It was hot today. My kids and I (apart from one nanny, a grandfather pushing his beautiful bi-racial daughter on the swing) were the only black people in the park. It's not that I'm not used to it; it's just that for some reason, here and today-I felt...black. But that could be me. I'm overly sensitive about these things, especially when the huge disparity between race and class practically screams for one's attention in such a glorious, lush, green, and white park such as this.
Nobody was overtly obnoxious; there were subtle nuances...of course the boys didn't notice a thing. It's what's so remarkable about children. They are wonderfully oblivious and shameless. Innocent and pure in their intentions. They just do what their hearts tell them to do without fear or inhibition. They will insert themselves into any body's game if they want to play, and if they aren't feeling particularly cooperative, they have no qualms about letting you know. Not like adults who have to pretend to be tolerant, read: politically correct), letting their children play nicely with your little black boys even though the icy frozen smiles they greet you with when these little black boys (who are a bit tall for their age ) get a bit too close to their golden-haired, flaxen skin, blue eyed beauty, express certain sentiments that need not be spoken.
And, as a mother who wants to spare her child any and every heartbreak, you want to tell your boys to back off, but since golden beauties people don't say or do anything-except stand there, like statues, the frozen smiles plastered upon their rock hard faces, neither do you. You let them run after one another, push each other on the slide, laughing and playing while you can feel your heart, your poor, mother's heart begin to crumble at the thought of how you'll have to explain the cruelty they will undoubtedly face as black men in America. And it will be worse then because their hearts will be broken too.
Of course New Rochelle is an affluent suburb, and affluent suburbs tend to have snooty residents.Well...I can be a bit snooty too, without the zip code to back it up-but, since it is the norm in this society to lord whatever you have to set you apart from your fellow man, woman or even animal to do so, (forgive me-I just watched Dawn of Planet of the Apes) that's what you do. Well, it's what I do. I'm not proud of it but I do it. I have an advanced degree. I am an intellectual. My cultured upbringing in indicative of the kind of person I am-I represents diversity and tolerance. I am the antidote to prejudice. When I open my mouth to talk, I don't sound the way " they" might expect someone like me to sound. I find myself perhaps trying a bit too hard to speak so they can see that I'm not at all what they think I am, or what I think they think I am--a "mammy" nanny fresh off the boat.
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2015/05/25/midtowners-battle-the-rise-of-the-midrise.html
I find when it's too hot I think too much. I know better than to be paranoid or over sensitive about these things. Things are what they are. I am who I am. I can't be responsible for every ignorant idiot on the planet-I can't do anything about the way they think. It should provide me with some comfort that my good friend, who happens to be a nanny and a white woman, and the beautiful little girl (also white) she cares for, is a great playmate for them right now.. Everything else is irrelevant. Seriously, All of the other stuff shouldn't matter right now, Why should I be upset that the black grandfather pushing his gorgeous bi-racial granddaughter on the swings, refused to acknowledge me or my kids? Why should him ignoring us, yet giving my white friend and her little girl a warm and hearty hello have any effect on me? I don't know. But it does. It just tells me that maybe he's a bit like me in the sense that he elevated himself above the "black help" in the park by having a bi-racial granddaughter. Like he was now a part of some exclusive club. He had arrived and he belonged.
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My tall, dark-skinned black boys and their black mother were an affront to him in some way--like our presence may bring down the property value of the park or something and probably, more important some of his self-pride as a black man who had arrived.
I don't share these thoughts with everyone. Only you guys. Maybe it is all in my head, Maybe I am overly "sensitive." A young trainer, who also happened to be playing with her kids in the park gave me and my white nanny friend a couple of passes to Equinox Gym in Scarsdale. She said they have great programs there for the kids. Me? At a gym where the discount monthly fee is $225 a month? Scarsdale is much whiter than New Rochelle-and richer too. Hey! Maybe she recognizes I belong there! Then again, I was with my white friend after all...I wonder if the other black nanny got a pass. Whatever. I'm flattered. I hate myself for that.
Thanks for checking out these links.Each of them, in their own way-get at the heart of the issues I'm trying to resolve, Thanks for listening.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/christophermassie/watch-this-rare-recently-surfaced-speech-old-obama-speech-fr?utm_term=.bqL0AvEb8&sub=3788034_5812380
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