We are Falling Together not Apart

We are becoming more aware and full as our consciousness continues to expand.
That’s a difficult thing to do.
Growing is always hard.
I grew up in a Methodist family. It seemed like Lutherans were essentially the same as us. The Christians that spoke in tongues and baptized adults in local lakes and river seemed odd. Catholics, weren’t good. No one actually said that to me, but that’s what was implied.
Although I’d heard of them, I didn’t know any Jews or anything about the them aside from this strange notion that they were the chosen people, whatever that meant.
Muslims? I didn’t know that was a thing.
There were a hand full of black people in my school. Actually, most were biracial. One, that I know of, was adopted. As far as I knew, they were raised just like me, why wouldn’t they be? My grandpa called certain Christmas nuts, nigger toes. My first job, we were told, you can have Martin Luther King Day off, if you’re black. No one was. Black jokes were just as common as blonde jokes.
We knew a handful of Mexicans, they were cool. We had tacos once a week, but I didn’t like the hot sauce.
Russians were scary. They wanted to hurt us. We practiced hiding under our desks in case they tried.
I didn’t even know gay was a thing…
That pretty much sums it up.
Oh, we’d get Chinese food sometimes; Chicken Chow Mein and Egg Foo Young. I didn’t like it very much, but the fortune cookies were fun.
Maybe I represent an extreme, I’m not sure. I’m sure many people had more diverse upbringings than I did. But, I bet most of us wouldn’t have to go back many generations to find the cultural norm that I was raised with. I’m sure this continues to be the norm for many today.
I remember being jealous of friends who had gay friends. I wanted to be diverse. I also remember being called gay when I did have gay friends. It didn’t take long before I was overtly exclaiming that I liked girls to people I’d meet.
While a senior in high school, I remember referring to a person as mulatto and being harshly corrected. I didn’t know it was derogatory. It took me years to find out why.
Aside from Canada, I was 23 the first time I left the United States. I went to Cabo San Lucas. It was fun, but the ocean was cold. The Mexicans seemed nice. Honestly, I didn’t think about it much. I went to Europe for three months, a year later. Language and food were the biggest obstacles. This taught me to let go of very basic expectations and embrace the unknown. It was Central and South American countries that really opened my eyes. It took years to integrate everything I’d learned into any sort of cohesive understanding.
That growth process was difficult and challenging.
It took me years to see gays as no different than me.
I was forty when I met my wife. She was the first black girl I’d ever dated.
Actually, she’s biracial.
It was after our first date that I found out she’s Muslim.
It scared me.
That was hard for me to process. I didn’t have any overtly negative feelings regarding Muslims. Yet, the fear was real.
I’ll never forget, within minutes of the twin towers falling, I wondered what had we done to make someone so angry with us? That’s the way I see the world.
I typically tend to be empathetic. Possibly too much, I’m not sure.
Incidentally, this was another growth opportunity. This was the first time I realized my republican friends were saying, “How dare they do that to us!” Something entirely different than what my democrat friends were saying.  Albeit, the right wing reply was a reasonable response, but a distinctly different way of viewing the world. It was then that I realized, we both needed each other.
Growth…
It was 9/11 that inspired me to explore the darker side of the political arena. This is how I began to understand how convoluted and nefarious global politics can be.
Painful realizations, though I felt fuller because of it.
My consciousness expanded.
When Fatima prayed in front of me for the first time, it frightened me at a primal root level.
I hated this.
It was, and is, difficult to acknowledge.
It honestly took me years to detach the falling twin towers from her style of prayer, a practice of selfless gratitude.
Such is the power of media and the unconscious mind.
I’ve fasted with her for Ramadan four times. Before I met her, I’m not entirely sure I’d even heard of Ramadan. Ramadan forced me to surrender my wants and needs like nothing else. This wasn’t a community or social event for me. This was my hunger and thirst. I was the one who was tired and had to slow down, letting go of my wants and needs for an entire lunar cycle. I needed to learn to pace myself and let go of my desires. I did it to support Fatima, but this was no passive exercise. It’s not that simple. I can’t tell you how many times I would empathize with the Muslim stranger on the street knowing they were likely fasting as well.
These were difficult realizations that I had to fight hard for.
Again, I was richer and fuller, but it didn’t come easy.
Fatima brought me to Eid celebrations. Again, as dumb as I feel saying this, I was surprised that they were remarkably similar to the cultural celebrations I was raised with, aside from the different costumes and food.
People laughed and made meals, in which they took great pride.
Their homes were beautifully decorated.
Everyone wore clothes they were proud of.
Still growing…
Just this year, I was explaining Fatima’s heritage to my son and I told him she was African and Italian. My intent was to embrace her African heritage. My thought was, there is no sense muddying up her African-ness with any suffix. After all, I wasn’t German American.
Fatima corrected me, “Actually, black people in the United States don’t have the privilege of knowing our heritage because our ancestors were slaves. This is why we are African American not African.”
Still growing.
Still painful.
Still hard.
Think of how far we have come as a culture.
We are all infinitely richer and fuller than our ancestors.
Think about it.
Maybe you were a raised in an entirely different culture than me, but the bigotry and prejudice was likely there, at some point, somewhere. We are all the same.
We distrust the outsider.
We are fearful of what we don’t know or understand.
This amalgamation of multiculturalism and the struggle around it, is a global phenomena.
What we are experiencing is growing pains.
Letting go of the old.
Merging with the new.
Expanding our consciousness.
It’s hard.
It takes time.
Have patience.
Be compassionate.