Racism is still thriving

 I was in the insurance agent getting problems sorted out when a woman eight years my junior came in to get her ID replaced.  I heard her private answers to all the questions, feeling awkward.  When came the pont of paying for the ID, I knew before she said it that this was an issue. She looked like she'd been beaten physically on a routine basis all her days.  Not necessarily recently, but she hadn't seen warm water in a long time. She was so tiny and tired and thin too.  I decided I would pay her bill if I could and get her that ID. So when they insisted that she had to pay, and she turned away, I piped up.  

She muttered a thanks but it wasn't a gratitude moment, more of a relief in a moment of frustration. Which is all it was meant to be.  Because now the poor woman has to listen to us talk about her in the third person as I quietly try to deal with the praise from the clerks for my generosity.

Blah. It wasn't generosity, it was decency.  Anyway, I insisted that it was pay forward and back and she surely had paid her dues by now. God I wish I'd said it like that.  I am so ashamed of how I phrased myself.  Well she left and right away the clerk is using the phrase "those people."  I just insisted that as far as I was concerned, she was sleeping rough and someone keeps stealing her stuff and that $15 makes a life changing difference to her.  Because it does.  Even if she has to do it every blasted month, it's still vital. They don't leave money behind when they take everything off you in the night. 

So I didn't say "they who?" Because I knew what she meant.  Some vague general category of First Nations people who aren't considered valid adult humans because they don't do life the way they're expected to.

Oh boy, don't get me started on non conformity.

Can we even begin to touch on the abuse this woman has survived?  Without knowing anything except her age and race and location I already know she suffered in the residential school system. By her features, she was extra white looking, much narrower of face than the usual around her.  So more attractive to these foul demons in black robes.  That would have framed her world from age 4 to 14. 

Excuse me while I breathe and calm myself.

If you don't know what she endured and witnessed, ask google. It's out there. Canada spent a lot of time listening to survivor stories.  

yah, so let's roll into her teens.  After all that, you know she had nothing when she ran away successfully to the city.  What does a teenage runaway indian girl with pretty bones wind up doing to pay for shelter?  Well she convinces men to pay for it. And they won't do that without being able to abuse the girl.  For her, same old same, but the semblance of autonomy.  that's a step up.  Until she starts getting beat up. Because, well, that's the kind of man you find in those parts of town, nes c'est pas?

so she's drinking and doing drugs, of course, you can't stand it, nobody could, she couldn't. she may or may not have tried to die, but that wasn't happening.

So this young woman in the early 90s is a gutter whore addict with abusive men in her life.

Now she's an old woman, all she's ever known is abuse and pain. She has nothing to fall back on, nowhere to turn to, and nothing but scorn even while trying to recover from yet another robbery.

Yeah, of course I paid it. I had exactly that much money left in my pocket. 

It's not for her.  It's for us.  I may not find another me, but by god, i want there to be people like me in the world.  If I can't do it myself, how can I hope for anyone else?

I can't do anything about the racism at the insurance office. They're on the front lines of the war on poverty, and they see it all.  Like she said, every three weeks or so they see the same faces with the same problems.  yeah, and nothing is being done to help them. they have to help themselves.  Said the privileged white lady who's stayed in her comfy lane all her life and knows squat about what these people are facing.

Plus which, the whole story is racism.  Maybe that woman was rich up to a year ago.   Maybe she is now.  It's all an assumption based on an assumption what race she is and what that means. 

But she did have the rural accent, so was first nations. She was the right age.

Well anyway, you know, the point is, kindness is a law unto itself.  If you wish kindness in the world you must be kind. Not because you have judged them worthy but because you are in the right place at the right time to be kind. Period.  If anyone tries to make out some heroic, use that to teach them that it's you being a decent person, nothing more, regardless of the story. You can set an example. Now they'll have a second thought. It might not be worth much but it's not nothing. 

I just made you, mystery reader, take a whole other look. 

It's just fifteen bucks. It's nothing to me, even in my current state of genuine desperation.  I went on to buy groceries on a credit card. In my CAR. Yeah, kindness is not expensive.