Unlike some people, I’m not at all troubled that race has been an “issue” in the current election. I prefer to think of it as a Racial Election Process that we’re currently going through because we’re being forced to process information like never before. This part of our daily lives isn’t so much an “issue” because that implies that it’s something to be dealt with, yet I’d like to offer another perspective: one in which we LIVE with those very real things before our eyes every single day. Sometimes we see it clearly, other times it is pointed out to us, and still others, like the faux-controversy surrounding the LeBron James and Giselle Bundchen magazine cover, are shoved in our faces. We’re told, “Be offended! Be upset! THIS should be causing you discomfort!”
No, thank you. There is enough of it that is real and felt every single day that I don’t need one more.
Race comes up these days as if it’s just another topic of conversation like healthcare and education. Those issues are separate and distinct and don’t even affect every person. If you have healthcare, you don’t tend to engage in conversations about it unless you’re feeling passionate about those who don’t have it, but mostly you go to your doctor and pay your co-pay and get seen for things that don’t take more than an hour out of your work week. Educational issues come up when we’re disgusted with the fact that 4th graders can’t do long division and we wonder who will be the future engineers and bank tellers and computer gurus. Those who don’t have children in school or even public school will weigh in on their repugnance of the state of education and will look to those of us in positions of influence for hope, but few will offer up their time to come into that 4th grade classroom for an hour a week and run through flashcards with James and Marquan and Denise.
Race, however, affects us every single day. Most of the time, we are choosing not to see it.
Don’t be mistaken: I want you to see my color. I want you to embrace my cultural being, not just my “heritage”, but who I am today and who I will be tomorrow and who I’m shaping my own children to be. My fair-skinned red-headed son gets asked weekly, WEEKLY, about being “black”. When his friends see me as I’m picking him up from basketball or taking him to youth group, they wonder. It’s a topic of conversation for these unworldly minds who are accommodating their intellectual reasoning in order to make sense of it so they can LIVE IN IT EVERY DAY.
Why must we adults compartmentalize it and treat it as an “issue” needing to be dealt with? It’s not a rash that requires a salve or a broken dish that needs some super glue.
Don’t deal with my race. Invite me in and get to know me underneath this mocha-colored skin, these odd green eyes, this “interesting” hair. Wonder about what makes me tick, ask what prompted me to make a purchase, inquire about how I came to a conclusion.
But don’t, just DON’T act like you will figure it all out and lean back in your chair while stroking your chin and let out an breathy, “Aaaahhhh” as if you now understand people of color. See my color, please, but love me as a human. View my humanity, but know that I’ve come to This Place in living with these experiences every single day. When you take them apart and try to file them under Cocktail Party Topics I become small to you. Insignificant and unworthy of real examination.
The point is, I’ve been examining you for a long time. I’ve watched you and made note of who you are. The breadth of your experiences get to make up who you are and you’d be horrified to hear me utter, “Aaaahhh” as if I’ve figured you out after one intense conversation.
This election has become a process for Americans and it’s rather painful to go through. For instance, what I thought would be a fascinating dialogue on Professor Kim’s website has sadly, and predictably, become a one-sided conversation once again.
Perhaps what people didn’t like in hearing Rev. Wright’s sermon are such because they are things said in black conversational circles every single day. As way of disclosure, though, I’d like to point out that during this highly political time I have stopped going to my own church because of the stranglehold they seem to have on the Republican Right. It’s not even thinly veiled and I’ve chosen to attend a black church for the time being (and yes, other factors are involved, I’m not that one-dimensional) and when and if that becomes a place where I feel the pulpit is being used to sway my vote, I will leave there, too. My intentions of connecting with God don’t always have ties to my politics. I believe I am influenced by my time with God, but I won’t be led by the convictions of the person happening to stand on the stage.
What I can understand, nevertheless, doesn’t always seem like much. What I can wrap my brain around is a minuscule bit of life, yet I am experiencing it every day. I may walk around the store with my typical white mother, share a steak dinner with my typical white mother, or hold tight to her when she is getting ready to leave on a trip but I am still black every single day. I may walk around with my typical black father and share a meal with him, too, and I am still black. My sisters are still black. That won’t change.
So since live with it and joyously so, can you stop treating it as an “issue” and deal with my blackness? Can you do it every single day?
I do.
Let’s have real discourse about race in all it’s messiness and aches and irritations.
Let’s do it every single day.
