Read part two of my column on race and preschool in Charlottesville here.
Tag Archives: Charlottesville
On a Serious Note
Hi Everyone,
You can click here to check out my Big Mom on Campus column about race and Charlottesville.
Is Tyler Perry Hiring?
I didn’t want this post to be about my fear of Black people.
Because if word gets out that I’m scared of Black people, Tavis Smiley and Cornel West will call and ask me to come on The Smiley & West Show on PRI so they can talk to me about internalized racism (which is what happens when you eat a tiny White man in West Virginia), and I will tell them I don’t even live in WEST Virginia, so how could I have eaten him, and, furthermore, how could I possibly hate myself? But Smiley and West are like the Ben & Jerry’s of Blackness ‘cept Blacks don’t live in Vermont and those who do are lactose intolerant, so if they say you ate a white man, you ate him. And there will be so much backlash from my radio interview that I’ll have to appear as an extra in a Tyler Perry film, but that won’t fix anything. Then somehow Touré will get in the middle of things and tweet about me, so then Piers Morgan will be all, “I wanna bloody meet this girl,” and my face will be all over CNN, and I’ll just be sitting there, all postpartum like, looking drab compared to Anderson Cooper’s baby blue–
OMG, I’ve done it.
You see, folks often compliment Elie Mae on her eyes, and I think that’s swell. I mean, really nice. I don’t mind a compliment from a stranger.
But I do mind strange compliments. From Black folk. Who scare me.
So this blog is about my fear of (a couple) Black people. And now I’ll have to be an extra in Tyler Perry’s I Can’t Figure Out for the Life of Me Why I Married Your Black Behind: Fine, Call Your Mother, I Don’t Care.
Here’s why: So Elie and I are in Whole Foods, and this Black woman says, “Those are the brightest eyes I’ve seen in a long time.” Nice, right? But then she leans in and adds, “Well, since my birth.”
Whaaaat?! Are you saying your eyes were light and your hair relaxed at birth, or are you saying your mama’s doula had blue eyes?
And just like that, she has invited Elie into some secret sisterhood, where everyone’s eyes turn into purple diamonds after dark. And they sing Vanessa Williams songs around a campfire.
I wish that this were the only offense.
But another day, Elie and I were in Starbucks. It started out nicely. The middle-aged Black woman saw Elie and said, “Look at those eyes!” But then she got right in my face–like I could feel her forehead breathe–and realized that I didn’t have hazel eyes. Then the secret sorority thing: “I had light eyes,” she said. “Actually, mine were lighter than hers.”
Great? How is your second toe? Got any freckles? Strange moles I should know about?
She continued. “But then when I turned 17, they got dark.”
Whaaaaa…? Get me outa here. Is this some kind of voodoo? What do you mean your eyes went dark? Is that a metaphor about your soul?
Did they ban The Bluest Eye in Charlottesville or something? What is going on here, my people?!
Where Have All The Black Folk Gooo-ooone?
I have to tell you a secret: I think there are Black people in Charlottesville, Virginia. And I think they are hiding from me.
This is different than what you’re thinking. This isn’t the thing where I think dentists are putting video cameras in my fillings so Rick Santorum can find me and make me shop with him at S & K Menswear. This is real life.
Maybe I was naive, but I thought I’d find plenty of my skinfolk around here. I’ve heard the Shenandoahs called “Atlanta only with mountains” before.
In any event, I’ve written a letter. I’m asking that the media re-print this letter and help me in my search to find anybody in the area who uses cocoa butter on their skin. And the letter goes henceforth and as such:
Dear Skinfolk of Charlottesville:
Where are you? Is it too late for me to join SNCC?
I just moved here, and apparently my GPS only directs me to places in Charlottesville where White folks gather. I ended up at Whole Foods, Barnes & Noble, and Starbucks. Okay, I found one Black guy at Starbucks. But he was a Republican. With squirrely eyes.
I’m not saying this city should be the Black mecca. I’m not looking for the next Soulja Boy, Cornel West, or even Colonel Sanders. But there must be a descendant of a sharecropper here somewhere. Please? Look, even if your family was the bougie kind that owned slaves, call me. We can talk this out. Final offer: I’ll settle for a White girl who eats corn muffins.
Maybe you’re angry that Thomas Jefferson’s university wouldn’t let us in until a few years ago. But I don’t think that was racist. I’m sure U.Va. was just waiting on results of those cranial measurement tests. And they had to make sure we didn’t have extra ligaments in our feet. Is that really too much to ask? I think not, considering how well the Kenyans do in marathons.
This isn’t all about me. I’m asking you to come out of hiding for the sake of my daughter. She needs friends who use hair milk. She’s just a year old, and I took her to the park the other day. Total white out. I’m talking fleeces, clogs, and BOB strollers everywhere. It was winter, and people were picnicking! What was I to do?
I’ll tell you what I did. I searched every inch of that playground with my eyes. And when my melanin detectors finally spotted two Asian children, I considered inviting them over to watch the next “Black in America.”
I am desperate.
And like the Black church secretary would write, Please Advise.
–Taylor Harris
