I own a nice vehicle.
The kind that hugs the road like a whisper and hums like it knows where it’s going.
It’s the kind of SUV that should be free.
Built for long stretches of empty highway and distant horizons.
But it sits mostly still.
It idles in the garage.
It moves through town and back,
But not out there.
Not far.
Because while it can take me anywhere, I go nowhere,
the country will not let me forget who I am while driving.
I used to move without worry.
Back when I was younger, maybe more foolish, perhaps just more free.
Back when I’d take off cross-country with nothing but a map, a CD wallet, and a crooked smile.
I didn’t think twice about what county I was in, or whose land I was rolling through.
But age teaches you what experience doesn’t let you forget.
It teaches you that being a Black man in a nice car is still a flag.
Still a reason to be stopped.
Still a reason to be questioned.
Still a reason to be followed, harassed, or worse—disappeared.
I’ve had the thoughts.
You know the ones.
What happens if I stop in the wrong place?
What if I need gas in the wrong town?
What if I pull over in the wrong stretch of highway with no shoulder or witnesses?
What if I encounter a police officer who feels like proving a point?
What if they plant something?
What if I reach too fast?
What if I say too little or too much?
What if I’m told to get out of the car and don’t make it to the next sentence?
These aren’t dramatic hypotheticals.
These are possibilities.
Probabilities, even.
Because Black freedom in America has always come with asterisks.
Because a license and registration don’t mean much when fear enters the room.
Because we still live in a country where a Black man in a nice car is a contradiction that law enforcement wants to solve.
And this fear isn’t new.
It’s passed down.
Inherited like a scar.
In another era, we had something called the Negro Motorist Green Book.
A quiet lifeline printed on pulp and ink.
A book of safe places—if any such place ever existed.
Gas stations where you wouldn’t be chased off with a shotgun.
Hotels where you could sleep without looking over your shoulder.
Restaurants where you’d be served a plate and not a stare.
It was more than a travel guide.
It was a Black atlas for survival.
And now I find myself decades later, carrying the same questions in my gut.
Wondering how far I can go before someone decides I’ve gone too far.
Sometimes I wonder if it’s paranoia.
If I’m being unreasonable.
If I’ve let the headlines and hashtags shape my fear.
But then I remember names.
Not just George or Philando or Sandra.
But names that never made the news.
Names whispered in family kitchens.
Stories told with sighs.
Cousins who had “bad encounters.”
Uncles who came home changed.
It’s not paranoia if it keeps happening.
It’s not irrational if the system was built this way.
So I fly.
I fly because in the sky, I have less chance of becoming another roadside ghost.
I fly because TSA might be annoying but rarely ends in blood.
I fly because the badge at the gate doesn’t come with a gun and a grudge.
Still, the road calls me.
Still, there’s something sacred about the open highway.
Something spiritual about Black movement—unfettered, unapologetic, unbothered.
That may be why I downloaded a new app today.
A modern Green Book.
A map of safe stops, safe places, safe Black-owned spaces.
It may be enough.
Maybe not.
But I want to believe again.
I want to believe that freedom can exist beyond my driveway.
Because a car that can go anywhere
deserves a country where that promise is true.
And so do I.
By Kyle Hayes
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