Quote:100% Agree, and it makes me feel good everytime i hear someone speak truth.  The sad thing is, it's usually the minds of those that don't get heard, or respected enough, or have the immediate reach and power to change things that feel this way.  I tend to focus on just trying to make life for me and my family as fun, adventurous, and exciting as possible with our budget and block the negativity.  

IDK. I like challenges, so racism kind of gave every non-racist friend outside of my race that much more honor to me, soul to soul, from the moment i fully understood it.

The thing that makes it so difficult for me is I was not raised by people who were from the south. My mom was born and raised on a cattle ranch in Colorado (and where I was born), my dad was born and raised in Rhode Island and my stepdad was born in Arkansas but his family moved to Arizona when he was very young. Long story short, we all converged in FL when I was a kid and went from there. I wasn't raised with 'southern pride' or by people who had that mindset. I was around those kind of people but they were not instrumental in forming my personality, mindset, whatever you want to call it, to be southern. I spent time in CO and RI in the summers which had a part in forming my mindset. From the ages of 17 to 39 I lived all over the US and in Germany, finally settling here in central NC so understanding the southern mindset is something I've never quite caught on to.

 

Where I live now is very different than anywhere else I've lived, the people are very different. Most of the folks I know were born and raised here or have been here for so long they don't remember the life they had before. I definitely feel like a stranger in a foreign land most times and a lot of my world knowledge/life experiences are so foreign to them it's hard to relate. I'm  always being looked at sideways when I speak up or do things in ways that they think are not......right, I guess that's the only way I know how to put it. Or not the way they would go about something. On election day back in 2012 I was in a mixed group of folks and I reminded everyone to go out and vote and the lady next to me said, "Ssshhhh, there are democrats here. We don't want them to vote." I'm not kidding. I looked at her and told her that's a small minded way to think and it's every American's right to vote even if we don't agree with who they vote for. She just didn't get it. It's this and other such mindsets that set me apart from a lot of people I call friends and family and it can be difficult but I just agree to disagree and move on. It's not the same as racism or sexism or any other -ism I can think of but it is an issue.

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