Sean D. Stuber
USA
I don’t remember what I said that prompted my daughter’s question. It was during a casual conversation about my experiences growing up, the good, the bad, the exciting, the boring, etc. and then we started talking about other people we knew that were from different places and what they had done while they were growing up that was different because of where they lived and when. At some point in the conversation I made a comment about difficulties blacks had in various places and times. I didn’t think much of it, I don’t even recall what I said but my daughter (4 at the time) thought it was an odd thing to say and then, thinking of our next-door neighbor, asked “Why would someone not like Dorothy?” for a split second I paused, backtracking through the conversation to figure out why she had asked and then it occurred to me that I was about to introduce her to a world with hate that she had never known.
It’s a lesson we all learn at some point; but it was a painful-shock to realize I was going to watch the exact instant that my child’s world would grow irrevocably darker.
