You’ll Always Be Second Place

“Vanity, Vanity, All is Vanity” Vanity, the quality of being worthless or futile (pointless). This is my thought, as I sit looking at the struggles we face as a society. For me as a thirty five year old BLACK MAN, its easy to get swept into the societal waste basket of life. I remember coming home one day, talking about all the things I’d learned at school that day. I talked about the fun conversations my friends and I had, the even more awesomesauce things we did. I remember one of my family members, then a good fifty years old if a day, former Vietnam Veteran, standing up shrugging his shoulders like, kid.... I am glad they let you play with em.. As the silverware forcefully hit the table, along with folks present soul, he made his exit. What a stupid thing to say to a kid. I bet many of you are snapping right now reading this, and would more than not slap the taste out of someone’s mouth if they’d said this to your child, yet alone said it to your five year old.

For thirty years that has haunted me. For thirty years I have struggled with the reality of being to good for blacks, but secondary to whites. For thirty years I have lives like a man without an emotional country. For years I was forced to go to west side. For years I was forced to accept, if I was going to better myself, if I was going to grow as member of this society I had to go to the west side. Why is this the case? Why is it nothing of substance resides in my hood? Is it that we are deadbeats, deplorable people, or was there some truth to what I heard during that faithful night?

He and I have never really spoke since that day, which proves that now some thirty years later I am feeling some kind of way.. There was however one moment in passing when he now eighty spouted a reprise of his original piece of bull 💩💩💩. This time I was ready, I was a grown man, and could do what I could previously.. I could look that old racist piece of 💩💩 in his face telling him how I felt. My question to him was, how dare you speak of my friends this way, more importantly, how dare you look at the world so negatively. He looked up at me, almost with a sense of regret, to which I realized, it wasn’t he that was a piece of 💩💩💩, it was me. I satdown, watching as he slowly, somewhat sobbingly went through his wallet. He removed from it a picture of him, flying a fighter jet. This man, my uncle was at one point a captain in the army, flying in enemy territories, while being somewhat supported by the enemy.

He began to talk of his experiences. How he once believed he was just as good as anyone alive. He looked at the world with a sense of optimism, believing the sky was truly the limit, until that dream was shot down drastically. He forcefully realized to the world he was nothing more than a NI💩💩ER. Even in foreign lands, he was still looked at as less than a human. He said, young man, no matter how high you go, no matter how good you are, there will always be someway for them to cut you down.

My heart begin to sink down within my soul, reminding me of how everyone else felt thirty years ago during that now personally infamous thanksgiving dinner. I couldn’t sleep a wink that night, getting up somewhere around 3am to chat with my grandma. She almost knew when I hit that door what was on my mind, and sat right up to explain. She said, sugar, we lost everything, working like dogs to build a solid future, not just for us, but for you. We lost because the moment we’d seemingly catch up, someone, somewhere, would move the goal post. So now WHITE PEOPLE ARE 💩💩💩 I somewhat proclaimed, with a voice of depression? Are you telling me, every friend I have ever had hated me, or used me as their token? NO... That is not what I am saying. There are many good people out there who are white. People who honestly don’t get just due for what they have done to help bring us through. But you still gotta be careful!!! The massa was beating us up, trying to kill us, we saw him, but missed his wife. Yes she took us in, yes she somewhat sheilded us from her husbands beating, but she still didn’t want us to be better than them.

Today baby, If you are going to survive, you gotta know who you are. You gotta believe in yourself. You gotta watch not for white people to try and knock you off, but people. You gotta be determined, you gotta know no one knows you like you, no one can define you but you. And if you believe in your heart you are doing what you were created to do, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL, keep doing it.