It's a nice afternoon on College avenue in Rockridge. Usually. Shoppers are out in full force. I see people laughing and smiling on their phones. Walking and talking casually. Which puts me in a mood to smile as I pass them by. Then I notice something else. And I'm not sure if they notice it, too. I am six foot one. Maybe that has something to do with it. I'm not sure. People see me and their smile turns to something else. What exactly? I'm not sure. If I were to describe it, it would be somewhere between bracing themselves for something awful annnnd the look of someone who just took a shit in their pants. It's weird after 20 years of this reaction. Which, on some days, is fine. I'm not that social. But a passing smile and hello is what I call normal behavior. And I say hello instinctively. And people give me that( shit in pants) look and ignore me all the time. Unless I am at Cole coffee. But if I'm not, I am a usual suspect. It is a strange thing to get use to, I tell you what...
Then I remember something else. Normal behavior is a program run by the media. We are repeatedly told about rapes, murders and robberies. And we are told who the usual suspects are. And there is no one to blame at this point. But it happens all day, every day. And it doesn't matter anymore what ethnicity you are. Even African Americans have ceased their hellos on the street, I have noticed. And that was one of the things about our culture that I thought was so cool as I grew up. Two African American strangers in passing use to always greet each other. Like we had culture. Now everybody seems to be in a state of suspicion...
Well...not EVERYBODY. In case you were about to shake your head and say, " gawd...not everybody is like that! " But how many people are actually out there taking notice of this anthropology? I dunno. But I done wrote a song about it...
Related Articles:
2 comments:
You are not trippin'. Keep on smiling and don't stop speaking. One person can change the world.
Nice. Well said. And never will I stop speaking and song writing. And thank you.
Post a Comment