Privilege - Why not you?

This might come across political, but it is defiantly not meant to be. I write this to put down on paper that moment I realized that I had white Privilege and didn't even know it.

I grew up in a house with my older brother, my mom and my awesome grandma. My mom and Biological Father (Sperm Donor) divorced when I was to young to remember. He gambled all the money away, hence the reason we lived with Grandma.

My mom worked at a bank, grandma was retired. And that was that. We lived a good life. If we struggled grandma and mom never let on that we did. My brother was in skating or hockey. I was in dancing. My mom or grandma would be at every event that we had at school. Life was good.

Flash forward to me being 9ish. Mom got remarried to who I call my dad. Dad is an Ironworker at the steel plant. He was there when I was sick, or sad and everything in between. They built a beautiful house on a that was right on the water. We had every fun toy. Four wheelers, boats. We were the house where all the neighbor hood kids would come. Never knew who was there, other than there was always a pile of shoes. LOL.

Now my brother is the Goalie for the High School hockey team, being pulled up to rep teams and scouts checking him out. I was in modeling. Appeared in flyers, commercials and even a movie. (small scene, literally all you see is my knee.

So growing up we were comfortable for sure. I still at this time in my life i didn't know what white Privilege was. I knew there was a horrible name my best friend would get called that started with a "N" and I knew the meaning behind that and I would through down with whomever if need be so my friend never had to hear that word if I was around.

The slap in the face of realization came with my husband and I were sitting down watching my favorite television show - Grey's Anatomy. And the scene was when Miranda Bailey and her husband had to sit down with her son Tuck to explain what you do if you are ever pulled over. She tells tuck " Ok baby you always have to show the police where your hands are, and always say what you are doing before you do it." And then she says the one thing that brought my entire life into prospective. "Remember your only goal is to get home safely. Everything we are saying is because we want you to come home every time, we want you to grow up to be anything you want to be. You are amazing, you are perfect . WE WANT YOU TO STAY THAT WAY....

Really how is this fair. That due to the color of someone's skin, you have to seat down and have to prepare your son or daughter about the potential of not making it home. I always knew that life was not fair, I wasn't that blind but I was blind to the fact that this would ever have to happen.

Now having children myself ( 2 Boys), I have always taught them that we are all humans, we all come in different size, shapes, colors, but we all deserve respect. I remember when I was telling my oldest about getting lost what do you do. You have to have a plan. I taught him you find someone in control, A teacher, principal, bus driver, fire fighter, Paramedic, and yes police. I am sending my child to be safe at a police officer, but there are parents out there having to tell their children that sometimes you won't come home.

Now lets clarify, I am not putting down the police at all. My grandfather was a city police officer until he had a stroke. The police do great things. I have had good encounters with police and I have had bad encounters with the police. And with all the encounters I was the victim.

I guess what i wanted from this is to just put the realization out there that things are not always what they seem. You have no idea what other parents are having to go through. Lets just have respect for everyone no matter the color of their skin. We are all humans. We all need help sometimes. Lets just be their for each other.