Terms of Endurance

I've thought a lot lately about the importance of race in our lives.

I'm (kinda) dating a guy who's equal parts Spanish, Greek, and Italian. Somebody warned me that this is the perfect storm of tempers, but in reality he's a pretty laid back guy. He's dark haired, dark eyed, but looks more Italian than anything. On date 2 he asked me if I spoke any other languages. I said "Some broken Spanish". He revealed that he was born in Spain.

This let out a giant mental sigh. I knew he was Spanish, but I thought he might be Mexican. Or Puerto Rican. Bear with me for a minute.

One of my parents favorite stories of me was when I was 3. A black friend of theirs came over, I walked up to him, licked my finger and rubbed his skin. And then I continued on my 3 year old way.

I didn't understand until the moment this guy revealed his heritage to me what a racial block I had when it came to relationships. I thought I was progressive. I thought I was a liberal person. But the fact that I was ecstatic that this man was "Spanish", rather than "Spanish speaking", disappointed me.

I just finished reading the John Mayer article in Playboy, and I followed people's comments on different websites. It upset me that so many people felt they needed to comment on the fact that he said "his dick was fucking david duke".

I read the entire article. I like JM. I met him outside a club once. He was completely stoned out of his mind. I was out having a cigarette (quit!), there was this guy standing outside by the wall. I said "Has anyone ever told you that you look like John Mayer?"

He stared at me. His friends came over, we talked a bit. John never said a word, he just stared. I briefly toyed with the idea of trying to hook up with him, and then I walked away. He probably has absolutely no clue that I was there. This was about 7 years ago, WELL before he was as famous as he is today. But even then, he had something about him. That great thing. That "I don't care what the world thinks of me, I am." But that might have been the pot.

Bottom line, race needs to stop being such a part of our lives. I wish instead of color, God would have given us something indicating whether or not we were good people. Like the US terrorist levels.


Orange - nasty
Yellow - having a good day, but need more coffee
Green - probably going surfing
Blue - definitely going surfing. hang at my house, dude