fact of life that persists today, if in different forms. Black parents give children The Talk, with all its endless clauses: how to act when Driving While Black, Sleeping While Black, and Walking While Black."
