Growing up I adored the outside and spent most of my summer days in the sun. I loved to swim, ride bikes, and play with the dog. Working in the garden was a daily chore. I tanned so dark. My mother and older brother had very white skin; he even had red hair. My younger brother and I had black hair and dark skin. Many times in public, my mother was asked if we were adopted. I didn’t like my skin because I didn’t want people to think I was adopted,  because I wasn’t. I just looked different.

Bullied

In middle school (which we called Junior High), I was bullied. When I was in sixth grade, a group of eighth grade girls targeted me.They would call me names and shove me. In PE one day, the sixth-grade girls were doing an activity with the parachute as the eighth-grade girls sat watching. If you have ever played with the parachute, you know the game. The teacher called out “under the mountain”. We raised the parachute as high as we could, then twisted our bodies under it, pulled it down to the ground and sat on the sides. It forms a huge mountain. As we all sat underneath laughing, I began feeling the kicks. I slid away from the edge, but they kept coming. When we all came out from the parachute, I looked up at them in the bleachers, and they were laughing. I just couldn’t understand why. 

Days later, as I passed them in the hallway, one of them yelled, “Who is black? Your mama or your daddy?” Then I knew why they were picking on me. They assumed I was of mixed race, and they didn’t like that. Both my parents are white, but I have Native American on my mother’s side. So, technically if you look at my lineage you would see I am of mixed race.

Our Georgia kindergarten standards cover Martin Luther King Jr.  The school I teach at is predominately white. Each year as I read the watered-down story about his childhood, I watch the faces of my students. I see their confusion. “Why? Why won’t his dad (the Caucasian boy’s) let him play with Martin anymore?” I see compassion. “They hurt his feelings. He is sad.” I see anger. “They’re mean. I don’t like them.”

In the Eyes of a Child

What I see is how my kindergartners accept each other; not caring if their classmates have a speech impediment, dress in dirty clothes, are over weight, or wear an eye patch. They see these differences clearly and may ask, “Why do you talk like that, or why are you wearing that?” They ask, but they don’t care. I have found that at this age, most children are unaware of past racism or current racism, and are not aware of either side of the story.

But somewhere along the way, many people become prejudice. Children are born with pure thoughts, until they are tainted with the world’s hatred.

(Proverbs 22:6)  Start children off the way they should go, and even when they are old the will not turn from it.

We are all descendants of Adam and Eve. No matter the color of our skin, we are all equal in God’s eyes. There will be one heaven for us all, and we will all be perfect.