the darker side of heritage....
Last night, Roger and I attended the Winter Pops Concert at Claire and Grace's Christian High School. It was a fun even that celebrated the decades of music from the 1920's to the present...and the kids dressed up......band, orchestra, choir.....it was such a great concert. We are so unbelievably blessed to have commitment to fine arts as well as sports in our little rural community. My mom came to care for the rest of the kiddos so that Roger and I could actually sit and experience the show. Thanks, Nana. I would never want to live somewhere you are not......
One of the soloists of the night had his moment to shine, and perform.....in costume, and did a great job. I know this boy.....I've known him for a long time. He is a hard-worker and his are as well......he works at a local fast food place and manages being super smart and talented with making money at a minimum wage, teen ager job.....he is a very respectable kid. As I watched him perform, my mind drifted to someone he used to work with at the fast food place. She is a young girl with a baby and she comes from a different kind of family and doesn't play in the band or have access to costumes for a performance. These two young people have worked side by side.....and yet they come from such markedly different places and have very different lives. At face value, it is easy to judge both. One came from privelege and opportunity and is flourishing....the other came from brokenness and hardship and is struggling.....and in the moment that I sat in the audience last night I realized something. If the babies had been switched in the hospital and had grown up in different families, their night last night may have been just the opposite. She may have had the solo. He may have been down and out on the streets......we are who we come from.
The families that raise us influence who we become. Grace is from South Korea and her experience is far different than one of Claire's friends who was adopted from South Korea as an infant and lives a life of priveledge and advantage with white parents.....in my own home, my black children will enjoy an easier journey than other black kids in America in the near future....because white privelege from their parents says so. Its hard stuff. It's not pretty. It is true.
One of the soloists of the night had his moment to shine, and perform.....in costume, and did a great job. I know this boy.....I've known him for a long time. He is a hard-worker and his are as well......he works at a local fast food place and manages being super smart and talented with making money at a minimum wage, teen ager job.....he is a very respectable kid. As I watched him perform, my mind drifted to someone he used to work with at the fast food place. She is a young girl with a baby and she comes from a different kind of family and doesn't play in the band or have access to costumes for a performance. These two young people have worked side by side.....and yet they come from such markedly different places and have very different lives. At face value, it is easy to judge both. One came from privelege and opportunity and is flourishing....the other came from brokenness and hardship and is struggling.....and in the moment that I sat in the audience last night I realized something. If the babies had been switched in the hospital and had grown up in different families, their night last night may have been just the opposite. She may have had the solo. He may have been down and out on the streets......we are who we come from.
The families that raise us influence who we become. Grace is from South Korea and her experience is far different than one of Claire's friends who was adopted from South Korea as an infant and lives a life of priveledge and advantage with white parents.....in my own home, my black children will enjoy an easier journey than other black kids in America in the near future....because white privelege from their parents says so. Its hard stuff. It's not pretty. It is true.
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