White is not really a color.
After following the Inauguration today and all the talk on civil rights I remembered something I did as a child. I could not read yet so I had to have been younger than 6. I had very little parental guidance and was over a mile from home. I had to use the restroom so I went in the bus station. There were a lot of doors and some had signs. I asked a porter what the signs said and he said "colored". Mnnnn, what does that mean? "The color of your skin". That was easy as I looked at my arm. I'm white so I go in the colored one. It was really hot out so I got a drink from the "colored" water fountain when I came out too.
The porter had several upset people talking to him and he kept saying "ask her, ask the little girl if I told her to go in there".A very disturbed woman told me the colored porter was being fired and questioned me about our conversation. I repeated my story to several perplexed people and then I cried and told them I didn't want them to fire that nice man for helping me.Then a detective came and showed me his badge and I repeated what had happened to him and told him I was so scared and didn't want to go to jail and I didn't want the man to be fired. Sob, sob, sniff, sniff. The woman wails" what do we do ? She actually used that bathroom and water fountain!" The detective told me I should go home and stated to the crowd the porter was not to be fired. That's how I learned about civil rights and prejudice-not at home, not from my ethnic neighborhood friends but from strangers in a bus station. I went home and never told a soul what had taken place, but I was afraid to go out of the house for a while.
The porter had several upset people talking to him and he kept saying "ask her, ask the little girl if I told her to go in there".A very disturbed woman told me the colored porter was being fired and questioned me about our conversation. I repeated my story to several perplexed people and then I cried and told them I didn't want them to fire that nice man for helping me.Then a detective came and showed me his badge and I repeated what had happened to him and told him I was so scared and didn't want to go to jail and I didn't want the man to be fired. Sob, sob, sniff, sniff. The woman wails" what do we do ? She actually used that bathroom and water fountain!" The detective told me I should go home and stated to the crowd the porter was not to be fired. That's how I learned about civil rights and prejudice-not at home, not from my ethnic neighborhood friends but from strangers in a bus station. I went home and never told a soul what had taken place, but I was afraid to go out of the house for a while.
posted by judy | 7:32 PM
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