Did you know in the Bible Moses was married to an Ethopian woman? Aaron and Miriam disagreed and criticized the marriage but in return, God was very upset with them for doing so.
When I was in the third grade, I remember talking about future husbands on the playground with my friends. We all told each other who we saw them marrying and then it came to me. “I see you getting married to a black guy”. I was a little shocked because that had never came to my mind. It wasn’t that I was opposed to the concept, it had just never came to mind. Now more than ever I think about that moment on the playground. Cliche, I know but I think about that moment now because I am in a relationship with someone of a different race. Yes he’s African American, but that’s not what matters. He’s intelligent, handsome, and he cares for me. Not only am I in an interracial relationship, but I am a product of an interracial relationship. My father, born and raised in Mexico, was authorized by Homeland Security to live and work in the United States and my mom is from Virginia, yet I still felt the tension from their relationship. Not the tension between the two of them, but from society.
It was during my first semester in college at UNC Pembroke that I met my boyfriend. It was mid-semester when we met, so we went on a couple dates to get to know each other, you know, the old fashioned way. We usually hung out in the Pembroke and Lumberton area where the atmosphere is more diverse than the average southern town. Having this environment made our relationship easy in the fact that we were accepted. We rarely, if at all, got second glances when we held hands or sat down in a restaurant on one of our date nights and when I introduced him as my boyfriend I didn’t get that look.
If you’ve ever dated someone of a different race and you live in the south, you know the look. It’s the “oh...I’m not sure how I feel about this” look. I get this look constantly whenever we go to his hometown or my hometown. Don’t get me wrong, I love my hometown and his has all the shopping malls, because shopping is important too, but there are some folks that just make you feel like you have a disease or something on your face because you’re with someone of another race.
In the beginning of our relationship, I used to be scared to even hold his hand at the local Walmart! Silly I know, but when people you’ve grown up with your whole life start looking at you like you’re the walking plague, it makes you feel awful. At first I was upset with myself for feeling this way. How could I feel so scared to be affectionate with someone who loved me so much and would do anything to see me smile? I beat myself up about this until I came to a cold hard reality. As we started dating longer and got closer, I started to realize it wasn’t that I was embarrassed or scared to hold his hand in public. I was scared about the judgement and treatment of others in society; we had both felt that way. I wouldn’t call it racism, because this situation isn’t on that spectrum; however, couples who are not the same race do get treated differently.
So my final question is, why? Why are couples treated so differently because their skin is a little yellower or darker? As long as they love and build each other up, color should be nonexistent.
