Finding Your Center

I was a really strange kid.  Looking at me, you saw a short, stocky, yellow kid but listening to me was like being a fly on the wall at "the" Black Barber shop down the street from capital hill.  I recall how proud yet uncomfortable I would make my parents as I bought up topics that were either not ready to address with their three sons, or not planning to address at all.  Race was seldom discussed in our home.  We knew we were colored but somehow we were so much more focused on the essence of that state of being colored that we had little time to wallow in the sorrow that is often not too far behind that same state of being colored.

I appreciate the objectivity that captivated my childhood.  I was taught to look for and focus on similarities and to draw connections.  As I searched for our commonalities, my focus was primarily on the positive.  All too often we are drawn to each other because of our common struggle as though recognize the common stench of oppression, or misogyny, or hate.  I guess I grew up embracing my differences and recognizing the value that those difference bought to every situation, every conversation, every interchange, and every conflict.  My dissenting opinion, my divergent outlook, and my ability to divest myself from emotionalism and be objective, in my opinion, has been a gift.

Like so many African Americans I wasn't raised by my parents.  Yeah, they were there.. but they almost operated like moderators.. editors at best.  I was raised by NPR and books.  I developed this love for the two; their ability to inform or to invite one to react based on what one's heard or what one's read.  An opinion, and understanding, a view, a biased based on the facts irrespective of color, socioeconomic status, religious affiliation (or non-affiliation), or involuntary preconceptions.  I developed this love for SciFi and Fantasy. From Green Woman to Fraggles I never gave any thought to why the Smurfs were Blue or why the little Lego people were Yellow.  When placed in real world situations or conversations, I had the unique ability to focus solely on the "what" and completely ignore the irrelevance of "who." 

As I grow my desire is to encourage people to evaluate and define their center.  Similar to this idea of success, it's important to define individualized, achievable goals that focus on today going forward without focusing on what was.  I speak to so many young men and woman, particularly of color, who are so paralyzed by racism, actual and perceived, they've decided against trying as they believe success to be impossible.  As a black man, if I think of my success as being relative to what White America will allow me, this presupposes that White folk sit around their dinner tables plotting my failures and weighing their success against my failures as if to say that a victory for me is a setback for them.  Realistically that family exist but I'm sure most of White America doesn't think of themselves as any less middle class or their degrees any less valid because I'm college and Barack is on his way to the White House. 

The feelings of disenfranchisement are strong.  To grow up feeling as though you will never.... because of your race, sex, ethnicity, complexion, etc. is unconscionable.  In order for our country to grow, everyone is going to have to give up a little.  Whites will have to let go of preconceptions and prejudices, and Blacks will have to (and I hate to oversimplify this) forgive and forget.  The one commonality that all people of color have in common is that feeling of inadequacy.  It's really hard to constructively articulate the feeling but I've started referring to it as "our common cousin."  It's interesting how "the wound" has this ability to take on it's own soul.