I had an interesting walk today. Some days when it’s hard for me to get going on my walk I tell myself, if you just walk a mile up to Speedway you can get yourself a cup of coffee. Then of course I have to walk a mile back. It helps to motivate me some days because I Loooooove coffee but have to restrict it because I have a minor heart condition and often suffer from insomnia. I try to keep it to 3-4 days a week and only in the morning so that it won’t contribute to keeping me up (I have been sleeping 7 hours a night lately!! woot-woot!).

Oh, so I’m out walking, got my headphones on, listening to my ipod. A car pulls up to me. It’s a white man (race is relevant to this, ok) and he rolls down his window, leans over and asks me if I want a ride. I say No and keep walking, I don’t stop because I am a woman, he’s a man, and could be a rapist/abductor/ax murderer for all I know, right. He continues to drive slowly alongside me, which makes me VERY nervous (I have been raped and attacked before) so I pull out my phone and say loudly, What do you want! I said No! He then says I’m sorry I didn’t mean to frighten you, I just see you walking all the time and it’s so cold today I just thought I’d offer you a ride since you don’t have a vehicle. I said I do have a car, I walk every day for exercise. Thanks for the offer, but just FYI women get attacked every day in this country, don’t you think I’d be crazy to get in a strange man’s car??? He said You have a point, I’m sorry again. Enjoy your walk.

So I exhale in relief, turn my music back on and keep walking. Then another car pulls into the driveway directly in my path. This time it’s a white woman, who rolls down her window and asks me if I want a ride. Oh boy. I said No thank you! and smile sweetly at her and begin to walk around her car. She then says Well I see you in the library all the time and see you walking, Do you need a ride somewhere? I know what it’s like not to have a car. I said No, this is my exercise, I walk every day for exercise. I do have a car, this is what I do for exercise, you know for health and weight and stuff. She said Are you sure? I said, Yes, thank you though. and I keep on walking.

Make it to the Speedway and out without further mishap. Then walked to my youngest son’s school. Dropped off his frield trip money, talked a bit with his teacher about walking and talked with another teacher about our older kids having jobs and stuff. She is a sweetheart. Then bumped into a white mom I slightly know who mentions she sees me walking all the time and tells me how brave I am to walk so much in the cold. Then she says, I guess you do what you have to do. Sometimes I wish I had that cultural strength I see in black women, I don’t know if I could walk around in the cold if I didn’t have a car.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I said, excuse me??? She kind of blanched and then said, well I mean I thought you walked so much because you all didn’t have a car, and I know you used to live in Cleveland (to many folks in my town, the city fo Cleveland is viewed as one big slum), and I hear on tv (she actually said this!!) about being a strong black woman, so I thought….and she trailed off. I was so astonished, I kid you not, but I just laughed it off. I said Actually we do have a car, and actually I walk so much for exercise. You shouldn’t assume I don’t have a car because I am black and used to live in a less affluent area. And just so you know, for future reference, because many people would be deeply offended by what you just said, we are no ‘stronger’ than any other ethnic or racial group of women. But I appreciate your concern. Have a nice day! She then said I am so sorry if I offended you (if?! you fucking skunk!). I said I accept your apology! Good-bye!

OMG!

So I leave the school kinda salty and make it home, hoping to god I don’t get stopped yet again by some well-meaning but racially insensitive white person. I make it home, open my porch door with a sigh of relief, and what the fuck do I see right on the porch in front of the inner door? a GARBAGE BAG FULL OF WOMEN’S PANTS with a note attached. It is folded over, on the outside of the note it says For You. I play Schroedinger’s Cat for minute or two in my head, I tell myself what’s inside this note does not exist until I open the note. It is not a bad note, it is not a good note. Until I open the note, both states/possibilites exist. Somehow I just knew it was going to be something that would piss me off. I sigh. I open the note. It says, I see you walking all the time in those skirts. They are long but I am sure you also feel very cold and could use some pants. I felt called to help you out. Remember that Jesus Loves You. Have a Merry Christmas!

I read this note over several times. I turn it over, I examine the paper. I am astonished. I am puzzled. I feel queasy. Then the hilarity, the utter ridiculousness of the situation hits me and I begin to laugh. I laugh so hard I have to sit on my porch couch. I laugh so hard I feel pee twinges. I laugh so hard tears come to my eyes. This is so funny and strange on so many levels, but especially funny because me and the kids JUST LAST NIGHT watched Everybody Hates Chris, a show based on the young life of black comedian Chris Rock. In last night’s episode Chris’s white teacher asks the class to bring in food for the needy, and when Chris, the only black child in the class, says he’ll bring something in she tells him Oh no you don’t have to do that, I know things are rough for your people now. Then gives him food to take home and actually shows up at his house with food later!!! This show is set in the early 80s….here it is over 20 years later and I had something similar happen to me!! LOL!!!! I think my kids are going to die laughing at this, oh my word.

It is also funny because I JUST donated 8 bags of gently used name-brand expensive kids’ clothes and coats (my mother in-law buys clothes for the kids all the time) to Goodwill ON MONDAY! LOL! I also donated 2 bags of kid’s coats, new hats and gloves, and 2 bags of women’s clothes, one full of just pants to a woman’s shelter. I am trying to de-clutter my house and also finally learn to live even simpler than we do in preparation for moving into our straw bale house in 20 months. It will be much smaller space than we have now and everybody will only have room for a dresser’s worth of clothes in their room. So I’m in the process of purging all our closets and the basement and garage. LOL!

It is also funny because the pants are a SIZE 8!!!! LOL, LOL, LOL. I have a size 12 behind, ok. I guess my long skirts and bulky coat are hiding it quite well, ha ha ha. From the waist up I can see how somebody might think I’m a size 8 I guess. tee hee!

So I calm myself down and take the bag of pants and put them in the trunk of my car to take to goodwill later. A neighbor dropped by and cracked up when I told her about my walk and the clothes, then asked to see the pants. She said Hey these are nice, can I have them? I said Help yourself, I was just going to take them to Goodwill, I can’t fit them anyway. I tell her But even if I could, I’d be just like Chris’s mother and reject them on principle, LOL.

Ok, now race is relevant here. In the first 2 I didn’t think anything about it, that the white people in question were stopping me because I am black. I was puzzled why they assumed I didn’t have a car, because where I live most families have a a car because the public transportation is so sketchy, but when the 3rd white person said something about it and actually mentioned race it made me wonder about the 1st 2. And the person who actually left the clothes on my porch had to have seen my car in the garage, it was open. So why did they assume I was too poor to buy a friggin’ pair of pants? Actually I wear long johns or track pants under my long skirts because wearing 2 pairs of pants is uncomfortable. a long heavy skirt over a pair of pants or heavy leggings or long johns is ideal for me. and my skirts are heavy and thick, most of them I made out of jeans, so why would anybody think I was cold? OMG!

Race is also relevant because I see white people walking and jogging around my town all the time, some even in shorts still, so why is my walking seen as so strange and extraordinary? I highly doubt any of the white people who stopped me/commented to me today do the same with the white people they saw out walking or joging today. The assumtion is that I am walking because I am poor because I am black. If I were white, the assumption would be I am walking for exercise. I am tempted to make a sign to wear of my coat: I AM WALKING FOR EXERCISE. OMG!

I am trying to see a positive in this, that these white people felt concerned to offer me a ride and clothes. That they did it because they erroneously perceived me as a destitute black women does not take away from their good intentions, they meant well. I wish to god I knew who dropped off those clothes, though, I would tell them Lookie here, since you feel so called to help me and all, feel free to drop some ends on dis here gas bill, playa! Oh yeah and my student loan is due, help a sista out biz-nitch! Shoot, I’d talk all ebonic-y and even roll my neck and snap my fingers like the sterotypes they see on TV if they’d pay my student loans, LOL.

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