I think I'm living in a Facebook page sometimes. Afterward, I blame myself for being so accommodating. However much I try and "take a deep breath," I experience a rise in my blood pressure. Given the efforts of the chaos-promoters, such as Mitch McConnell as well as Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema, it's no wonder encounters with fellow American leave me questioning why I'm here"
In the US. Still. Why I haven't beaten a path to live in an Ontario town near friends! Here, however, when I run into a neighbors, albeit, "conservative," I seem to be the one who recognizes the presidency was won by Joe Biden! Usually, I suddenly remember I have something urgent to do.
Otherwise, there's the odd because awkward one-on-one. Beyond the initial greeting, what follows is a series of rapid-fire questions. Do you put milk in your coffee? (What?) I supply the answers and then listen to a five-minute description of what transpired when she (it's usually a woman) purchased of a rug recently.
Apples versus oranges!
What?
Which ones do you like to eat? How about watermelon?
Just when I'm preparing to claim I have that urgent business to tend to, I hear, How do you braid your hair? And, finally, there it is. Always there. I have dreads, I answer back. Or is it "talk back"?
Do you wash it?
No, this isn't an example of hate speech. Ignorance, yes. But in 2021, what is contributing to this stagnation in race relations in the US? I've heard these comments 20 years ago! What is providing the framework for old stereotypes and the sort of misinformation that forces encounters between Blacks and whites to become so stressfulfor the Black American?
This spring, I received a set of free veggie vouches, from a program free to any and all seniors. The coupons were worth $25. To be honest, I imagined myself going out of my way to find a Farmers Market only to be looked at as if a freak. In 2021. I didn't want to feel uncomfortable ! So I offered the coupons to a senior in my building. A male.
There are people selling food stamps! I think I threw my head back. Did I forget, this is America! I explained that the coupons were neither "food stamps" nor part of any "welfare" program. Why should I have explained, anyway. Black Americans toiled in the cotton industry and our free labor is what contributed to the growth of America's hegemony in the world. But neighbor continued on about what he hadn't witnessed himself, but what he read online. On the Internet !
So he imagines, as his source intends for him to do, people he has never actually seen "taking" money away from him. The neighbor disseminates what he perceives to be a fact.
The next day, in a conversation with a woman, when I try to discuss race, I hear this: Are you Black! I don't see color! Besides, she doesn't want to hear about "racism" anyway. Tired of it!
Except, when the subject of violence prompts a conversation about crime , of course! In 2021, thanks to Facebook's business model, Black is a deviation from the norm.
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