At the end of the summer of 1985, I was the last passenger to board a plane in Denver heading east, dragging my Smith-Corona typewriter, as tears streamed down my face. It was the end of another questionable relationship, this time with a man who always pointed out when someone referred to him as Mexican that his family was not from Mexico; he was of Hispanic descent. He could not take me home to meet his family because I did not share his family's heritage, or at least this is what he told me before I found out about his girlfriend of similar heritage who had recently given birth to his son. He had written a farewell letter to me on the back of one of his pencil drawings he had given me, hoping I would someday read it when I decided to re-frame it or when that frame broke, which it did, along with my heart.
I would begin a new chapter of my life at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia, where I would learn more about race relations and poverty than I would learn about journalism. It was a place I chose to get a Master's degree after combing through one of those big books that contained information about colleges and universities. When I came across my Graduate Record Exam (GRE) scores in recent years, I had forgotten all of the places I had them sent: three small schools in Illinois, Arkansas State, Louisiana State at Baton Rouge, along with Marshall. I had never been to any of these schools. All I needed was a school to give me a graduate assistantship so tuition would be paid for, and Marshall was the one that met that requirement.
I wasn't even sure I should have been studying journalism since I had already received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Michigan State University and any journalism position I could get would not require a higher degree unless I wanted to go all the way to earning a PhD so I could teach at a college level. I had looked into studying Urban Development for reasons I cannot even remember. After abandoning my home state immediately after graduating from college the first time for Colorado, living on my friend's couch and touring with her band, eventually getting my own apartment and becoming a secretary and then a waitress at The Brown Palace Hotel, I needed to do something to get back on track. I think the real reason I went to graduate school is the academic world had always treated me better than the "real" world and I wanted to get back to a place where I could succeed.
Moving back into a dorm after years in my own apartment had its challenges. My roommate's sexual preference didn't bother me nearly as much as the fact that she lied on the application about not smoking. That, and her proclivity for listening to The Pointer Sisters at high volume first thing in the morning after coming in late at night from the biker bar where everyone knew her name. She is the one who insisted that I thought I was better than she was because I was a Christian and to whom I calmly explained that didn't make me better, I just knew where I was going when I died. She said she wanted to go to heaven, too, and would get her act together someday before the end of her life, which, I had mentioned casually, could very likely be that day.
Our biggest conflict, that of my roommate and I, did not revolve around her spiritual beliefs, health practices or even the fact that she was dating girls. The conflict between us had to do with whom I was dating. He was black.
I should have known there was more to the idea of interracial dating, when the guy I had been dating, editor of the university's literary journal who liked to talk about going to the Kentucky Derby with his family, dared me to date this undergraduate journalism student whose ancestors happened to be from Africa, as he laughed, probably drinking his mint julep in anticipation of race day. I didn't find the dare to be humorous or even understand why it was a dare. In any case, I took him up on it and he wasn't laughing then.
This new boyfriend's mother had been an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) minister who had died a few years prior to our meeting, leaving a gaping hole in his life and in the lives of his brother and father, an executive at a chemical company in Ohio. He was a straight-A student who bore a striking resemblance to the actor, Gregory Hines, who had portrayed a dancer, along with Mikhail Baryshnikov, in the movie White Nights that came out in 1985, a year before we met.
As journalism students, we had a lot in common. We even wrote a news story together about interracial dating that did not go over well with our professors when it was published in the university newspaper. I was told by the university photographer with whom I worked in the dark room every afternoon, developing photos to be published in the yearbook, that he had been told he was not allowed to ever publish a photo of an interracial couple. I got the feeling he had tried.
As Christians, our lives were more problematic as churches were segregated. Going to a white church together brought about a forced kindness and general coldness by the members, as he would be the only black man in attendance. The songs, as well as the Scriptures, seemed to be re-translated into a culturally accepted point of view. Walking across the railroad tracks, literally, we found ourselves at a black church with a name almost as long as its services. As college students we could not regularly devote ourselves to five hours of worship, but found the time on Sundays when there were covered dish luncheons. It was the best fried chicken I had ever eaten, and helped to soothe over how being stared at as the only white woman in the church by an entire row of the faithful had made me feel.
The general student population did not seem to care one way or another that we were dating at first. It did confuse them, however, that we were not fitting into the stereotypic black football player having a one-night stand with a white cheerleader story. We were serious students who studied together and went to church. We weren't doing what others thought we were doing and as time went on it somehow seemed to anger them when they realized our relationship was based on a true friendship. We found this out while walking through campus late one evening and having a bottle thrown at our heads, its shattered pieces glistening on the sidewalk the next day.
I would be called "casper" as in the ghost, "white bread" and "cracker" as I would make my way to the library or to class. This was not like the teasing I had endured about my hair color or freckles I had grown accustomed to all my life. These were angry, threatening voices, trying to break me. I continued to follow my conscience by intervening when a black girl was being hazed in my dorm, going to the dorm room of the suspected girl-in-question with my Bible in hand. She said she was a Christian. I wanted her to prove it.
In the end, it was not the color of our skin that ended our relationship, but our age difference and level of experience in dating. I was four years older and had already dated a wide variety of guys over the years. Though I was his first girlfriend, when temptation came knocking on his door one night, he succumbed, giving the title of first to her.
We would remain friends for a few years, meeting briefly in Los Angeles where he had an internship and then in Denver where I had returned, noticing that in neither place did anyone even raise an eyebrow as we walked together, two people of different racial backgrounds, talking and laughing about books and movies, and making observations about life the way writers do.
(I was reminded of this time in my life recently, in the midst of a nation at war with itself, and in no way am I casting judgment on Huntington, West Virginia or on Marshall University. Though my two years there would be fraught with the challenge of new experiences, it was the 1980's and change takes time. I would like to think that segregated churches are a thing of the past and that those from different cultural and ethnic backgrounds can live peacefully together, but it comes down to individual decisions and intentions--a hand opened to accept the hand of another instead of a hand drawn into a fist. It is easy to fear those with whom we do not break bread and difficult to take the time to consider how different any of us really is from another. We are all human beings bearing the image of our Creator. We, every single one of us, need to be loved. It is by His Spirit, we are able.)
I would begin a new chapter of my life at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia, where I would learn more about race relations and poverty than I would learn about journalism. It was a place I chose to get a Master's degree after combing through one of those big books that contained information about colleges and universities. When I came across my Graduate Record Exam (GRE) scores in recent years, I had forgotten all of the places I had them sent: three small schools in Illinois, Arkansas State, Louisiana State at Baton Rouge, along with Marshall. I had never been to any of these schools. All I needed was a school to give me a graduate assistantship so tuition would be paid for, and Marshall was the one that met that requirement.
I wasn't even sure I should have been studying journalism since I had already received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Michigan State University and any journalism position I could get would not require a higher degree unless I wanted to go all the way to earning a PhD so I could teach at a college level. I had looked into studying Urban Development for reasons I cannot even remember. After abandoning my home state immediately after graduating from college the first time for Colorado, living on my friend's couch and touring with her band, eventually getting my own apartment and becoming a secretary and then a waitress at The Brown Palace Hotel, I needed to do something to get back on track. I think the real reason I went to graduate school is the academic world had always treated me better than the "real" world and I wanted to get back to a place where I could succeed.
Moving back into a dorm after years in my own apartment had its challenges. My roommate's sexual preference didn't bother me nearly as much as the fact that she lied on the application about not smoking. That, and her proclivity for listening to The Pointer Sisters at high volume first thing in the morning after coming in late at night from the biker bar where everyone knew her name. She is the one who insisted that I thought I was better than she was because I was a Christian and to whom I calmly explained that didn't make me better, I just knew where I was going when I died. She said she wanted to go to heaven, too, and would get her act together someday before the end of her life, which, I had mentioned casually, could very likely be that day.
Our biggest conflict, that of my roommate and I, did not revolve around her spiritual beliefs, health practices or even the fact that she was dating girls. The conflict between us had to do with whom I was dating. He was black.
I should have known there was more to the idea of interracial dating, when the guy I had been dating, editor of the university's literary journal who liked to talk about going to the Kentucky Derby with his family, dared me to date this undergraduate journalism student whose ancestors happened to be from Africa, as he laughed, probably drinking his mint julep in anticipation of race day. I didn't find the dare to be humorous or even understand why it was a dare. In any case, I took him up on it and he wasn't laughing then.
This new boyfriend's mother had been an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) minister who had died a few years prior to our meeting, leaving a gaping hole in his life and in the lives of his brother and father, an executive at a chemical company in Ohio. He was a straight-A student who bore a striking resemblance to the actor, Gregory Hines, who had portrayed a dancer, along with Mikhail Baryshnikov, in the movie White Nights that came out in 1985, a year before we met.
As journalism students, we had a lot in common. We even wrote a news story together about interracial dating that did not go over well with our professors when it was published in the university newspaper. I was told by the university photographer with whom I worked in the dark room every afternoon, developing photos to be published in the yearbook, that he had been told he was not allowed to ever publish a photo of an interracial couple. I got the feeling he had tried.
As Christians, our lives were more problematic as churches were segregated. Going to a white church together brought about a forced kindness and general coldness by the members, as he would be the only black man in attendance. The songs, as well as the Scriptures, seemed to be re-translated into a culturally accepted point of view. Walking across the railroad tracks, literally, we found ourselves at a black church with a name almost as long as its services. As college students we could not regularly devote ourselves to five hours of worship, but found the time on Sundays when there were covered dish luncheons. It was the best fried chicken I had ever eaten, and helped to soothe over how being stared at as the only white woman in the church by an entire row of the faithful had made me feel.
The general student population did not seem to care one way or another that we were dating at first. It did confuse them, however, that we were not fitting into the stereotypic black football player having a one-night stand with a white cheerleader story. We were serious students who studied together and went to church. We weren't doing what others thought we were doing and as time went on it somehow seemed to anger them when they realized our relationship was based on a true friendship. We found this out while walking through campus late one evening and having a bottle thrown at our heads, its shattered pieces glistening on the sidewalk the next day.
I would be called "casper" as in the ghost, "white bread" and "cracker" as I would make my way to the library or to class. This was not like the teasing I had endured about my hair color or freckles I had grown accustomed to all my life. These were angry, threatening voices, trying to break me. I continued to follow my conscience by intervening when a black girl was being hazed in my dorm, going to the dorm room of the suspected girl-in-question with my Bible in hand. She said she was a Christian. I wanted her to prove it.
In the end, it was not the color of our skin that ended our relationship, but our age difference and level of experience in dating. I was four years older and had already dated a wide variety of guys over the years. Though I was his first girlfriend, when temptation came knocking on his door one night, he succumbed, giving the title of first to her.
We would remain friends for a few years, meeting briefly in Los Angeles where he had an internship and then in Denver where I had returned, noticing that in neither place did anyone even raise an eyebrow as we walked together, two people of different racial backgrounds, talking and laughing about books and movies, and making observations about life the way writers do.
(I was reminded of this time in my life recently, in the midst of a nation at war with itself, and in no way am I casting judgment on Huntington, West Virginia or on Marshall University. Though my two years there would be fraught with the challenge of new experiences, it was the 1980's and change takes time. I would like to think that segregated churches are a thing of the past and that those from different cultural and ethnic backgrounds can live peacefully together, but it comes down to individual decisions and intentions--a hand opened to accept the hand of another instead of a hand drawn into a fist. It is easy to fear those with whom we do not break bread and difficult to take the time to consider how different any of us really is from another. We are all human beings bearing the image of our Creator. We, every single one of us, need to be loved. It is by His Spirit, we are able.)
No comments:
Post a Comment