The Only White "Dude" In A Colored Waiting Room

[Teach]

Twenty pairs of eyes were staring at me. But why? Did I do something wrong? I wasn’t on the FBI’s “Ten Most-Wanted”. I wasn’t creating a scene. A disturbance. I was simply minding my own business. Was it my heavy loden winter coat? Then, it all dawned on me. I was the only white “dude” in a colored waiting room.

March, 1964, Boston, MA. I was going to where I had never been before: Ft. Lauderdale, FL. As a poor inner-city kid (no crocodile tears or hearts and flowers; it was what it was), I had always wanted to go south during the “spring break”. Now, in my senior year, I had saved up just enough to make the nearly 1,400-mile trek to where college students from all over the country congregated.

Well, no plane, no train (too expensive). That left me with one alternative: the bus. Actually, “Big Red,” Trailways. Round-trip bus fare between Boston and Ft. Lauderdale, something like $80. Snow flurries when I left. New York. “Phillie”. D.C. “Old Dominion.” The Carolinas. “South of the Border”. The Peach state. Jacksonville, FL.

Now near midnight. Totally exhausted (ever try sleeping on a bus?). Zonked. A cup ‘o Joe. Maybe a doughnut. I exit the bus. Blurry-eyed, I walk into the terminal. Who knows “colored” waiting room from “white” waiting room. Hey, I’m a northerner. Born in upstate New York. Lived briefly in “The Big Apple”. Most of my life in Beantown. I went to school, both high school and college, with kids of all backgrounds, races, ethnicities. The farthest south I’d ever been, up to this time, was “Joisey”. When I was four years old my mother and I walked across the GW Bridge over the Hudson from NY to New Jersey, and then back.

I enter the JAX terminal. I might as well have been on Mars. I see a waiting room. In the corner there looks like what appears to be a refreshment stand. I walk into the waiting room. That’s when I start to feel a tad uncomfortable. Everybody’s lookin’ at me. Why? Then, I realize: I’m the only white “dude” in a colored waiting room.

[chrisl]

Here we go again...skin like a peach teach...has spoken?...well maybe...uh..kinda...anyway..who cares.

[1st time lasix]

What the heck is this garbage.... man you need to get out more....

[Inner Dirt]

If this is a true story and you want to relive the past go visit Arkansas. I have passed through the state eating sit down meals, stopping for gas, spending the night on a half dozen trips across the USA. I never strayed much off I-40 but the place is creepy segregated. They might as well still have the colored only and whites only signs up. I drove through areas and stopped at convenience store gas stations where there was nothing but whites. I ate at a crowded McDonald's and I was the only white person in the joint. I last visited that state in 2012.

[Valuist]

"Colored"? Was there any broads there, as well?

[CincyHorseplayer]

I was a seriously rowdy hell raiser as a younger man. Been through this plenty in the county jail. Yawn...!

[MutuelClerk]

Years ago myself and a date were the only white people at a George Clinton and the Funkadelics concert. I had the best pot in the house and didn't have any problems. Great show!!!!

[Teach]

POTUS attacked George Clinton during the campaign. "Atomic Dog".

[sammy the sage]

Life is a matter of timing...or stone cold sheer luck sometimes...My best friend & I went to see Superman in the late 70's....very 1st showing ...public release....(forget actual date...but sure somebody will check up on it)....we realized about 10 minutes before start of movie...only 2 whites in there....stayed and watched anyways...I mean...come on...Superman....even the Black folks making it a sell-out...

Exactly one week later...many white folks died in that neighbor-hood...Liberty City in Miami...

the mentality of a "MOB" is stupid and very dangerous...regardless of race/religion or otherwise based...

Yet many here and everywhere practice & preach EXACTLY that...so VERY sad...

[johnhannibalsmith]

I went to a showing of Shaft and it was nothing but white people. I left.

[NorCalGreg]

Originally Posted by sammy the sage

Life is a matter of timing...or stone cold sheer luck sometimes...My best friend & I went to see Superman in the late 70's....very 1st showing ...public release....(forget actual date...but sure somebody will check up on it)....we realized about 10 minutes before start of movie...only 2 whites in there....stayed and watched anyways...I mean...come on...Superman....even the Black folks making it a sell-out...

Exactly one week later...many white folks died in that neighbor-hood...Liberty City in Miami...

the mentality of a "MOB" is stupid and very dangerous...regardless of race/religion or otherwise based...

Yet many here and everywhere practice & preach EXACTLY that...so VERY sad...

So your story is: "THE ONLY WHITE DUDES IN A COLORED MOVIE HOUSE--BUT WE STAYED ANYWAYS"?

[Jess Hawsen Arown]

Originally Posted by Inner Dirt

If this is a true story and you want to relive the past go visit Arkansas. I have passed through the state eating sit down meals, stopping for gas, spending the night on a half dozen trips across the USA. I never strayed much off I-40 but the place is creepy segregated. They might as well still have the colored only and whites only signs up. I drove through areas and stopped at convenience store gas stations where there was nothing but whites. I ate at a crowded McDonald's and I was the only white person in the joint. I last visited that state in 2012.

Do you think the neighborhoods you stopped at might have been the reason -- and not because there was segregation in the businesses. I've been the "only white person" in the joint before and I know it was because of the local neighborhood as I experienced nothing but friendship from the people there.

I only experienced blatant racism once in my life. It was a long time ago and my family was on vacation in Virginia Beach. A black man put his son on a merry-go-round and all of the white fathers stood politely to the side as the black kid was on the ride. Nobody said one word. But after the black kid was finished, the white fathers then allowed their children to ride. This was in the late 50s.

[barahona44]

Until I was 13 (1966), I lived in a neighborhood that was 90 % black.This was at the height of the civil rights movement and the beginning of the racial unrest of the mid to late 60's The thing is race was never a big issue but it was in the background.But the more important thing is that it was A MIDDLE CLASS black neighborhood.The neighborhood had some physical advantages.It was a devolpment that stood at the edge of a fairly large city park, surrounding it on two sides.A nearby college, American International, had all their sports fields and gymnasium on the third side.The fourth side was a main thoroughfare which had a public high school and an insurance company.That isolation, combined with the fact that the 100 or so homes were almost all owner occupied.led to a minimum of what I believe sociologists call 'negative creep' in which neighborhoods pick up bad influences little by little as people move up and out and less desirable types(deplorables? ) move in.To this day, it still is a good place to live;I rarely see the addresses of people of where I lived in connection with crime or violence and the homes -built in the late 1940's -are still kept up nicely.What is interesting is when I tell people I grew up in a mostly black area, the assumption is I was living in a slum/ghetto.

To me, economic class is almost as important as skin color.But there are too many on both sides of the spectrum who can't see beyond pigmentation.

[Inner Dirt]

Originally Posted by Jess Hawsen Arown

Do you think the neighborhoods you stopped at might have been the reason -- and not because there was segregation in the businesses. I've been the "only white person" in the joint before and I know it was because of the local neighborhood as I experienced nothing but friendship from the people there.

I only experienced blatant racism once in my life. It was a long time ago and my family was on vacation in Virginia Beach. A black man put his son on a merry-go-round and all of the white fathers stood politely to the side as the black kid was on the ride. Nobody said one word. But after the black kid was finished, the white fathers then allowed their children to ride. This was in the late 50s.

I have no idea, but from the conversations I heard at a "white" Waffle House I would assume any non white was made to feel uncomfortable there. When I was in a black McDonald's someone said "You aren't from around here, are you?" I have been to something like 28 states and never seen anything like it. Even in areas I have been where there were a lot of neighborhoods of predominately one race there is some mixing in the businesses that serve the public in those areas, in Arkansas there was none of that.

[MONEY]

I live in Houston.

Two weeks ago I was in a neighborhood bar having a drink with my son,
when a white female walks in and shouts to the barkeep,
"Hey Jim, you're keeping it pretty dark in here, I'm going to have to find a different place to hang.
Race was the farthest thing from my mind until the woman made that comment.

The woman, Jim and the few other people in the bar began to laugh.
I took a glance around the room at the laughing people and realized the me and my son were the only non-whites in the bar.

I quickly realized that we were not welcomed there.
My son and I got up and left quietly and obviously we will never return.

Racism is live and well in the U.S.A.