SueAnn Porter

Time seems to go faster these days; the weeks and years fly by.

Mr. Porter and I are buying another house. Yes, after all the hard work of preparing the old house for sale, we are going to buy our “down-sized” home. I can’t give away too many details yet, as we are still shuffling papers with attorneys, but things are moving along.

The first task in the new house will be “de-pinking” the kitchen cabinets. The cabinets are described as ‘white stained maple’ but if you see them in person, they are pink. I picture potential buyers viewing the house, and then running out screaming because of the pink cabinets and plethora of wallpaper throughout the house. That turned out well for us, as the house was available for sale when we were ready to buy.

I’m not afraid of wallpaper either. You may remember the Great Wallpaper Removal Project of 2014, when I took down the wallpaper in the dining room and repainted. I finished just before I was diagnosed with breast cancer. After the mastectomy and removal of lymph nodes, I was not able to use my right arm for anything more strenuous than feeding myself for several months.

We are renting a townhouse. It’s small and poor, deprived Bailey 😉 doesn’t have much room inside. The neighborhood is filled with dog lovers and dogs, so he loves going outside for his walks, sniffs and potty breaks. Yesterday was too hot for him to be outside very long. He spent the day inside with the air conditioner. He was bored, but comfortable.

Yesterday I attended a funeral mass for a friend’s mom. It was heartbreaking of course. What really blew me away was that after the service, my friend noticed I was limping and told me she would pray for me! What a beautiful heart that she would even notice such a small thing when she just lost her dear Mom.

I try to avoid the television news as much as possible. I’m not naive, but I can’t take the constant bombardment of bad news. (Who can?)

I can’t solve every racism problem in the world. None of us can. We can each do a little part in our own corner of the world. Number One of course is pray. Then we need action. I’ve resolved to try each day, to say something nice. “Hello.” “Let me hold the door for you.” “That’s a pretty blouse.” Something. Baby steps. Not all white people are mean racists. Really.

I’ve debated in my head if I should write a blog about what it’s really like to be white. That life is not handed to us on a silver platter. That we know hunger and cold. That I grew up in a bedroom where the cold air blew in and kept me awake on a winter’s night. That we know what it’s like to go without. That my direct ancestors did not arrive in this country until 1890 and that none of them owned slaves. That my grandfather was embarrassed at his Irish heritage, as he grew up in the era where “Irish need not apply.”  That my father died at the age of 47, bitter at life and the dreams he could never reach because he was not in “the good old boy network.”  But would it really help to write this? Or would it just make more anger?

 

#StopTheHate