"You're not from around here, are you?"
That’s what the police officer asked after he stopped me when I pulled out of a Target parking lot onto a busy street in an inner-city neighborhood, dressed for a party and not paying attention to oncoming traffic.
Back in the nineties we lived in north Minneapolis. Minneapolis doesn’t have many people of color, but most of them reside in north Minneapolis. Our Folwell neighborhood was, as people say, in transition. Longtime residents were dying off or moving out. New homeowners were Asian, Mexican, African-American, and whites like us who didn’t have a lot of money to buy a house.
Our friends Brian and Lisa bought a house a couple of miles from us. Lisa was having a bridal shower. In a rush to go, after I got glitzed up I stopped at the neighborhood Target (which locals called TarGhetto) to buy a card and get film for my camera. (This was the early nineties.) After I made my purchase, I started my car, exited the parking lot, looked one way and entered Broadway.
The trouble is, Broadway is a two-way street. I nearly got sideswiped. A police car came out of nowhere, so it’s possible the car I sideswiped was the police car. I don’t remember.
The white officer came to my window, looked in and grinned. “You’re not from around here, are you?,” he asked.
Had my righteous anger been in place, I would have demanded, “Why do you say that? Are you profiling me? Would you give a driver of color the benefit of the doubt?”
Instead, I pleaded. Yes, I live around here. I’m so sorry, I was going to a bridal shower and wasn’t watching where I was going.
He probably let me off with a warning. I honestly don’t remember. The whole evening was a fog, except for those seven words:
"You're not from around here, are you?"
Since then I’ve had several encounters with police, state police and county sheriffs. I buy my cars from carsoup. Because I shop by price and mileage, I often drive cars that fit the profile of a younger, rowdier driver. My current ride is a yellow Dodge Neon with a factory spoiler. It also has tinted windows. Which I didn’t realize until I was pulled over twice, once by state police and once by a county sheriff. None of these traffic stops resulted in anything more than a warning. When I lived further north, my car was never a problem. Here in southeast Minnesota, suddenly it’s a problem.
Each time, I felt gratitude that my white privilege prevented the cost of a traffic ticket and the hit my insurance premium would take. And also felt shame that I talk the talk but didn’t walk the walk.
So if anyone asks me what white privilege is, I can tell them. In seven words.