On a Monday afternoon, while riding the C train into Manhattan, a young white couple walked the aisle of an average train car spouting their spiel to anyone willing to donate. Several people acted busy or just plain uninterested. An occasional dollar was folded into the hand of one of the young couple.
Grace Harrison, a black 64 year old woman from Brooklyn, took this as the perfect opportunity to prove her acceptance of people of non-color. She reached deep into her purse and pulled out the crispest one dollar bill she could find, stood up and carefully approached the young man.
In an overt act of kindness and pity, she breathed in deep to avoid having to smell him as she got closer, and held the dollar high just before placing it in his hand, careful not to make actual physical contact with his dirty flesh. Mrs. Harrison then turned proudly to face the car full of skeptics and returned to her seat knowing, much like Rosa Parks on that fateful December day in 1955, that she had in fact made a difference.
No comments:
Post a Comment