My kids gravitated to the footage of George Floyd's funeral

My kids gravitated to the footage of George Floyd's funeral, to the commentary that followed.

I can't even explain it. We were mucking around, being tired-at-the-end-of-week silly, hugging and playing tickling games on the couch. We were ignoring the TV; and then, suddenly, we weren't.

There have been so many sentiments spoken in these last days, but it was this handful of words, seen on social media, that I can't leave behind me; painted on a piece of cardboard, and held up by a protester who was inscrutable, or maybe just nervous. It was hard to tell behind her COVID mask.

The words said: "All mothers were summoned when George Floyd called out for his Momma".

I wept. I couldn't help it. Sometimes the truth is a vicious unpredictable thing, like tear gas or a taser or something profoundly, immeasurably worse.

The younger of my sons, on the right of this picture, is almost fourteen. When I was fourteen - in social studies class in Invercargill, watching a grainy documentary series on VHS - I learned the story of another kid of fourteen, Emmett Till. His mother insisted his casket was open at his funeral. The brokenness of his child's body, recognisable only to the mother who had created him, is a stain handed down, to this day, one generation to another.

My kids, tonight, watched the segment, 'This is America'. They sat side by side. They did not move or speak. Nor did they move or speak when the commentary changed to 'This is Aotearoa'. But I know, one day, they will.

If we raise kids who know the time to move and speak, who have the courage, then maybe - just maybe - we achieve something.

All mothers, we are summoned.