Bethel University - Spire Yearbook (St Paul, MN)

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Today I was talking to a guy and he asked me why I came to Bethel. I started thinking about how to tell him, but the more I thought about it, the more I was aware of the incredible gap between my perspective on the world and that of most of the people here. I wanted to ask him if there were people in his home community who stole food for their dinner, or if he had friends who had been beaten by police, or if he’d ever lived in a ghetto. Of course I knew he hadn’t. He would never know what it was to be on the bottom of a system that was determined to hold him down. How can he ever understand the urgent drive I have to better myself, and to help my people? I just changed the subject. There are some people here who are different, who just accept me as a human being. They understand that I didn’t come here to cause trouble or to make people paranoid. They give me hope that the barriers separating people can be torn down. I guess maybe I’m crazy, but there’s this one girl that I really like. She doesn’t act fakey with me. She doesn't make me feel like a freak when she talks to me. It's a relief to know I can be natural with her, and not worry about playing little games all the time. In fact. I’ve been thinking about asking her out. I know it doesn’t often happen that a white girl will go out with a black guy. I think maybe it's different with her. It would be really good for me to be able to go out v ith someone and just have a good time and relax and be myself. I could almost hear the doors crashing. bringing my little fantasy to an abrupt and gut-wrenching end. One look from her and it all came back to me. like a bad dream that turns out to be real: people are arranged in their ov n groups. Those who try to cross the lines get stepped on. One minute we were talking freely and I felt confident in our friendship. Then she would not look at me. She tried to talk but only stammered. I felt a sickening coldness in my gut. I stubbornly demanded to know why she would not go out with me. I made her tell me. She said her parents don’t want her going out with black guys, though of course they're not racist. I am drained. I have no energy left to argue, and nothing left to say.

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There is constant tension here for me, because I am not in my environment. I am constantly aware of my family and home community, as if my people’s eyes were fixed on me from a distance, their collective expectations I came from. At the same time, I am aware of the eyes of people here. I will always stand out among them, and nothing I do goes unnoticed. So, I am on stage here. I am performing for audiences. But I have become used to the eyes, I have learned to live with the tension. It's almost like being on the court with my team down on points. The odds are against winning, but I cannot allow myself to lose. Right now I've got the ball and I can see my goal. I must negotiate the opposition as best I can, but I can t quit while I still have a chance. How should I react to people? Should I hate them, showing my hostility? Should I bend over backwards to prove that I’m harmless? Or maybe I should just try to ignore them, though that’s not always easy either. Sometimes I wish I could confront them all. and see how they would answer. Do they really believe we are all brothers and sisters? Do they believe we are all equal under the same God, a God who knows what really goes on inside people? I wish they would really face these questions; then I could begin to hope. JM. oe