The year was 1996. The Month was May. The day was the 26th. The time was 8:14 p.m. It was by far one of the happiest days of my life. I can close my eyes right now and relive the entire moment. On this day one of my favorite people in the world entered the world and I gave birth to him. It was my oldest son.
My oldest son is half Hispanic and half White. In that delivery room there were four other people present. The Lieutenant that delivered him, she was white. There was a Corpsman present to assist, she was Asian. There were two precious ladies that could have been anywhere else, yet they chose to stay in that room and hold my hand as I breathed through the pain. On an occasion or two they would tell me to calm the hell down. Of course that didn't go over too well. They were black.
Oh and I shall not forget the awesome person that drove me to the hospital. She was Mexican and still is Mexican. That hasn't changed.
Now why is the color of their skin or the race of my child even relevant? Well to me it doesn't matter. However if you would have told me four years prior to that moment that things would transpire as they did, I would say that you were crazy and I would sale you some ocean front property in Arizona.
You see where I grew up, I wasn't taught to hate people of a different color and I could mingle with them however at the end of the day I should stick to "my own kind." In other words this picture was painted for me that "my own kind" would be the ones that had my back. As a child you do as you are told and what you are taught is all that you know. I knew no different.
Thank God I left home at the age of 18. Thank God that I didn't stick to "my own kind." Because had I kept to what I had been taught then I would not have my precious son. Had I kept to what I had been taught I would have missed out a lot of awesome moments. Had I kept to not wanting to know anything different, I would have not tried new things. I would not have met new friends. I would not have tried new foods.
And mostly...... I would have been ALL ALONE in that delivery room.
Because guess what, "my own kind" was no where to be found.
All races have people in them that make you wonder if they have half the brain that God gave a billy goat. Being an idiot does not show prejudice.
It is tragic that so many people miss out on great things because they are closed minded to other people because of their race and stereotypes. At the end of the day you can peel back the skin and we are all made the same. We all feel, we all love and we all hurt.
I am forever grateful to those two precious ladies that stayed and held my hand for the 24 hours that I was in labor. I am more grateful that they decided in my moment of need to not stick to "their own kind."
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