Closed Doors

(It's a long one... just to warn you)

Sometimes it jumps up and smacks you in the face that you are different from the people around you.

Mostly, I don’t consciously think about those differences. I skate through life with the assumption that people who look like me are treated like I am, because I’m self-centered like that. It’s sort of like forgetting that other people still exist when you aren’t with them, assuming a long-lost friend is the same person they were when you knew them, because, they can’t change if you aren’t there to see it. Right?

But once in a while, it becomes blaringly obvious that we are not a homogenous society. And much as the US has become a “melting pot” there are still those people who are not as accepting as others and maybe it’s an unconscious reaction to a perceived difference, based on skin color or gender, or a prejudicial assumption about a person, but we people of color are treated differently than our white counterparts.

It’s a good sign to me that white people assume we are treated the same, and that people of color receive the same benefits as they do, but it’s also disturbing that they are oblivious to the discrimination that we deal with on a frequent basis. I think it’s positive because it shows that they themselves don’t believe that we deserve less, but it also creates a divide between us because there is a huge part of me, a major influence on my past and present, that they can’t understand.

And really, this county is more accepting of racial differences than other places that I have lived, but I get the feeling that a lot of it, especially with older generations, is a front. They are courteous when you are a customer in their store and they know you’re going to be putting your money in their pockets. They are polite when you are in a position of authority to help them. But many are also blatantly racist when they make an assumption about your heritage, your economic situation, your marital status, or whatever. Sometimes they make racist remarks about a culture they assume you are not connected to. Sometimes they treat you with disdain because they assume you don’t deserve their respect.

This all came about during a conversation this morning in which a blonde-haired, blue-eyed coworker of mine looked perplexed when I pointed out that when I was pregnant, people in our building assumed that I was here to apply for some type of welfare benefit. I was trying to make the point that based strictly on appearances when we were pregnant at the same time, employees were more likely to hold the door open and let her in before the building was officially open, than they were to do the same for me.

She sort of blew me off like I was being dramatic, not in a rude way, but more like she obviously didn’t take my comment seriously. And I was sort of stunned, because it’s something I dealt with often when I was pregnant, trying to walk into the locked building after someone else, and they would go so far as to pull the door shut after them when they saw me coming and saw I was close enough to get inside before it closed and locked behind them. I just don’t see that happening to her. And I know she has faced her own battles for other reasons, but I can’t hide who I am. I am judged on sight and I can’t do a damn thing about it. She is judged on sight too, but unless she was with her partner, I doubt most people would pick her out to discriminate against.

I’m not trying to imply that my struggles are worse than hers. In fact, I think she has probably had to fight a lot longer, and a lot harder than I have against our respective prejudicial magnets. I’m just saying that anyone who is prejudiced against Black people, Latinas, young women, young mixed women in the workplace, pregnant people of color, Black people who are too light-skinned, Black people who marry out of their race, people of color who are doing well for themselves… any combination of the above and many more bullshit reasons, I get it. I’m not even Latina and people are racist against me simply because they think I am. I’m treated like shit by White people for having darker skin than them, and Black people for having lighter skin. I get shit from Black men and Latinas for marrying my husband. I have people tell me that I think I’m too good for them, since I’m not hooking them up with extra Food Stamps. I have older people tell me that I’m too young and naïve to understand what they are going through. I get shit from bosses for talking too much, or not talking enough. I get shit from coworkers for doing too much work….

And I know we all have out struggles, I just get so frustrated sometimes that I can’t escape mine. I can’t walk down the street and have people think, “Oh, she looks like a nice person,” because the minute they see me I’m slapped with hundreds of labels, and people are reacting to their perceptions of me without my doing a damn thing. Not everyone has that curse.

But sometimes it’s a blessing, because I can look at another person like me, and I get it. There are a lot of prejudices I feel sympathetic towards, but there is no empathy because I’m never experienced it. But there are so many that I’ve dealt with, and learned from, and I appreciate that knowledge because if I was even slightly different, I might not know what I now do.

So that’s all. No hard feelings, just processing. And I am a little sad because I will never meet anyone who has dealt with what I’ve gone through. I ignore our differences sometimes with the hope that I’ll feel totally understood one day, but I think the real issue is that I need to learn to let go of that need to feel understood. There are so many fragmented parts of me that I haven’t wholly integrated yet. It’s my life lesson, maybe, to see myself as a whole person, so then I can really feel that way.