Boy, am I white. I mean, I've always known I'm white, but today really exaggerated my whiteness. We went on a field trip today to a circus. The Universoul Circus. Now don't get me wrong, it was a really good show, very fun for the kids, with lots of "traditional" circus stuff like elephants, trapeze artists, and the like, but a lot of the circus was geared towards the black audience. My kids, 16 out of 17 whom are black, had a GREAT time. They danced to all the popular songs and danced all the popular dances, while we white folk were like, "What the...?" "Where do they learn this stuff???" I couldn't move the way some of my kids move even with training. It must be innate.
Now I know all black people can't dance, and not all black people have rhythm, but for the most part they do, and while at the circus today, I realized that the love and talent for rhythm and dancing is not innate, it's passed down. It's part of the culture. Even today was a way for the older generation of the black community (the ringmaster and some performers) to reconfirm and strengthen this love of rhythm, music, and community in the younger generation (the audience).
White people don't have this. In fact, I can't think of one thing that binds white Americans together into a "community," and this makes me sad.
Hilariously enough, my kids wanted me to volunteer when the ringmaster called for volunteers 25 years old or older to participate in a "Soul Train" type dance contest. Yeah, right! Like I would get up in front of a hundreds of black people (or white people) and dance! It's sweet that they thought I would.
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