Blood in my eyes
The story of one young woman in Oakland who has suffered from too much violence

Commentary by Amber Johnson

I’m sitting in the hospital, waiting with my family to find out if my brother Platinum is going to be okay. He was shot three times.
   I’m sitting in the hospital, waiting with my family to find out if my brother Platinum is going to be okay. He was shot three times.
   My family had been having a barbeque in Oakland at Grandma’s house, and all my close family were there. Platinum, 22, had just left us to go with his friends. He left because he was mad about his baby mama trippin’on him. So when he started walking down the hill, he never looked back.
   Not even 30 minutes later on 23rd Avenue and East 22nd Street, Platinum was gunned down. I got the call from his baby mama saying he had been shot, and she told me that if his friend Shorty hadn’t driven him to the hospital right away, he would have died from the blood loss.
    While my family worries around me in the hospital, my mind flashes back to when my oldest brother, Brian Jones, was shot in the head and left at Lake Merit in Oakland. He was only 23. I recall sitting in the living room with him and our Papa talking about going to church that Sunday morning. A car pulled up and blew the horn. I always get up and look to see who it is, but for some reason, I did not look that time. My brother said, “Love y’all! I’ll be right back.”
    Then when morning came, the police did too. They knocked on the door and told Papa the news. He couldn’t catch his breath, and I just dropped to my knees and cried till there was no more water coming out. I remember his gold teeth shinin’ and his voice sayin’ “I love you.” I’ve been through fire, but this was too hot to handle.
    A tap on my shoulder brings me back to the hospital and the fact that I don’t want to lose another brother, my last one. Mama yells about the doctor not telling her anything.
    My heart pauses and takes three deep beats. On the first, my mind flashes to the time when Lil Willie, 18, was gunned down in front of Mazanita Center in Oakland. They never found the gunman, and all I can think about is how we used to run around that center every day when we were just 10 years old. The second heartbeat takes me back to when Lil Tony got shot in the neck. We were shocked. I remember dancing with him at Roosevelt Middle School. Now he can’t move a muscle, but the big blessing is that he didn’t die. The last, most powerful loss was Tim Tim. He was gunned down right by Highland Hospital, when police just opened fire on him. He died right at the scene.
    Now my mind comes back to the hospital, and I take a deep breath. Mama screams, “My baby made it! My baby made it!” I thank God that my Mama’s son made it out of the ocean, because this time we couldn’t jump in and save him. Everyone wipes their eyes and feels better, but my eyes stay bleary from thinking too much about how all this violence has affected me.
    On the way home, I think about how the violence has changed me. Now, I count every footstep, pray every second and put more life into my heart. I think this is why I am so focused today, because you never know what is going to happen. You can never be too careful about what you were born into.

Read the three Crime Series articles:
Blood in my eyes  - The Story of a Young Oakland Woman >>
What's working: How to develop an effective program >>
Examing Black on Black Crime by David Muhammad >>

Or download the entire Crime Series .PDF (584 KB) >>

The “Seeking Solutions to Black on Black Crime” series is copyrighted 2007 by The Globe Newspaper Group.
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