I grew up eating Sunday dinner every week. Like many other Black families, my grandmother, “Granny,” was in charge of the kitchen and cooked every week like clockwork. Granny was a very organized person, and my introduction to meal prep/planning didn’t come from some blog or new-age fad, it came from her.

Still, there were times when even she would forget an ingredient, and because she began cooking on Saturday, would then send my momma or one of my aunts to the store for the missing piece so she could finish, sit down in her chair, and wait for Sunday to come.

Because she was cooking, Granny didn’t have the time to wait for one of us to go out to the Price Chopper on 63rd, HyperMart, or even her favorite store, the Aldi by the Landing Mall, so she sent us to the one closest to our house: “The Stink Store.” “The Stink Store” was a SunFresh located on the corner of Linwood and Prospect. If you’re from Kansas City, you’ve at least passed by this store, or gone in it. The store always had an aroma of very fresh fish, and those who’ve gone fishing know that fish are not the best smelling things in the world. But I digress.

My family and I, the Aldi (though you wouldn’t know it today), and “The Stink Store” each existed in Black neighborhoods. Yesterday’s massacre in Buffalo brought these memories to the forefront.

“This could’ve been us.” is what I told my Momma yesterday. It’s not the first time I’ve felt this feeling.

Much like the Mother Emanuel massacre, this was not only an attack on our race but our culture. There are families that won’t have Sunday dinner today, because their grandmothers, mothers, and aunts/uncles, weren’t allowed to return home with the missing ingredient. Families, who, due to a white man’s hatred imbued by politicians and talking heads, did not get the chance to watch their granny take her seat in her chair last night, waiting for Sunday to come.