It's Memorial Day in America, and I did what we do so well; fry meat outside surrounded by loved ones and engaged in pleasantries. I was apart of what politicians like to call "Main Street" or the preverbal heartland of our country, where simple folk live and life isn't too complicated (Think the Andy Griffith show). It was in Fairfield, Connecticut and I shit you not, their is a street called "Main Street" and a parade happened their earlier today. I hail from what America likes to refer as Wall Street where we over indulged Liberal hippies are destroying American values I feel like I can attribute that to Sarah Palin, without actually having to check if she said that (I feel like I should throw in a GETTERDONE for good measure). Women generally have low standards, alcohol consumption is high, crime is high, schools are lacking and police brutality runs rampant (see: stop and frisk). So why do I stay you ask? Why not move to Main street where my son and his best friend can go fishing in the local pond, while simultaneously inflicting shenanigans on the harmless town residents? Main street lacks what Wall Street has, and thats the ability to create whole persons.
I will get a lot of what CIA agents like to call "blowback" for my above comments, but I believe it and can argue it fairly strongly. I was tasked with the all important mission of purchasing a recently depleted condiment; Ketchup! While on my journey to the local stop and shop I was starkly reminded of my blackness. Yup, I went there, I realized my difference and how I stuck out like a sore thumb. Literally every other shopper in the store was white, except the people working the cash register and pushing carts around outside, there at least some minorities could be found. I strolled around the isles in a wanton fashion just surveying the local populace and my initial thought, as it usually does, proved correct. Their weren't any black shoppers and to all my friends with B.S's instead of B.A's I do realize this was an isolated incident and doesn't constitue an actual study. It was revealing nonetheless and made me uncomfortable, in Wall Street I rarely am surrounded by so much homogeny and their is always such a diverse cast of characters It's not a pretense that comes to mind. I feel that I have to disclaim that I was not treated in any unusual fashion or made to feel uncomfortable by anyone in particular, quite the opposite actually, while picking out the ketchup in the isle a lady asked me if I have ever had "spiced" mustard and if I like it.
simply stated homogeny isn't ideal to making a whole person. I was gonna say it in some fancy shmansy verbiage something like "isn't conducive to fostering empathetic growth" but I recently came across a Yeat's quote (and yes I created an instance for me to share the quote with you) "Think like a wise man, but communicate in the language of the people" and i'll go with the "whole person". Wall Street forces me to understand different cultures and perspectives on the world, which in turn forces me to think about the world differently and it seeps into everything I do. You can extrapolate everything else from that such as Main Street's lack of diversity is creating a generation of automatons lacking in all cultural nuances that they will later seek on parent funded visits to Europe (yes I'm salty my parents couldn't afford to send me summering in Europe) while Wall Street has those nuances built in. But alas As I am constantly reminded I'm young and Idealistic maybe when I get some money and age I will move to the Main Street too, I would like to think I wouldn't though. In the meantime currently reading nonsense science fiction, listening to "nuthing but a G thing baby" and saw the Star Wars into Darkness which I would recommend. I, too, am America.
