The Choir Boys

There are very few cookies that I will not eat. I enjoy sweets and cookies in particular. But there is one cookie that hurts me every time I see them. I never buy them. There is a story behind it, for sure.

My parents are particularly good people. They adopted me when I was five weeks old. We are different. I am Black and they are White. When I investigate their faces, I do not see a reflection of my own. To be culturally competent, they kept the recent issue of Ebony magazine on the coffee table. We never discussed the magazine, or why it was in the house. Internally, I knew it was for my benefit. But it did not feel authentic. I felt shame every time I saw the magazine. It confused me. I hated everything about my blackness. It was the thing that people hurt me over. It was a thing I could not control.

My parents reared from communities where everybody looks the same. Small New England towns can be very White. So, I grew up in a whitewashed world. It felt like the whiter the better, but that was not so. It was a dichotomy between the world of white and the cancer ridden, suicidal wish for tones that covered the beaches like pink quahog shells burning for the color which they chastised. It did not make any sense to me.

Early summer beach days were like whitewashes where the red towel accidentally got thrown in. Late summer, the pink often turned into a red and brown rainbow, fall colors littering the beaches like wood stain with strap marks to reminisce that they are whitewashed underneath.

I remember the day clearly. It was early spring, so the children were extra whitewashed, they had not been laid out on the beaches yet. Those whitewashed antagonizers, they made fun of me one day-- no…. not one day, many days. But on this day, I was cut deeply. It felt like the wound reached my bones. I could feel that knife slowly penetrating. The pain was subtle at first, but then it smarted, stung and felt like it would never heal. I was already confused and now I was in pain.

The clouds rolled into my head, into my very being and they settled there, ready for a downpour that never came, but threatened to do so. My already confused sense of identity was shattered. The cruel whitewashed neighborhood boys paid one of the mentally ill men from the rest home to say a few words. Not just any words, but words that injured me. They were full of hate words. They were spite words, malevolent words, bad words.

Over the years when I looked back at this day, I hoped that the boys were ignorant of how deeply they hurt me. Perhaps, they did not know better because they were simple minded. But I do not believe that is true. They grew up to attend private schools and colleges. They turned into businessmen. Their fathers were financially successful, and they grew up with the whitewashed privilege that gave them the same. Their cruelty was just part of the game.

They paid their pack mule to walk down South Main Street and deliver the misery. He was a short, unbathed, tiny handed man, with a cruel laugh and foul breath. His pants were dirty and too short, his dress shoes probably came from the church rummage sale, once belonging to an accountant or a lawyer. They were worn out now, but you could tell that they were quality many years ago.

Their patsy laughed in jest as he approached me looking back for approval to the whitewashed boys who snickered after putting their heads together. I was nice to this man even though he was different. I was brought up to respect everybody and I worked hard to obey. His name was Jimmy. He came from the Highland Hall Rest Home. Many folks were transplanted to this small, New England, Connecticut River town after deinstitutionalization and the widespread use of Thorazine sent mentally ill people to smaller unlocked facilities across the country.

I believe that he did not know better, in the same way as the boys clearly did. He walked up to me with purpose and through his laughter and his bad teeth, he said, “You are on Oreo cookie, black on the outside and white on the inside.” My heart sank as I heard the boys dissolve into hysterical giggles down the street. The pit in my throat swelled and I turned and walked away full of shame and embarrassment. I felt shame for that which I could not control and that which I could not change. The feeling of devastation filled my being. I swallowed tears and walked home.

I was white on the inside because I did not know my culture due to lack of exposure to my Blackness. It was a whitewashed town. There was only one other family of color. My hair was short because the curls were too unruly for my mother who did not understand nappy hair. I didn’t delight in red beans and rice until I went away to college. Our school spoke of slavery and Harriet Tubman, but I knew nothing of Frederick Douglass or Claudette Colvin. I was in a setting where there was no Black on the inside for me to learn. My only sense of culture came from learning Scott Joplin on the piano. I was black on the outside and lost on the inside.

I walked into the house alone and my mother was making dinner. She asked how my day was and I told her “fine.” She is whitewashed, how could she understand? I put my head down and sat on the couch to watch the news and forget about the damage. I went to put my feet on the coffee table and saw the Ebony magazine and choked back a sob. I sat in my shame in solitude. I hated my Blackness. If felt unacceptable.

I grew away from that small town and into my culture to the best of my ability given the circumstances. Every time I am offered an Oreo cookie, I think of that day on South Main Street. I think of those terrible boys who sang with me in the junior choir at church. Going to church does not automatically make you good. I bet they do not contemplate whether they are hateful. If you ask them, I imagine they would tell you that they are not prejudiced. I wonder what they are like all grown up and out in the community. Do they still harbor racist views? Do they pay people to say horrible things for them on a different level now? Do they believe that black lives matter? Do they eat Oreo cookies?