For The Greater Good

One day in July of this year, when it was hot as balls in the city, and hotter still with the simmering, uneasy feelings that welled inside of most people after the horrible tragedy of George Floyd, I found myself on the sidewalk about to run into a neighbour-lady friend of mine I’ve known for over twenty years. She was walking her dog with a friend in tow.

Her pooch started barking excitedly as they drew nearer, and started lunging at me as dogs sometimes do, and I put my hand out for him to smell and I caressed him under the chin for a moment as he bounded and pulled against his leash. We all said hello, and I just smiled as my friend tried to get her dog to calm down, and heel.

I’m so sorry, she said laughing and yanking, He doesn’t like… black… clothing. We’ve nicknamed him The White Supremacist.

Ohyesshedid.

How many thoughts can go through a person’s mind at once? I had so many. But the one that came out on top was, Oh no.

My second clear thought was, Man, she is so lucky it’s me, and not someone else.

I was raised to be one of the good ones, you know.

I looked to the left, and met the eyes of her walking companion who was frozen stalk-still and her eyes were popping out of her head and her mouth was open like she wanted to say something but couldn’t. I could feel her willing the ground to open up and swallow her whole so she could just die on the spot. But being polite as I am, I averted my eyes to afford her some dignity, and quickly looked back at my friend, who was recoiling in abject horror, sputtering and stammering, N-no of course we don’t call him that… I… I was just kidding… I’m… I’m…

I closed my eyes and smiled, and shook my head, and waved my hands in the air a little before petting her dog again, as he’d finally settled down. “I know. It’s okay,” I said before changing the subject completely. 

It’s sometimes what’s required when people make gaffs such as this. I know she didn’t mean to. This lady is a nervous type – a bit self-deprecating, and easily tongue-tied. A hand-wringer. I knew she meant no ill, so I thought it best to just… leave it. We chatted about other things, exchanged a few more innocuous words about the weather or whatever, and then I said goodbye and walked on.

On the way home, I considered how I do this. How quick I am to smooth over situations like these.  And this was an easy one. I reckon due to the signalling people who look like me do all the time, even unconsciously, by way of making ourselves appear non-threatening and safe. Easy. Pleasing, even. Usually there’s no mal intent, which makes things easy to forget and move on from. And I’m not the sort to let people flounder in a socially unmooring situation such as this – its entirely too uncomfortable for everyone involved, so I’m quick to ease tension whenever I can. 

But I realise I am this way because it makes my world safer for me, socially. Sometimes I’m so safe for others, they accidentally say all kinds of things they don’t mean to say. Not in front of me anyway.

Sometimes a comment is made, and the uncomfortable tension is hanging over my head like an ugly raincloud, but I’ll just snatch it down and swallow that shit without a missing a beat. The fuckery that’s been said to me tho. I fix a plastic smile on my face and just suffer it all by myself.  Do some quick breath work to bring my heart-rate back down – a lifelong trick I’ve pretty much perfected – to keep my body calm. Nary a furrow in my brow. In the moment, it feels easier. For everyone.

I’ll just remember it for the rest of my life, that’s all.

.  .  .

Later that evening as I was busily preparing dinner, my daughter came to the kitchen to say there was someone at the door for me, so I dried my hands, and descended the stairs to see.

It was my neighbour-lady. She took a few steps back down our front stairs when she saw me approach, as to give us enough distanced space.

Well hello again, I said, smiling at her. 

Oh, Tracey… I am sooooo sorry… she started, mincingly, with her right hand squeezing and pulling on the left. She shifted from one foot to the other, and back again. She couldn’t have looked more uncomfortable if she tried. 

But this time, even as I saw how pained her face was, and how she was struggling to find the right words to express how tormented and sorry she was, I forced myself to stand still and let her just tell me everything she wanted to say. Her agony was heavy and huge, hanging in the stifling air between us. She had tears in her eyes and her face was flushed from her chin to her temples. 

She said when she got home from her walk earlier with her dog, and recounted our interaction to her husband (who is one of the sweetest, most mild-mannered people I’ve ever met) he said, I think you’d better get over there. 

And so here she was. Apologising profusely for an ill-timed verbal misstep during a particularly hot day during a particularly hot time in the world.

And I just stood there quite calmly and… let her. Which was as important for her as it was for me, I think. I was very warm with her, as I would always have been. I felt fine now, and I told her so, and when we ended things I said how much I appreciated that she’d take the time to walk over to my house to come say these things in person.

She said, When you feel wrong, you have to apologise.

I had to agree with that. And it takes some balls.

We didn’t hug when she turned to go, but we bid adieu with as much affection as we could, without touching one another. It’s how we all have to do in these Now Times. I made a mental note to be extra bright with her next time I saw her, so she’d know things are really okay between us.

Being a good one is often deeply steeped in efforts the other cannot see. But maybe rising above something doesn’t have to mean sinking your own self in the process.