Just about me

talkingbreakfast:

digsyfinallyhasa:

coreybrown:

I remember the first time I felt absolute racism from a person I had a chance to say just a few words to. Before I get to that, I must say that I have seen and felt racism many times in my life, but I am extremely good at looking past it. My white grandmother was a racist, so you either get a thick skin growing up or you retreat into a shell of a human being. Watching her yell at black people doing crime on the news was pretty gross. She never directed it towards me because she learned to love me despite her horrible nature.

When I was around 19 years old I went on this date with this absolutely stunning girl named Leslie. It was one of those girls a dude is terrified to ask out because he doubts himself insanely. But I nutted up and asked, and shockingly she said yes. The night of the date I went to pick her up at her house. She opened the door and let me in. I then heard a nice voice shout from upstairs that we couldn’t leave yet because she had to meet me. She had heard a lot about me and was very excited. She came around a bend and stopped dead in her tracks and said “Oh, be home early.” This was the only communication I had with her. I told her that I would have her daughter home early, and then she vanished. I assumed she was doing something important she had to get back to, so I dismissed the oddness of the interaction. The date was amazing and we ended the date talking about future dates. All good things.

The next morning I was surprised to see that Leslie was calling me. As soon as I picked up the phone she told me that she was no longer allowed to see me. Not that she didn’t want to, but she was not allowed. The conversation was super short and I was just completely confused. I talked to some of her friends who informed me that her mother didn’t realize I was black because Leslie kept that from her. If she had known, the date never would have happened in the first place.

I guess I like to talk about this because I’m so happy that people like Brett can come out and share his experiences with being gay and accepting who he is. For someone like me, for the first 1/3 of my life I wished I had a way to hide what made me different. But you can’t hide the color of your skin. If your skin is different than the majority, you stand out pretty well.

New York has been a pretty awesome experience though. The UCB community welcomes everyone and we are blessed to have found this place. NYC and this community made me see that the world is changing and that nobody sees me as a minority here and I love it.

But months ago I sat next to this white woman on a very crowded train who immediately raised her voice and said “don’t you EVEN TOUCH ME.” I asked her if she was serious, which she said she was. Disgusted, I just stood up and moved away from her very confused. Until a very very butch woman, who I assume saw the exchange, sat right next to her, spread her legs wide and put her body all over the woman.

Just when you start to hate the world you can see that there is always someone who has your back.

This.

This both disgusts me (that you have had to go through that) but also makes me so happy (because of the bit about UCB). That’s how I feel about UCB. It really is the island of misfit toys in some ways. I was intensely bullied and depressed as a kid, and I felt really alone. That changed in high school and college, but then I came out to myself and those fears came back.

I legit moved to New York to find a woman. That is a thing that happened. That I thought. I even tentatively labeled myself bisexual through at least 401, even though I was dating men exclusively…and also didn’t like women outside of being able to acknowledge when one is pretty (sidenote: gay men love acknowledging pretty women!). I remember coming out to Jess (and possibly Katey?) by mentioning that I had to leave after the ASSSSCAT we were seeing (we went to ASSSSCAT after our 101 class almost weekly) to meet with the guy I was dating. I remember saying those words being hard, just like how saying any phrase that would out me was super hard back in 2006. But I was getting used to it.

I want to thank improv warm-ups for giving me a reason to come out casually to large groups of people, in ways that don’t call attention to me or make it a big deal.

Corey’s story is incredibly eye-opening and…I’m fascinated by the lenses we all see life through. This is important to share, and thanks for doing it, Corey. There is so much for all of to learn from each other, and I love that the UCB has become more of a melting pot. I don’t know how much of that is due to the diversity program, but I imagine a lot of it is due to it. So, great. Absolutely fantastic.

Got your back indeed.

Got your back!

Yes. Got your back(s).