What is it like to fight for ten years?

 

Of course the question implies that the animosity erupted suddenly when the ink dried on the marriage certificate, and ended sharply with the thump of the gavel on the Supreme Court bench. 

 

Which is unlikely.

 

Mildred and Richard Loving wanted to raise their family outside the scrutiny of law enforcements and judgmental neighbors. But that simple wish could not protect them from jail. He was white. She was black. That disparity in complexion did nothing to thwart their love for each other, but it was the occasion for backlash from the local police. 

 

The movie Loving chronicles their struggle, carrying us deeply into the decades where civil rights were still more theory than practice. Their case catches the attention of a pair of inexperienced lawyers, who are themselves dubious about the possibility of changing the Constitution. 

 

Richard is a mason. He builds walls with bricks, and wants only to take care of the woman he loves. Yet for reasons that confuse him, the tides of prejudice rail against them. He cannot find cinderblocks to withstand such gales. Richard is a man of few words, speaking only a fistful in the entire movie. Mildred is soft spoken in her own way, but she understands that their tenacity could build a foundation not only for their darling children but for society. Which it does. 

 

It was painful to witness the way fear dragged Richard's feet like cement boots, and yet their commitment to each other and to their children was not sacrificed. I like to imagine that laughter spilled more extravagantly after the ruling from the highest court in the land came down. Then they could stop looking over their shoulders for cop cars kicking up dirt in the driveway. Their liberty washed away all the sharp edges of rules devoid of mercy. 

 

"And I will give of the water of life freely....There will be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall their be any more pain, for the former things are passed away."-Revelation 21