I’m going to suggest an odd thing on the heels of all this pent up racial strife that’s exploding, once again, on our TV screens and even in some of our neighborhoods…

And that is…

to be thankful…

that the underlying thing…

behind all this…

in fact…

exists.

Not racism, dummy!

Race…

Or, the simple fact of life that some of us…look…and do…different.

Imagine, for a moment with me, a world without race.

Without that difference.

Without the color, or the culture, or the creative rhythms that they give birth to.

There would be no…

Michael Jordan, or

Michael Jackson,

or even The Rolling Stones (inspired by Muddy Waters).

Perhaps The King himself would never have shaken nor shimmied his way into the living rooms of shocked white parents.

There would be no…

Morgan Freeman, or

Denzel, or

Maya Angelou.

Break dancing perhaps wouldn’t exist.

No one would’ve ever hipped or hopped.

or, bebop’ed.

We’d never have had the chance to, “say hey, Willie.”

There never would’ve been an Ali…

to float like a butterfly…

and sting like a bee.

There’d never even have been that man,

who had a dream.

What a tragedy the world would be…

without race.

So, let’s be thankful for race…

Because, being thankful for what is…

can help us get rid of what should not be…

Racial inequality…

and racial hatred.

Imagine a world without race…it would look a whole lot different, wouldn’t it?

Race without the ism…well, it’s a wonderful thing.

Imagine a world without race…

and then be thankful that we don’t live in it.

 

image credit: Cabrillo.HWY via Compfight cc