THIS IS WHERE my brother lost his eye: 1212 Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica. A restaurant with a confusing name above its door: 1212—nothing but the numbers. Inside, the ceiling is too high and the metal tables glitter with artificial light as I think about my brother and that night some 30 years ago when an argument with a white man led another to smash a beer bottle into my brother’s face. I used to call it a hate crime, but the truth is more complicated, and I don’t know what to think or feel as I sip my overpriced seltzer and watch tourists navigate street performers and those massive dinosaur topiaries that spew water into reflecting pools. I wish I were one of them—a tourist—not a grieving brother struggling to make sense of all I’ve learned about that night, struggling to make peace with everything I still don’t understand.
About 10 years ago, I began…
