Race Relations

While we were at The Corner Bakery today, The Boy was coloring the front of the menu/coloring book with a red crayon. He fiercely colored over the face of one of the cartoon people on the front, saying that he didn't want him to go over to another cartoon person's house. I looked over and the face he had colored over belonged to what was supposed to be a black person. It may not have been related or even a race thing; The Boy seemed to think that the Latina cartoon person was OK. But it got me thinking.

Although I consider our neighborhood to be fairly diverse, it isn't of the black/white variety. There are lots of brown folks here, but not a lot of Asians or Blacks. In fact, in my musing this afternoon, I could only come up with one black resident, a man (married to a white woman, with two small children just older and younger than The Boy) in our immediate neighborhood. I am on a "hello" basis with the family, but nothing further. I am on only a "hello" basis with most of my neighbors. However, in this case, I don't want to deepen the relationship at all. This has nothing to do with my neighbor's race and everything to do with his recent place on the registered sex offender list.

I've concluded that The Boy just must not see a lot of black folk. I think we need to change that because it kills me to think of my child excluding anyone, whether it's for reasons of race or otherwise.