I am a caucasion woman of Irish/German descent. I grew up in an intergrated neighborhood in the city of New York. I was raised by a very liberal single Mom.
The events of this past week had me thinking back to a moment in my childhood-a defining moment that shaped not only who I am, but how I felt about the world in general. I was thirteen years old.
The year was 1965. My best friend Denise and I were playing in my room. Denise(who was called Neesy by her family but preferred to be called Dee-neese) is black and we shared all aspects of our lives, as most thirteen year old best friends girls do. We met in fifth grade and were inseperable by the time we became teen-agers.
On that day, getting hungry, we headed to the kitchen, passing through the living room where my mother was watching TV. The images on the set froze both of us in our tracks.
There, in black and white, were images of people, black people, being beaten by cops, white cops.
I don't know how long we stood there before my mother noticed. I can't remember if there was any commentary coming from the TV. I can still, however, remember hearing my mother curse for the first time.
"Oh shit, Denise." she said, and turned the TV off. Before even gauging Denise's or my reaction, my mother went to the phone to call Denise's mother. Basically I guess to prepare her for what her daughter just witnessed and to get some insight into what to tell her now.
Denise and I just stood there, staring at the blank screen.
And what Denise said next was the defining moment, etched in my conscience forever.
"Are we not allowed to be friends?"
My mother came in and told Denise her mother wanted her to come home.
"I'm going too," I announced, not waiting for the answer. Of course we were allowed to be friends. Why would Denise ask that question?
As we walked the three blocks to her house Denise started crying. I was confused. I knew what we saw on TV was ugly, but that happened to the people on TV, not us. It wasn't like that in our neighborhood and school, was it? I said pretty much that to Denise and hugged her. She was my best friend. Nothing was going to change that.
My memory fades as to what Denise's mother told us. I remember her oatmeal cookies and talks about respect and honor and that strange word-prejudice, and how there are mean horrible people in this world, but if we be the best we can be, etc,etc,etc. (I was thirteen, remember?)
What went on in Denise's household after I left was a mystery to me. I'm sure she received a different talk, just like my mother spoke to my sibling and me at dinner. Racism had reared its ugly head into my world and it was never the same again.
Denise and I grew apart the following year. I like to believe it was because we attended different high schools. I went to a catholic high school, Denise to the local public high school. During the following years I discovered I could do something to change that awful image implanted in my brain. I became very active in the Civil Rights movement. I marched, helped plan events in my school to discuss what everyone was calling "the race issue" and made it my life's mission to treat everybody with the respect they deserve, no matter what the color of their skin.
When Barack Obama was elected president, I stood in my living room and cried, shouting the words of a great man. "I have a dream, that one day, my children will be judged, not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." Martin Luther King, Jr.
And I thought about Denise. The last I heard she had moved to Chicago.
One day, someday, the adjectives we use to describe ourselves will change. Not "a black man arrested..." but "an angry man arrested..."
I have a dream, too.