I don’t belong here…

I have never been a girly girl. I dread the morning routine of ‘doing’ my hair– and if I can get away with not washing it, I will. I occasionally wear heels, but only because I like the idea of playing dress-up. The most make-up that I will ever wear is eyeliner and mascara, but if I can get away without that too, I will. Skirts have this annoying habit of riding up past the place where my hips should be, so I avoid those. Lipgloss is product to be abhorred and only brought out for special torture session, like weddings. I sometimes get my nails done, but only because I like the attention (and the massage!)– not for the sake of ‘good grooming’.  I will never be THAT girl….

So, why is it again that I work for a modeling agency??

I was just in the car, listening to NPR and the highlights for the next hour’s News and Notes and one of the guest speakers, from Big Brothers, Big Sisters, was campaining for more black people to be involved. He mentioned that in order for a young black boy to at some point be a man, he needed a black man to be there. On the surface, this statement was  harmless enough, but it seemed to me to highlight a subtle and ever present form of racism. By saying that a young black boy would not grow to acceptable man-hood with out the aid of a black man he implies that the young boy would be sub-par and unacceptable under the guidance of a man of any other ‘race’. And in effect, saying that there is a wide and unapproachable gulf between the differences between a black man and any other man, further emphasizing an inequality that so many have fought so hard to dispell.

Is this evidence of an underlying cultural taboo? That a child brought up in a racially defined culture other than that prescribed by his skin color is forfeiting his heritage? A Black man can only be this… A White man can only be this… A Native American man can only be this… Why do we persist in putting up these destructive racial divides? Could the child not simply be called man? Or human? These rifts go deeper and older than I will ever be able to fully understand, and I don’t claim to have answers or to discount past grievances, but it seems to me that the more we separate ourselves based on race rather than individuality, the more this negative divide deepens. Why can’t we instead, choose to focus on the richness of our cultural diversities, the things that make us proud, the hard won accomplishments? And yes, the people who helped us to get to where we are, and continue to make us the individual we should be proud to say we are– regardless of race.

Today is the last day of freedom, and I cling to it like the last day of summer vacation. I truly believe that weekends should be at least 3 days long. Why is it that I spend more time each week with 9 almost total strangers than with the man I love? Something about that seems indescribably wrong, I can’t seem to put my finger on it exactly though…