"I Wasn't Hungry Anyway"

I have done all that I could
To see the evil and the good without hiding
You must help me if you can

Doctor My Eyes, Jackson Browne

Business travel has its ups and downs. You're alone in an unfamiliar place, you're eating alone, but sometimes when having dinner at a bar you meet people, strike up conversations, share stories. The food is usually not all that great unless there's a client present in which case you get to go someplace nicer. But the people, well, the people you can meet are almost always worth the trip. So it was recently when the man on the next bar stool to my right asked me about my trip and I asked him about his day (he was a local). I know I can't discover much about the world in this way, but it's more educational than staying home or getting room service, and it's my way.

Anyhow this fellow gets to noticing that I've finished a half rack of ribs and then allows as how he wasn't hungry but they looked great. I gave him my review (a bit dry, but mostly that was intentional, they were dry rubbed, not cooked in any kind of sauce.) He was in. So he asked the bartender for the same, but, was told that the kitchen closed at 10. It was then 10:15 or so. I thought that was odd, since as a visitor I had checked the hours carefully before coming in, and it just said the whole place closed at 11. Oh well, figured I, there's always something undocumented going on, maybe that's just how this place operates.

Anyway at about 10:45 another guy two bar stools further down gets a plate of food delivered. My bar buddy for the evening raised his eyebrows at this, and muttered something I couldn't hear, then said, Well, I Wasn't Hungry Anyway, finished his drink, paid up, said good night, and left.

By now you may have guessed that this man's skin was a good bit darker in tint than mine. Mine is more or less pink, his was a dark brown. Because of our skin colours, I would be called white, which I am not, and he would be called black, which he is not. We were dressed about the same, he paid with a credit card, he was not a bum, or indigent, or a beggar.

I didn't like what was happening. He was blase. I don't see this every day. He acted like it was pretty much normal. I didn't like that he found it pretty much normal.

So, I have this to say to the white supremacists and neo-nazis and all of their respective sympathizers making headlines in Charlottesville Virginia this week: your dicks are still tiny, no matter what you're allowed to say or do in furtherance of your ignorant hateful intolerance.