Goldilocks

The NYC subway ridership is a melting pot. If you want diversity, ride the train.

Rush hour starts when school lets out. I'm on the subway, going to a meeting. My kids aren't with me. They are old enough to travel home by themselves.

The subway is doing a brisk business but is not too crowded yet. I have a seat.

A mom enters the train with a little girl. She's about three years old. She has blond hair, very light skin and blue eyes. Her hair erupts in a million perfect curls, so platinum that they are almost white.

The atmosphere in the subway car shifts.

All of the adults on the train notice. Moms with kids of their own smile. Some people exchange delighted glances. Grandmothers get all crinkly eyed and grin, missing teeth and all. Some really maternal types catch her eye and wave or blow kisses. Fathers and grandfathers aren't immune either.

The little blond girl is a big hit.

Many - most - of the people smiling, buzzing and happy to see the blond girl have kids with them. The kids are of are all different ages. Some are babies. Some are toddler aged, like the blond child. Some are older.

All of the other kids are brown.

Their skin color ranges from creamy caramel to coffee, from mahogany to hot chocolate.

Their hair is dark and ironed straight, poofy, frizzy, curly, cropped short or kept long. One little girl has fancy cornrows with colored beads attached. There's an Afro.

Nobody seems to notice the brown children. Not with this girl on the train. She has surpassed all of the other children.

The brown children do not elicit a bad response. They are invisible. No one's face gets all scrunchy when they walk onto the train. No one is whispering about their curls.

As a human, I do not like being taken for granted. If you treat me like chopped liver, I bristle. I turn this over in my mind.

The blond girl and her mother exit the train. Everything quickly goes back to normal.

I hope that the brown kids didn't notice. My gut says some of them did, even if words weren't involved. It might be experienced differently than that.

My mother-in-law was born in 1932. She told me she hated Shirley Temple.

I've seen pictures of my mother-in-law as a child. She was adorable. She grew into a radiantly pretty young woman. When I knew her, her smile could light up a room.

She was Jewish. Shirley Temple made her feel ugly. That's what she said.

I think about the light-skinned blond girl and all of the other kids for the rest of the ride home. When I get off the train, my mind goes to other things. But while I'm still sitting there I feel like an idiot.

You might also enjoy:

Seats At Starbucks

I Only Buy Stuff From Nice People

Now I Understand

What To Say

I like going to parties. I like to meet new people. After a bit of back and forth, the person I have just met asks what I do. I'm not upset about it. I do the same thing.

For 15 years I had something crisp to say. I'm a freelance still life photographer. I work for magazines, design firms and ad agencies.

Then that line of work no longer fit.

For another several years, I worked for another photographer. He shoots these exquisite portraits and I helped with the behind the scenes work.

My what do you do conversations became a bit more complicated. It wasn't as tidy. It became a tangent of this work, taking care of my kids and various volunteering.

Then I stopped working for money. I work very hard. Just not for a paycheck.

All children need their parents. Some kids need extra.

Because of this, I have an impressive laundry list of skills. I enjoy doing these things a lot, and feel a deep sense of competence. At some point, I may promote these skill sets and start a business. That business will have a name and a short description. Then it will be easier to talk about myself at parties.

This is a possible plan for the future. It doesn't do anything for me now.

If someone asked me today, I could say that I am amassing skills that I plan to monetize later. That actually sounds pretty good. I might even say that the next time I meet someone.

I am reading a book. There is nothing to say except that this book is incredible. Right after I started it, the author, Ta-Nehisi Coates won a McArthur Grant. The name of the book is BetweenThe World And Me. I consider it required reading for everyone.

There is a part of the book that had resonance with me in a way I didn't expect. For most of the book I am being schooled about racism and things I don't already know on account of my being white. This one small piece took me in a different direction.

Ta-Nehisi Coates is at a party. People ask him what he does. He said that he's trying to be a writer. Then later in the book he feels entitled to just say that he is a writer. He gets rid of the trying part - somewhat tentatively. That is how I remember it anyway.

Ta-Nehisi Coates and I have lived very different lives. My white privilege follows me everywhere. That is mostly what I think about when I think about this book.

But I also think about that one little part. This author would probably be surprised but he sort of helped me out with the party question.

Not everyone who gets asked the party question feels confident in the answer. It always feels like everyone else has something compact and easy to say. But that isn't so.

I wear a lot of hats. But I also do one hell of a lot of writing and photography. I'm seriously prolific even though I am not holed up somewhere at an artist colony. I'm writing this while multitasking.

I can say that I'm a writer and a photographer. Or at least trying to be. Or the other thing about amassing skills and monetizing them later.

You might also enjoy:

The Hatchet Job

Letting People Get Used To Me

Welcome To Holland