Blonde with blue green eyes, my obvious Caucasian ten year
old son still believes in Santa; barely, he pushes more each month on this
topic. He lives a more privileged life than many in this country, however not
overindulged. He has been raised so far to appreciate what he has and to be
himself. He understands each person is unique and to be compassionate of
differences. He tells me every chance he can about his dreams of playing
professional soccer, being a pilot, or going to the moon. He is by all
definitions a child, to which no other word compares. I do not have to look
back at pictures to see how much he has grown and changed, yet he is still a
child. I do not have to think about him starting junior high next year, yet he
is still a child. Children are innocent, children are pure, children are by no
better word or phrase children.
When you close your eyes and think of children most would
describe playgrounds, the sounds of laughter, and the feelings of deep hugs. I
close my eyes and see my children, yet as of last week one of those children
has lost a piece of innocence. He has grown up and faster than my heart was
ready for. He is not upset by what caused him to grow up so quickly. In my
eyes, it is the sadness of a mother and her heart to know that he by the mere
conversation we had to have is no longer a child. He is no longer part of an
innocent children’s world. He is now a part of the adult world. The world that
is not always fair and just where the greatest concern is about playing four
square tournaments or finishing your homework.
My brain may have been ready for the conversation, but my
heart was not. Fall was in the air and a slight chill took that morning by
storm. I felt the cold that hit my face as my daughter opened the door and each
took steps to go towards the car. My son stopped, turned around as I began to
take a step and reach for the door and said the words that have now forever
changed the world that I can pretend he should forever live in. “Mom, what is a
n-i-g-g-e-r?” He spelled it out. The cold felt much colder and the feelings of
innocence for his world left my heart. “Where did you hear that?” I asked. “I
didn’t hear it, I read it.” He proudly
replied and showed me the book he checked out from his school library and
pointed to the word. With every syllable and explicit letter pronunciation I
did my best to hide the internal fear growing inside me for what I should and
needed to now say.
He had no notion to what he was asking. He had no fear or
preconception about the implications the words drew upon me. I drew a deep cold
breath and told him we would talk about it after his sister got out of the car
at school. I now had a very short few miles to get my thoughts and feelings
together. Out went my first grader on her side of the school and around we
pulled into the other parking lot where I pulled into a spot and put into park.
“Why are we parking?” he asked. “So we can talk about the word you asked
about.” I said. “Oh okay,” he nonchalantly replied. Innocent to the word,
innocent to the feelings, and innocent to the loss a mother was now feeling as
she began to describe a word that changed how he now was viewed to her.
You see, as a fifth grader he has learned about slavery, he has learned about the civil rights movement, and the farm laborer movements. He knows the importance of Rosa Parks, Cesar Chavez, and that Christopher Columbus was no hero. What he does not know are the privileges he holds because of the color of his skin and why one word, two syllables, alters now the world I feel he lives in. We discussed the cultural implications to the word. I said the word out loud and tried not to hang my head. I explained where it came from and how it is used today by differing people and why he may be confused about hearing it from his African American friends or in songs as he grew. To him, it was another example of how the world had changed. To his mother, it was the defining moment that the world she wanted him to live in, the world she saw him in, full of innocence and purity had changed.
As a Caucasian child and a Caucasian mother I could only hope he made the right choices in his future about use of the word and others like it. However my heart sank that those were choices that he would have to make, and as a mother, what I really wanted, was the innocence in his world to stay intact. He is growing up. He is no longer my baby. However, I wish his world was as simple as it is when he is on the soccer field and his greatest challenge is figuring out who is open and who he can pass the ball to so it can be put into the back of the net. Now I realize that the challenges begin to counteract the hate and foster the love, so he continues to pass the ball to whoever is open and can put it into the net, instead of being a ball hog or even worse ignoring the open man on the sideline.
