Growing Up In the Race Divide (part 2)

Ironically enough, my first encounter with racism had to do with myself. Let me explain!
But, first, go back and read part one of this series.

I didn't get very many birthday parties when I was a kid. In fact, I got a sum total of two. The first one was during first grade. My mom actually gave me a party at McDonald's, which is probably something that I wanted to do because what kid doesn't want to do that? Okay, kids these days probably don't want to do that so much but, back in the 70s, it was a cool, new thing to do. The problem was that, due to the cost, I was limited to something like only five friends. Or four. Some small number. It meant making some hard choices as to whom to invite.

Three of the people were a given. Two of them, the boys, were my best friends all through elementary school. Well, that elementary school, at any rate. The other was a girl who would end being my longest running friend. Basically, she and I grew up together from kindergarten until we graduated high school. Of course, I didn't know that was going to be the case in first grade, but it says something, I suppose, that she was one of my best friends even then. All three of them were at that party.

There may or may not have been one other person there but, if there was, I can't remember who it was.

The issue, though, arose over the "last person" I invited.

I remember the discussion with my mother about whom I was going to invite. On the list were the three (or four) people who ended up coming, and I had one more person to go. I was conflicted. I could either invite Derrick, a black boy in my class at school and next in line on the "friend scale" after the people I had already invited, or I could invite Chris, a boy who had lived down the block from me before we'd moved and had gone to my school until he moved. He had been one of my close playmates for a couple of years, but I hadn't seen him since he left my school. Playdates weren't a thing back in 1977 so inviting him to my party seemed to be the only way to get to see him again. I ended up choosing Chris over Derrick.

That turned into a problem. Chris didn't show up to the party, so my mom wanted me to call Derrick to see if he could come because she had to pay for the guest whether there was a person there or not. So there we were at the party and my mom was telling me to call Derrick and also telling me about how upset Derrick had been not to be invited and that Derrick's mom had even called her and said that I didn't invite Derrick because he was black. Basically, my mom was shifting the racism comment onto me.

Of course, she hadn't told me any of this ahead of time. She waited until we were actually having the party. Evidently, she'd suspected Chris wasn't going to show because his mother hadn't RSVP'd, and my mom was upset about wasting the money. The problem is that I can't remember whom she'd wanted me to invite in the first place. I remember there being a discussion about it, but the only part I remember is that I wanted Chris to be at the party more than I wanted Derrick at the part because it had been close to a year since I'd seen him.

The party was... traumatic. The only thing I remember is being on the phone, listening to it ringing and ringing, and my mom telling me that I didn't invite Derrick because he was black. And crying. I was pretty horrified, too, at the thought that Derrick would think I left him out because he was black, which just wasn't true. And, of course, no one answered the phone. Because Derrick's mom had taken him to do something fun and special because he didn't get invited to my party. The party I can't remember.

I don't remember our friendship being the same after that, and I have always always felt bad about what happened over that birthday party. Sure, yeah, I know it wasn't my fault. I was barely over a hand old. But that doesn't change the emotion involved. In general, when they ask that question about things you would change in your past if you could, I don't have a lot of those things, but this is one. I would certainly go back and invite Derrick instead. If I'd known how important it was to him, I wouldn't have cared about Chris being there at all.

But I didn't know.

It was this relationship, though, that inspired the character of Derrik in "Christmas on the Corner." See, I did grow up in the South, and I did have black friends. Let me rephrase that: I had friends who also happened to be black, because I never thought of my friends in colors. They were just my friends. Derrik is a reflection of that dynamic and, I think, an important one. But Sam won't be having any birthday parties that Derrik doesn't get invited to.

Redneck Fun Part One (a Fair post)

The County Fair came through here recently. We try to go to the Fair every year although I'm not always sure why. It's way friggin' more expensive than it's worth, and the kids do their best to make it as unenjoyable as possible most of the time. But, still, every year, we forget about the pain of the previous year and drag ourselves out to it. We went twice this year: once to look at stuff and once for rides. I do have to say that the first trip, the trip to look at stuff, was quite a lot of fun.

Let me sidestep a moment. I grew up in the 70s. The 70s birthed a lot of weird things: disco, bell bottom jeans (really?), and cars smashing into each other. When I was a kid, we called the car thing "crash 'em up derbies." I never got to go to one. I did, however, own a couple of zip racer cars (one red, one blue) that blew up when they crashed into things. The hood and doors and stuff would fly off, and you could put them on so that they cars looked new or crashed. I loved those cars. Then we moved and the cars disappeared, so I think my mom probably trashed them, but, anyway...

There was a demolition derby at the Fair this year. Maybe there's always one; I have no idea. Somehow, though, the topic of the demolition derby came up between my kids and their grandparents which spilled over to us and my declaration of, "I've never been to one of those." I don't quite understand why these statements of mine generate the kind of "What? You've never..." reactions that they do, but that is what it is I guess. So, much like last year's "I've never been to Disneyland" generated a trip to Disneyland, this year's statement of "I've never been to a demolition derby" generated a family trip to see cars smash each other to pieces.

It was way more fun than I expected. And full of the kind of people I grew up with, which are not the kind of people you really associate with Sonoma County, but there they were. A whole stadium full of people chugging beer and... well, I don't know. It just felt like watching the people in the "beer garden" at Shreveport Captains games when I was in high school (because watching the people in the beer garden was usually more entertaining than watching the games). I have to say, though, that by the end, the big finale of the event, my wife and I were rooting just as loudly as anyone. Because, see, we'd bet each other which car was going to win.

Before I go on, how about some pictures of the event (because, yes, I took my camera (who's surprised?))?

The cars coming out for the first round elimination event.

Round 1 gets started.

Things start to heat up.

And I do mean heat up. That's smoke, not dust.

That's 300 about to plow into the burning 69. (That sounds dirty, doesn't it?)

The shark car lost a tire...

...but kept driving anyway, which is fairly impressive, especially considering that he did pretty well.

But he didn't win. Some of the losers being towed from the field, which is a pretty good indication that you didn't win.

However, there was one guy that, after being declared winner, had his car give out on him, which had to be towed from the field. That was the end of round two, I think. Then, in round three, pretty much any cars that were able to make it back to the field were allowed to compete.

What's amazing to me is how quickly these guys were able to repair their cars and get them back out to compete. They were literally (and I don't mean in that in the sense of the new google definition, either) pounding their cars back into shape with sledgehammers in order to make repairs on the engines and stuff.

Exciting bits:

• The shark car (42) lost a tire and kept competing.
• Another car (I don't remember the #, but maybe I will find it when I go through the rest of the pics for the next post) broke the front axle but continued to drive around on it for a while. When it got towed away, though, the whole thing flopped down and dragged on the ground.
• Cars caught on fire. Occasionally, this meant they had to wave the red flag to start the derby so that fire extinguishers could be brought in. Let me just say: it's hard to get the drivers' attentions during something like that.
• Which brings me to the guy that got trapped in his burning car and couldn't get out because they were being unable to get the drivers to notice the red flag. Finally, they blared some big horn, the guy jumped out of his car, and they put it out.
• Sometimes, after they put a car out, the driver would start it back up and get back into it. Crazy!
• If a bumper fell off of a car, they would stop what was going on long enough to go out and retrieve it, which they didn't do for other parts of the cars. However, bumpers, depending upon how they were run over, could come up through the bottoms of the cars and seriously injure (or KILL) the driver.

Next time I'll tell you all about the finale and show you some more pictures.

Okay, wait. Here's that car being towed off the field in the middle of round two. This was the only car they stopped the derby to tow out, I guess, because it was blocking too much of what was going on. Notice the front, passenger tire dragging the ground.