Interesting Story

I have wanted to tell anyone this story and not had a platform or audience so here we go...

I was chatting with a black co-worker who has an amazing story. He played football in Oklahoma back in the 50ies or 60ies. Up until then there were all black & all white schools. A black sports team would play other black teams and not teams from white schools. Well he was in high school at the time they reversed this rule. His school's team was playing their first game against a white school's team. They were ahead by a touchdown but in the last quarter the officials made so many bogus calls against them & labored them with penalties that the white team was able to score repeatedly and win the game.

My co-worker's name is Bernard. Bernard was telling me he was just a kid and when you are a kid you don't care about color or racism or any of those issues. All kids care about is playing, winning and having fun. It is when we get older and lose our innocence we realize why life is unfair and how people look at each other unfairly. As Bernard got older the loss bothered him.

Bernard is currently in his late 60ies. He walked to a nearby bank on lunch to get money and ran into one of the footbally players from the white school that his team played against in that game. They recognized each other and began chatting. The white guy made the comment that Bernard's team should have fairly won that game had the officials made honest calls & not been prejudiced against the black team. As Bernad told me this I could see him fighting to hold back tears welling in his eyes.

I like Bernard's story. It is a real experience, it reveals unjustice & prejudice society has held, and it also allows for redemption in the end. Even though there are many stories of horrible things white people have done against blacks it doesn't mean all white people are horrible. Bernard's white high school football teammate wasn't and was able to see the unjustice that was going on. He couldn't undo what happened but he could agree with Bernard about what happened. It seems like precious little but his comments meant the world to Bernard.

There is more to creating healthy interracial relations then stories with happy endings & the ability of both races to agree about injustice. There will need to be much discussion and willingess to honestly address our beliefs & ideas about ourselves, biases, and others. I believe most of the important changes won't occur there. The most important change occures at heart level. It occurs when we embrace the innocence of children, longing only to laugh, play, and have fun with our neighbors.