a collection of adults who had never met one another, spent an hour together in a room with the door closed.
We were there as part of a Baltimore program called Be More ("B'More" is local slang for "Baltimore"), which brings together a whole bunch of kids from different racial and religious and economic backgrounds to have fun for four successive afternoons playing sports and having organized conversations with kids they'd likely never otherwise meet.
At one point, some of we adults were called to sit together and talk in a room. Most were there because they'd brought their children for the afternoon. I was there because I'm interested in anything that tries to cross stereotyped barriers.
We sat in a circle and did the kinds of exercises you do in groups like this to get to know one another. I learned that the white guy to my left, Bill, teaches math and science in the city public schools. The black guy to my right, Craig, is a former cop who now does security for the Baltimore Ravens. Our small circle included men and women; Jews, Muslims, and Christians; Asians, blacks, and whites; a woman from Korea who has a young son; a woman who spoke French as her native language; a man with his eyes obscured behind sunglasses who turned out to be one of the most emotionally honest people in the room. Through simple talk about who we each are as people, I felt my presumptions toppling to the ground like felled trees.
But here's the thing that really got me. I found out, from being paired in conversation with Bill, the white guy seated to one side of me, that his paternal grandparents are Cherokee and that he is named for a chief of the Cherokee nation. That's right: this "white guy," who I took to be as Euro-Caucasian as can be, self-identifies both physically and culturally as substantially Cherokee. And get this: so do I. Through my maternal grandfather, I have ancestry that appears to be Cherokee. Family elders have talked for years about this Native American presence in our family history. And I have long found this connection, alongside my African-American heritage, to be a big part of who I am as a human being. So here we are, two men sitting next to each other in a room, suddenly revealed as being neither entirely "black guy" nor "white guy" in the ways we might expect of each other.
I guess this is why there is no substitute for unfiltered human contact when it comes to learning who people are. The tales told by mass media are worse than worthless in this regard. So, too, often, are the teachings of our parents or instructors or friends. As long as we remain stuck in this matrix of manufactured hearsay, we will never know one another.
So what I learned today, as vividly as I ever I have, is that if we want to know anything of who someone is, we have to ask them. And watch them. And see them. In person. Nothing else will do.
We were there as part of a Baltimore program called Be More ("B'More" is local slang for "Baltimore"), which brings together a whole bunch of kids from different racial and religious and economic backgrounds to have fun for four successive afternoons playing sports and having organized conversations with kids they'd likely never otherwise meet.
At one point, some of we adults were called to sit together and talk in a room. Most were there because they'd brought their children for the afternoon. I was there because I'm interested in anything that tries to cross stereotyped barriers.
We sat in a circle and did the kinds of exercises you do in groups like this to get to know one another. I learned that the white guy to my left, Bill, teaches math and science in the city public schools. The black guy to my right, Craig, is a former cop who now does security for the Baltimore Ravens. Our small circle included men and women; Jews, Muslims, and Christians; Asians, blacks, and whites; a woman from Korea who has a young son; a woman who spoke French as her native language; a man with his eyes obscured behind sunglasses who turned out to be one of the most emotionally honest people in the room. Through simple talk about who we each are as people, I felt my presumptions toppling to the ground like felled trees.
But here's the thing that really got me. I found out, from being paired in conversation with Bill, the white guy seated to one side of me, that his paternal grandparents are Cherokee and that he is named for a chief of the Cherokee nation. That's right: this "white guy," who I took to be as Euro-Caucasian as can be, self-identifies both physically and culturally as substantially Cherokee. And get this: so do I. Through my maternal grandfather, I have ancestry that appears to be Cherokee. Family elders have talked for years about this Native American presence in our family history. And I have long found this connection, alongside my African-American heritage, to be a big part of who I am as a human being. So here we are, two men sitting next to each other in a room, suddenly revealed as being neither entirely "black guy" nor "white guy" in the ways we might expect of each other.
I guess this is why there is no substitute for unfiltered human contact when it comes to learning who people are. The tales told by mass media are worse than worthless in this regard. So, too, often, are the teachings of our parents or instructors or friends. As long as we remain stuck in this matrix of manufactured hearsay, we will never know one another.
So what I learned today, as vividly as I ever I have, is that if we want to know anything of who someone is, we have to ask them. And watch them. And see them. In person. Nothing else will do.
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