My First Angry Attorney Blog. Should I be proud?

So I’ve read a ton of really great Angry Attorney Blogs, this is not that. This is just one, angry, attorney's first good day in a while gone bad.

For a moment, when capturing this photo of my grandmother the day was starting to feel pretty Great, but where to start exactly... You ever have an out of body moment where you have to go outside of your body just long enough to tell self to “CALM THE FUCK DOWN.”(In your best black mother telepathic look) 

But by that point, my anger was something different. Not peace. Not understanding. Just someplace I think they only spoke about in biblical times, maybe at that point, I was indifferent. Or maybe it was because I was currently feeling EVERY emotion. Oh but like on In Side Out, anger was about to win and I simply laughed (my new medicine when I can’t dance in public, thank you Grey’s Anatomy) so I simply shrugged. Hit a few air punches and said let’s just add this to the list of battles I’m currently fighting.

So when standing in front of Whole Foods trying to figure out why the same Uber driver that was 2 mins away 10 mins ago whom I just canceled with the same plate is now the same Lyft picking me up… I laughed thinking that I was having a REAL “where'd you go bernadette” moment. 

To be clear, I’ve had to tell self to calm the heck down on SEVERAL occasions. I’m A BLACK Attorney after all, so after 5 years(in April) of being an ( amazingly talented, badass, don’t take no crap, intellectual property, and estate planning savant) Attorney, growing up my entire life in Seattle, starting law school off in LANSING, MI, finishing Law School in JACKSONVILLE, FL, I get being the only minority in a room. But with those experiences leading to being present to hear a tearful Sybrina Fulton give words of encouragement just a week after getting the worst news a parent could get, working on all-white male teams at Microsoft (2 women of 10), or having my senior EVP’s talk about my non-factual sex life in a break room while with the Portland Trailblazers, to bring my polished, in a freaking black fur coat self into Swedish MEDICAL center to be treated and talked to like the HELP in 2020. WOOSHAH. 

When I was first told, that only one person could go up at a time for which I knew the policy, I asked the guard to call for a particular nurse who had permitted us to be called at the nursing station, in which a quick call to someone other than the person I asked him to ask for, he turned not looking at me and said “they said no, so you have to leave” and I struggled to find the right words to say next. Because in my mind, the two weren’t Mutually exclusive. So like any natural human mind, my next statement/question was “Okay that is fine all 3 of us don’t need to go but can I go get my belongings, say goodnight and then send the next person up?

I think for every moment I didn’t speak up in watching neglect and emotional abuse on my brother and myself, smiling through a funny yet hurtful comments a friend made in light fun, every accusation my “family” had thrown at me under the preface of them just “expressing their opinions” when all I’ve ever simply done was try to lead with love and be the best human I could be to others.  

See. I had flown to Seattle just a mere 68 hours and 50 minutes ago to see my grandmother who for an entire week I received calls, video’s and pictures of her status updates while she was being seen at Swedish Medical Center for what I feel like constitutes neglect by my family and Merrill Gardens (which they have a bunch of policies and regulations to protect them as a facility which I’m sure a lovely attorney helped draft, the irony). Upon my arrival, I got my first check-in, recited a sticker, checked granny, ensured she wasn’t sick to the point that she wouldn’t be making it another day (her dying in the nursing home has been my fear since the day she moved in). 

Kissed granny and knew I could get a few hours of sleep before I headed back into see her Discharge nurse Sarah I was informed knew all the tea on granny tomorrow at 9:30 am. As I promised Granny ( she knew I’d be late) I got back to Swedish at 10 am and got my second check-in and spent all day Friday just me and granny having girl time (and Kathleen her roommate on the other side of the curtain chiming in) I had a blast, but given the new virus lockdown there’s only one guest per patient so when my little brother who I hadn’t seen yet popped up after work we hugged and allowed him to come in and get him some granny time. Of course, I wanted so much to just sit and catch up with them both, but Swedish isn’t our home, my grandmothers shared room wasn’t her living room, me and little brother aren't little anymore. So when Sarah mentioned Friday night of the policy I had ZERO problems complying. When I left that night my heart was broken, Granny asked me “what was going on” before I left. Yep, the woman who since her stroke my senior year in high school had maybe only said 5 phrases to that point said the one thing I had been asking myself. That night I didn’t sleep a wink. 

So when my little brother who was recently was diagnosed with being Bipolar called at 6 am because we committed to breakfast which I figured any 23-year-old male on a Saturday morning meant noon, he was already on his way to meet me at Swedish I begged to at least lay in the non-sleeping bed until 9 am, figured this would be safe because my brother has gone to see my grandmother every day since she’s been admitted, but anyone who has even had 1 single conversation with him, like many homeless struggling in Seattle, can tell something is all the way okay with him. So As I walked up Cherry trying to hold onto the blanket I had bought for Granny, she was cold when I had left her, at 9:02 am my uncle starts calling, since I’m literally out of breath walking up this Seattle mini hill I didn’t pick up but after the second call in 2 mins (pet peeve unless its an emergency) I pick up like “yessss,” my I’m trying to be chipper but you’ve already got one strike voice.  

(If you don’t follow me on IG you should take a look at my video recap posted shortly before my “incident, click here to watch)

Only to be informed by my Uncle that my little brother has just been arrested by SPD(Seattle Police Department). The story I gathered from my crying dementia patient Granny, Kathleen her roomy, the beautiful nurses, is that security asked little brother to submit to a health security screening. He showed them his checked-in sticker from last night at 9 pm and said “Oh, I’m good” Where Security said they were receiving “complaints” and that he needs to sign a visitors agreement or needed to leave the premises, In which he replied, “I’m not leaving my granny so call my sister.”

By 9:17 am when I made it to Grannys room, she had just been calmed down and my uncle was standing there looking puzzled. My immediate and only question “Why didn’t you speak up?” Because I figured as the ONLY adult with knowledge of his medical history he would’ve tried to intervene to which he replied, “Oh he brought this on himself when he didn’t just shut up.”

To feel like I was being profiled at a Medical Center sent me. While I had been anticipating my adversaries coming due to my grandmothers estate fighters but from the staff from the hospital I was born in, watched my sister have my nephew and have spent time with the nurses and patients while they navigate the hardest task I’ve ever undertaken.  Can I get an “OH HELL NAH.”

As I typed this, I legit had to take a break and poured myself a glass of the presto rosè I had to stumble into Whole Foods to grab (shout out to Hamsis, I was delirious in Whole Foods he and his amazing curly hair guided me to snacks. ANYONE who knows me knows my HEART smiled but was quickly back to WTF when “Brain” couldn’t be bothered to help me locate a freakin box of CAB, WHATEVER TO YOU BRAIN, I’LL ASK THE BLACK GUY IN MY MIND ONLY, to make eye contact with the only black worker up there thinking surely he’ll help me and he looked PAST ME, looked again and realized like me THAT I WAS THE ONLY CUSTOMER THERE, to finally ask “did I need help?… Was that Seattle Times article I read a while back correct? Had the new influx of new Seattle residents made Seattle an entirely new town? Where we weren’t just slightly less weirder then the people in Portland, every classroom I ever sat in diverse and being proud to write King County, the only county in the United States named after the 20th Century civil rights icon, Martin Luther King, Jr., on every piece of formal documentation did Seattle not still have this amazingly diverse happy love vibe I had come to count on?  

Back to the point. See this is why when my sister texted to see if I was okay. All I could do was cash app her bail money because of this story TEAM TO MUCH. But in sending her bail money I wasn’t looking for that type of fight(LORD KNOWS I HAVE A DIFFERENT LIST FOR THAT). I had already cried all night in worship to God the night before so loud I gave the neighboring rooms down at the Kimpton Starbucks gift cards because I was afraid that my whaling at 11:11 pm might have startled them. I knew God was going before me fighting my battles. I just didn’t have it in me to tell. I was just numb trying to wrap my head around how one decision to check on two people I love turned into standing at a security checkpoint at Swedish Medical Center, trying to strategize how top of the week I’ll have to make my arguments as to why I don’t see my mother and her siblings fit to look after my granny care turned into this type of hateful discrimination where a white male with a set of rules to follow does even have respect for me to tell me said rules while looking me in the eyes, happens every day, to people who just TAKE IT. Because moments prior, “Domonique, just shut up” was what my uncle said while shooting me a dirty telepathic look). 

But today, it happened. It happened to someone who has taken too much and is tired. Today this level of discrimination and hate (YES I SAY HATE BC ALBERT wouldn’t look me straight in the face from the moment I walked up, neither would his partner who strolled up a few minutes later to witch Albert said so loudly I could hear along with the Starbucks barista “She’s not cleared and can only get tea, her belongs are being brought down and she needs to leave, to which the partner did a “fake” walk by look around to see if I was ordering my tea which I’ve had twice daily the little two days I’ve been here) were looks sent towards someone who’s had enough physical and emotional bruises and bloodstains from battles, it’d make any WWII vet proud. It happened to someone equipped to fight because unfortunately how rules and punishments are communicated, sought after and carried out do not look the same for ALL. (I hate that this is still a thing in 2020, it’s probably how many of y’all feel about the Kardashians who as “Y’all would say about racism, “Y’all should get over it that happened years ago” insert the biggest eye roll a 2-year-old could give you) 

So yes, when Albert, top-flight security of the world, doing check in’s at Swedish, not to be confused with my beloved Albert Einstein, told me, “I was being asked to leave the premises and could not continue upstairs” with then refusing to give me his name, the contact information for the security department or if I could wait for a manager? Telling another young minority he needed to wait bc he was not cleared when Albert's partner who at a minimum wouldn’t give me her supervisor's name but gave me a number to call, had just cleared him 2 seconds prior. The SYSTEM is broken. Insert a million other words system could be replaced with. To their defense because (again the Lawyer in me). 

[Swedish is committed to the health and well-being of our patients, caregivers, and community. In light of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) public health emergency, we are taking extra precautions to keep everyone safe including modifying our entrances at our hospital campuses. So basically Swedish has the majority of there doors locked (yes think lean on me), since I tend to get lost easily, I also go through the same checkpoint to avoid not being able to find my way, you’re asked 1. Do you have a cough or any flu symptoms? 2. Have you been around anyone with the Flu? 3. Have you been outside the US in the last 30 days and then you’re given a sticker with a date and your check point]

LOOK. Let me stop here and express that I am beyond the understanding of the fact that we’re in the middle of a health epidemic and Swedish has enacted these policies to not only contain the virus but keep its patients healthy or on the road to recovery and not relapse. buttttt…. 

Sir. I’m trying hard to be polite to everyone because as Granny has probably told me 75,957 times since I touched down in Seattle on Thursday at 9:30 pm and got a ride directly from the airport to put my eyes on my girl, “Everybody has something.”

“Integrity, Compliance, Privacy, & Security”? For and from whom? So no, I cannot shut up Uncle and since apparently I have all the time in the world, and I’m already forking over a cute penny to Karen to sue my mothers siblings for guardianship of my GRANNY let me add Swedish and to the list of people who will be getting a formal Service of the Summons and Complaint FROM ME THIS WEEK. 

So Thank you, Olivia, at the Starbuck counter in Swedish (that I tried to tip only to be informed that they can’t take tips. LORD WHAT IS THE WORLD COMING TOO!!) who happily and cheerfully told me her name whom when I asked for a paper to write down Alberts who wouldn’t give his last name after I asked for the third time and his partner who also declined to give her name, the exact time so I could add it to my angry blog and an email to the head of the hospital, Security dept. and Seattle Times, because, go her for great customer relation skills remembered that I was an Attorney from my first Medicine Ball of the day asked if I had one of those “Anonymous Angry Attorney Blogs” 

I've seen, been victim witnessed but never in my hometown. Because maybe I was wrong in always thinking that WHERE I WAS RAISED, WE DON’T ACT LIKE THIS OR DO WE ???? '

So I turned back to Olivia to return her pen with a  smile, simply with a quick reply as I walked away, “ Thank you, but no,  I’m just an attorney with a legal practice who happens to blog on occasion when something strikes me, dabble in writing and do live videos to educate people from time to time and I think a few people need a little education on how to talk to people. 

(I apologize for any errors, it’s Sunday and my paralegal doesn’t even start until I hire a new one)