Posted on 09/08/2002 8:50:52 AM PDT by Chi-townChief
Sometimes the only way to understand how another person feels is to walk in his or her shoes. Recently, Jimmy (and I'm not giving his last name for reasons that will become clear later), a white reader, inadvertently stepped in the shoes most black people walk in every day.
Before I get to his story, though, I need to tell you a little something about Jimmy. At age 32, he probably means it when he says he has black friends. He grew up on the South Side of Chicago west of Western, the imaginary boundary line that 20 years ago separated white homeowners from black homeowners.
Jimmy went to Bogan High School, where he met a lot of black football players, he said, because the wood shop teacher was also the football coach. From time to time, Jimmy would even cross Western Avenue to go to parties.
"Western used to be our dividing line," Jimmy says. "But I remember going to a party once, and this black dude was looking at us like what are [they] doing here? I thought we were going to get our butts kicked. But my friend stepped in. Most of the people there were really cool to us."
He also appears to be the kind of guy who has some degree of racial sensitivity. For instance, he says whenever he travels through small towns, he is turned off by the bold display of Confederate memorabilia.
"We went down to Myrtle Beach, and everywhere we looked we saw the generals of the South. It was like let's go fight the Civil War all over again. I wanted to say: Get over it. You lost. They are free, and it's over," he said.
Still, Jimmy couldn't really understand when his black friends complained about bigoted behavior until his vehicle was hit by an Italian driver in a predominantly Italian neighborhood.
This is what Jimmy says happened:
I was at my father-in-law's house in Melrose Park. We went there to marinate a pig because we were going on a camping trip. We were just getting ready to leave when someone pulled up on the front lawn. They pulled up in the driveway where my van was, then the driver proceeded to back out and slammed into the side of my van. I ran out of the house as they were pulling off. I had to jump in front of the car to stop them.
The driver of the vehicle was his father's 83-year-old neighbor. He had three women in the car, who Jimmy guessed had to be in their 70s. Jimmy was trying to tell them that they had hit his van, and the driver was yelling at him in Italian.
"You hit my van. Give me your insurance card, your driver's license or something," I said. They kept pointing at his license plate and yelling. "Why are you people yelling at me?" I asked. "You hit my car."
Apparently, communication broke down rather quickly.
"The women started poking at me. They were obviously from the old country because when I told them I was p-----, they kept sticking their fingers in my face, and one lady tried to slap me."
At this point, Jimmy said he told his mother-in-law to go inside and call the Melrose Park police.
"Five minutes later, the police come flying up. They sent three squad cars and a motorcycle cop. The first policeman at the scene was listening to me, but then another cop comes up and grabs me.''
"Just do me a favor," the officer said.
"Sure," I said.
"You need to shut up. You need to just shut your mouth," he said.
I was stunned. I have never felt that way probably since I was 10 years old and being punished and yelled at by my father. I didn't do anything to have him talking to me that way. I could see it if I was belligerent, but I wasn't. He put me on my father-in-law's front porch. All the cops were looking at each other and hugging and shaking hands with the other four people. They were on a first-name basis. I was just sitting there, and no one said nothing to me. Instead of being police officers, they were acting like the guy's relatives."
Although Jimmy got a police report and the insurance information he needed, he couldn't shake off the anger.
"It just bothered me all weekend," Jimmy said.
"I can't get that officer out of my head yelling at me and telling me to sit down. Seeing what went on--all those Italians hugging and kissing. It was definitely favoritism. I bet that is how black people feel in a lot of instances," he said.
"I am Polish and white and have lived here all my life. That was the first time I saw things from a black person's perspective," he said. "I was treated like I was the bad guy and not the victim."
After the other driver pulled off (riding up on the curb for nearly half a block, Jimmy says) and the policemen left, Jimmy could slip his own shoes back on.
But they will never feel the same.
"It never hit me," Jimmy said. ''But after what happened to me, I told my wife: 'You know. I bet this is exactly how it is to be a black person in America.' "
E-mail: marym@suntimes.com
Evidently, Jimmy goes through life seeing people as ethnic stereotypes: "black dudes", "generals of the South", "all THOSE Italians (maybe Jimmy watches too many episodes of "The Sopranos); and Jimmy, of course, is "Polish and white."
It appears that Jimmy is still acting like he is 10 years old and needs to grow up before he has even worse problems.
Does this mean you won't be coming back down South again? Darn.
Funny thing is - I live in Tennessee, where a few of the biggest battles were fought - Shiloh, Lookout Mountain, Stones River, Franklin, Nashville...and I'm hard pressed to find any kind of memorial anywhere other than at the battlefield itself. But then, you also find memorials to the Yankee generals as well.
Maybe I should just do a reverse take on his attitude. Everywhere I look I see the generals of the North. It was like "we beat the South, and all we're going to do is keep rubbing it in."
Jimmy, it's like my mama always says - you don't like it down here? Delta has flights leaving every day.
Why doesn't Jimmy ask one of his black friends? What a fruitcake.
If what you say is true, why not actually find one of these "real" cases?
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