Ice Cream Social

I'm surprised I didn't blog about this yesterday, when it happened, but I'm glad I didn't. I was too worked up about it. So even though it was one of those, "Oh, this is going in my blog!" moments, it's probably good that I slept on it before posting.

Anyway, here's what happened:

We headed to Bruster's for ice cream around 7pm Saturday night. Even though it was getting dangerously close to the kids' bedtime, and despite the fact that getting their shoes on and getting them in the car was yet another big battle, I was in the best of spirits. We all were. We love us some ice cream.

Once at the shop, we stepped into line and began discussing what we'd get. The line wasn't outrageously long, but we still had about ten minutes to stand and wait, with the kids getting more and more hyper by the second. They were dancing, singing, practically bouncing on the pavement, and I was doing my best to keep them out of the other customers' way. Suddenly, a middle-aged black man grabbed my elbow and asked me to step out of line.

"Excuse me, young man. I'd like to talk to you about something." I first did the, Who, me? gesture, and looked around like me might be talking to someone else. Be he continued to pull me away from Alecia and the kids.

He had me confused from the get-go. At first, I thought he might be trying to sell me magazines, as he had a pamphlet of some kind in his hand, and that's a frequent occurrence in our neck of the woods. Then I noticed the pamphlet was actually a menu from J.R. Crickets, the restaurant next door. He was also wearing a red, short-sleeved polo shirt, so my next thought was that he worked at the restaurant and wanted me to sample something, or maybe participate in some promotion. But I didn't see any food to taste. What was going on, here?

Imagine how confused I was when he told me, in dead earnestness, "I noticed that you pulled your girls away when you saw me coming. Because I'm a black man. I wanted to let you know that they see what you're doing. They'll learn from that."

This guy could've walked up and told me he was an alien from the planet Bloobah, and I don't think I would've been more stunned.

I told the man that I had no clue what he was talking about, that I'd never seen him before in my life. I asked him where this happened. I was trying to think of any possible moment I could've done something like that since arriving. The only thing I could think of is when I told Maddie to stop and take my hand when we got out of the car. I said, "Are you talking about when I grabbed my daughter's hand before crossing the parking lot?"

He said, "No, it wasn't in the parking lot."

I was lost. "Well, we didn't go anywhere else. I have no clue what you're talking about--we got out of the car and came straight here. We've been in line ever since. Where did this happen?"

He didn't see the need to explain, I guess, because he moved on to his bigger point. "Sir," he said, "I just thought it was my duty to come and talk to you. Because if you're that way, they're going to see that and they're going to grow up to be that way. Do you understand?"

I was still absolutely confused, but I'm not an idiot. I knew what he was getting at. "Yeah, I get it. 'Don't teach the kids to be racists.' But you have it all wrong, buddy. What you think you saw didn't happen. I swear, I've never seen you before in my life."

The guy started in again, as if I didn't understand his point. "Little kids see everything," he said. "And they'll learn from that. I just wanted to tell you, so you know."

"Well I'm telling you, you are way off base," I replied. I put my hand on his shoulder. For some reason, I felt it was absolutely imperative that I touch this guy. Like he'd then say, Oh, he's being physically affectionate. He must not be a racist!

I was sort of half laughing now, out of nervousness, but also because of the sheer insanity. "I assure you, it just didn't happen," I said. I was very careful about not saying, "It's all in your head." I worried it would be the same thing as saying, "You're fucking crazy!" And I wasn't trying to be confrontational.

"Maybe it's just perception," he countered. "But it looked like that to me. And if the kids see that..." I cut him off, not wanting him to get started again.

"There was nothing to see, sir. I'm sorry, but you got the wrong idea."

The man said, "Okay, then. I just thought I should come over. No problem, then." He shook my hand, and I shook his. I think I told him to have a nice night. He headed off, leaving me shell shocked.

As he walked away, I mumbled to myself, "That was so random." A lady immediately in front of me heard me and enthusiastically said, "But you handled it well!"

I'm not sure I did. And I had plenty of time to think about it that night.

That conversation wasn't just random, it was one hell of a buzz kill. First off, it was embarrassing. The guy accused me of being racist in a crowd full of people. And when he left, I felt like I needed to convince them all I wasn't. That he was imagining things. I felt like everyone was looking at me and silently judging.

Alecia actually looked near tears when the guy turned and walked away. I suspect she, too, was embarrassed, but also probably a little scared that something worse almost happened. She had a kid's hand in each of hers, and was about to lead them to the car. "Come on, guys, we're going to get our ice cream somewhere else tonight."

I wasn't having any of that. We came to get ice cream at our favorite ice cream shop, and I wasn't about to let that guy ruin it for us. "It's okay," I told her. "He's gone. Let's just order."

The incident stayed with me for hours. I couldn't stop thinking about it. Alecia and I took the kids to a pet store to look at some fish after leaving Bruster's, and all the while, I kept randomly saying things like, "Maybe he was talking about when I called the girls over to ask if they wanted a Dino Sundae?" Or, "Did we do something by the car? Maybe he was parked by us." I was examining everything I could remember about our evening, trying to find the supposedly racist incident. I still can't figure it out.

Later, I started to get mad about the whole thing. This guy accused me of something pretty serious in front of a group of random strangers. He felt the need to publicly humiliate me for something that was all in his head. He couldn't have pulled me further away? Couldn't have tried to tell me in confidence? No, he was intent on letting everyone know my supposed problem. Did he ever think that he could be wrong? Did he ever think I could just be a parent who doesn't want his child getting too far out of reach? I'm constantly corralling Maddie and Josie in, and two seconds later, they're wandering off again so that we have to repeat the process. Anyone with kids is very familiar with this dance. And even if he did think I saw him, what if I was just a parent who didn't want my kids wandering too close to a strange adult male? That's not so far fetched, is it? Does it have to be a race thing?

I wasn't just mad that the dude had embarrassed me in front of people. I was mad that he made me feel guilty for something I didn't do. I may be a lot of things, but I'm no racist. And I shouldn't feel like I need to prove that in front of people. When he left, I felt like apologizing to the other people in line. I felt like pulling out all of the usual non-racist "references" (I have black friends! I'm an Obama supporter! etc.) and trying to get them to see I wasn't the villain this guy had portrayed me to be.

It was a shitty experience. It threw off my entire evening. And this guy probably went home with a sense of triumph, like he'd done his part to right society's wrongs. He threw out an accusation, then wandered off to leave me to deal with it.

You know the weirdest piece of fallout from this incident? While I won't try and say I'm completely colorblind, I really don't think about race when talking to a new person, black or white. I see people as people, and I don't think I ever treat someone differently based solely on his/her race. But that hasn't been true for the last twenty-four hours or so. For some reason, I've been treating any black person I've encountered since the ice cream shop incident with overwhelming warmth. I'm practically hugging every dark-skinned person I see. It's like that guy made me hyper-aware of every word I say and every gesture I use. And in an effort to prove that I'm a friend to African-Americans, I've been massively overcompensating. There are probably a handful of black residents of Cobb County that now think of me as that "creepy white dude" because of my totally random outpouring of love for them.

If it wasn't so over-the-top, I guess an increase in warmth would be the one positive thing to come out of this stupid experience. But as it is, I've probably just annoyed people.

Here's hoping I snap out of it soon and go back to being annoying to ALL races.