Well, I'll be!

We're Unitarian Universalists, my husband and I. By tradition, UU's didn't have church over the summer. But our people want to come. There's a minister's dream! And so we are having services, but with a different theme: Colors.

Yesterday, the color was black. And the discussion was race distinctions and their influences in our lives. A friend and one of the leaders of the group grew up in my home town. Because of his mother's clever planning, he never knew that he was "different" because he had been born brown. And his disclosures triggered painful memories in me.

Racial discrimination was The Way Of Life in our town. People didn't speak about it, but they practiced it. As children, we didn't know there was prejudice. I came up against it hard when I was seven.

I was going to have a birthday. My mother had promised me a party with all the bells and whistles: lunch out at a favorite restaurant and a movie afterward, a major big deal in those days.

Mom sent me to school with the request that I choose 8 friends to invite to my party. That was easy. I came home with my list and gave it to my mother.

As she checked off the names, she paused at one name she did not know. "Who is Marie," she asked. "A friend in my class," I said. Somehow, Mother knew that Marie was black. How would she navigate this delicate topic with me?

She didn't bother. She said simply that I could choose either the entire birthday extravaganza with my friends, or I could have Marie over to our house by herself.

I wanted that party. I couldn't understand the new rules, but I knew which option seemed more pleasant. Mother said I must tell Marie the next day that there would be no party. I did.

What a kaleidoscopic array of betrayals: mine, Marie's, Mother's! Mother was afraid of many things, not the least of which was public opinion. What would happen if her friends saw us with Marie? The fear was enough to make her willing to inflict on Marie and me its bitter fruit.

There are some who believe that the worst behaved people are really older souls who have agreed to help you learn something you need to know. I'd like for that to be true in my mom's case. Knowing little, I still knew that my mother was wrong, and that has made a real difference in my life. As I grew, I knew better than to take on my parents' prejudices. It has been important to me to get to know all kinds of people instead of taking others' opinions of them as fact.

And oh, the richness that has come from that decision! Thanks, Mom.