You Matter. Your Life Matters. Don’t Give Up.
By: Sam Dyson
Tags: Equity, Spirituality, Physics, Racism, Motivation

To all of these children who are mourning the losses of their fathers — for all of these bright, beautiful Black boys and girls, men and women — I want you to know that you matter and your lives matter. I want you to know that your fathers dreamt about you before you were born. We all did. I’m so sorry that they are no longer here to tell you, so I will: I know your fathers loved you. I knew your fathers and I saw their light. I didn’t know everything about them, but I saw their light. I wish I could celebrate and acknowledge that light by telling them once again that I love them.

But I can — we can — keep loving you, their children, even those of you who I have not yet met. Our love can keep encouraging you to live as if your life matters. Because it does!

The back story is that, just before I got that call from Duane’s mom — like literally moments before — I had just finished whispering a prayer of gratitude and commitment to God as I submitted my last applications to graduate school in physics. You see, I am a free negro — one of the three A-Nigros — and I had just commited to live like it. My commitment was to give each day my full effort despite my fears of falling short.

So if I were free, what would I do? Who would I be? If I were free, I would be an astrophysicist studying the mathematical laws that govern the physical universe, on earth and far beyond it. That’s what I’d do. That’s who I’d be. I would spend my life doing what lights me up: shining God’s light by delighting in the magic and mystery of the natural world.

So 25 years after graduating as the only Black student I saw in four years of math and physics classes at the same university that awarded the first PhD to a Black student in any subject in 1876 , I have decided to live as a free negro and to do what people do when they believe their life matters: I’m choosing to invest in what lights me up so that I can shine that light to those who have been left out.

Edward Alexander Bouchet, the first black person to earn a PhD in the United States, which he did at Yale in physics in 1876.

So to all of our future Black scientists, artists, mothers, and fathers, what will you do with your one wild and precious life? What will you do? Who will you be?

Please keep shining the light that God intended you to shine. Live each day as if your life matters. Because it does!

For my part, I’m going to use my freedom to affirm the value of Black lives and other undervalued people by investing in their capacity to pursue and expand the wonder of science at the highest levels of study. God’s invitation for us to delight in the Universe is universal. It’s an invitation to all people, not just the privileged few. To affirm an individual’s right to more deeply pursue the magic and mystery of the natural world is one way to proclaim the value of their life. And I want to lower barriers to encountering the wonder of science among underrepresented and undervalued populations. The widespread presence of Black people doing and delighting in science will be just one indicator of our freedom and value in science and in society.

So I’m going to keep proclaiming our collective freedom and value by continuing to do more of this: