George

George was his first name.  I never knew his last.  He worked days and I worked nights and weekends, so our lives didn’t overlap much.  We were “Merchandise Handlers” at JCPenney’s. Unload trucks full of JCPenneyisms and fill up the loading dock.  Be lord and sovereign of the freight elevator, cardboard bailer and back stockrooms.  Crawl into the pitch black, downward slopping trash compactor and unclog it like OSHA didn’t exist.  Shoot down lost helium balloons with a slingshot and paper clips before the night shift ended so they wouldn’t set off the burglar alarms as they floated down after the store closed. 

Juggle rolls of packing tape.  Load customer cars.  Tie entire dinette sets to the truck, roof and hoods of AMC Matadors with the most outlandish of knots and take bets on whether they’d make it out of the parking lot.  Assemble and repair stuff.  Be especially charming, to no avail, to the bevy of young women in or just out of college who were Jacque Penee’ colleagues.  It wasn’t quite as lucrative as the stockboy gig at the liquor store, but it was a solid high school job.  At least I didn’t smell like beef tallow since moving on from McDonalds at the age of fourteen, citing “no room for advancement” on the exit interview form.

So, George was his name.  He was a giant of a man; 6’6” and well over 250 pounds.  He’d be the biggest guy in any room you were in, unless you were in a Division 1 or professional football locker room.  You couldn’t miss him.  Nice guy, too. 

I had just arrived for the evening shift and a customer wanted to know where parcel pick-up was, and who to see about picking up his new television.  I gave the simple directions; down this aisle, turn right, go to the end and turn right again.  There will be a guy there who I’ll bring it to, and he’ll load it into your car for you.  Big guy.  You can’t miss him.

I grab the television out of the stockroom, make it through all the back corridors and deliver it to George at parcel pick-up.  Go on about my work and about ten minutes later the new tv owner comes looking for me.  “Hey kid”, the guy says, “I must have gotten lost, can you give me directions again?”  “Sure”, I say, “down the aisle, turn right, go to the end and turn right again.  It ends at parcel pick up.”  “Are you sure?” the guy asks.  “Um, yeah” I say.  The guy says, “Well, I did that, but when I got to the end, there was just some black guy sitting at a desk in what looked like a small stock room.”  “Big guy”, I ask?  “Yes”, the guy says.  “You found it.  That’s George”, I say.

“Why didn’t you tell me he was black”, the guy more says than asks.   In part, because I never thought to.  In part, because racism is among the most enduringly stupid of learned human behaviors.  In part, because I described him as “big guy, you can’t miss him” which was more than enough to pick out the ONLY person in the room.  Why the heck should I be describing someone by the color of their skin?   

Some years later, I’d be at the Chicago Math and Science Academy with a bunch of Davenport officials.  CMSA is located in the neighborhood I grew up in in Chicago; Rogers Park.  It was great to be home, if only for an hour as we toured the school.  It’s an impressive little school with impressive results, but one impression stuck with some of my fellow Iowa travelers.  There weren’t any two kids who looked anywhere close to being alike and so they asked about demographics.  One of the CMSA officials said Rogers Park was the most diverse neighborhood in America.

I’ve since tried to verify that statement, to no avail.  But it rings true.  The Chicago of my youth was a brazenly segregated city, but I never figured that out until I left, because my neighborhood was the gooiest of melting pots.  My classmates and friends were a kaleidoscope of ethnicities and I just thought that was normal.  It wasn’t until I got dropped off at a nearly all white orphanage that I even understood what racism could be.  I arrived there about the time when boys enter their Lord of the Flies phase, so I just chalked up the stupidity to being in a stupid place, at a stupid time.

It is quite the stupid place America has been this past week.  I’m guessing it’s all the more stupid on full throttle television, and that Mr. “why didn’t you tell me he was black” has his own opinion on these life and times.

Here’s mine.  The human race needs to get over itself, and it can best start by setting tribalism out with the trash.  Let’s leave it at Cubs / Cards, Giants / Dodgers, Yankees / Red Sox, Honda / Yamaha, Mustang / Camaro, Tastes Great / Less Filling.  Which is to say; stuff that really doesn’t matter. 

Skin color is genetic.  Genetic.  The same as hair color, or eye color.  Would you draw your gun on someone with blue eyes, but not green eyes?  Would you shoot someone with brown hair, but not blond hair?  Particularly if you are a Second Amendment enthusiast, try to be a little less proud of your hand-held firepower and a little more aware of your implicit biases, before they become explicitly life-ending. 

Because – and this important – this nation not only deserves better, it may be the human race’s last chance.  This is supposed to be the place where we welcome all who are committed to the ideals of life and liberty.  Where we strive to perfect a by, for and of the people union free from hatred and persecution.  A life made better each day by industriousness, merit and content of character, and only enriched by the kaleidoscope of color and culture.  This is the place where that is supposed to happen. 

Beginning April 19, 1775, more than a million have given their last full measure such that it could be.