37. Puzzle: Write about putting together the pieces of puzzles.
Potential audience of two now. Woot. http://thinkwritten.com/365-creative-writing-prompts/ as per usual.
I've been stumped on this prompt for something like 2 weeks now. Today, many things struck at the same time that push flash fiction far away from my top priority.
I woke up this morning.
I got dressed for work and then I hurried to the car.
I got to work and made my breakfast.
Before lunch, a few people around me mentioned that they were going to a Cinco de Mayo happy hour. The "holiday" of Cinco de Mayo has become a racist embarrassment, but the blatant racism of wearing oversized sombreros and fake mustaches, all while drowning in tequila didn't really concern me. I wasn't going to happy hour.
The work day slowly ticked away, and two people in another department decided to have a very long conversation right behind my desk. It doesn't matter what they were discussing; it was boring and not work related. It was, however, rude that two people would plant behind someone's work space and chat for at least 20 minutes.
I messaged someone to blow off some steam. Their response was to ask their ethnicity (to be specific, “Are they from a country that isn’t the USA?”). I kind of laughed, but I also was alarmed because it's irrelevant. It's actually not just irrelevant; this was actually racist. They didn't ask about ethnicity to confirm the identity of the people having the conversation. This had nothing to do with anything other than identifying if there were any “stereotypically rude" ethnicities that I could have encountered.
The final piece of the puzzle (guys, I actually stayed on prompt!) came from a relative of mine.
While I am not close to my extended family, I am friends with a few of them on social media. She messaged me asking for help. In one very long digital breath, she stated that a boss of hers was clearly upset with her, and that she had always done excellent work but the boss hated her. She then asked if this was because her boss was Jewish, but not just Jewish, but part of some Jewish cult.
Side note: My family has been mostly understanding of my wish to convert to Judaism. It's something that, given time, I will one day achieve, but for now, I am "spiritually Jewish" but officially no such thing.
When I said, “No, your boss does not hate you because they are Jewish (and you are not),” she wanted to confirm if it was true that Jewish people hate fat people.
I think a simplistic approach to this would be to say that obviously my relative is just very much uniformed. I stated, without malice, that no, Jewish people don't aggressively hate fat people.
Later, I began to think of everything that happened today and it brought me back to this morning. What my day actually started with was:
I woke up this morning. I didn't think about racism.
I got dressed for work and I hurried to the car, without thinking about racism.
Most moments of most days, I don't think about racism. I don't think about the small things that occur each and every day to people that do not negatively impact me, personally.
Often, I just move on with my life, because small amounts of racism where nobody gets hurt... happen. It's even past me being simply able to ignore it. There are often times that I partake in these little moments of racism. The song "Everyone's a Little Bit Racist" has become a battle cry for my generation. I have been performing in The Rocky Horror Picture Show for over a decade, and part of the "charm" is the offensive nature of the participation. Every demographic that can be taunted at Rocky, is taunted at Rocky, and in a very bizarre way, this is what makes Rocky as inclusive and far-reaching as it is. At least from my seat of white privilege.
I'm not going to stop doing Rocky. I'm not going to stop going to work, and while I am going to "unfollow" any relatives on Facebook, out of respect for family accord, I will probably not even block racist relatives.
What I will do, is strive to wake up every morning, and think about racism. Go to work and think about racism. I am going to go to Rocky, and movies, and be on Facebook, and all the while, I will remember that racism is not just an occurrence in life. Just because I am not the person it's directed at, and just because I’m not the one saying it, doesn't mean that it doesn't affect me.
My unsolicited advice: Celebrate holidays with respect. If someone is being rude, don’t assume it’s because of because of their ethnicity. If you have interpersonal conflicts with someone, it’s highly unlikely that it’s because their religion hates fat people.
I've been stumped on this prompt for something like 2 weeks now. Today, many things struck at the same time that push flash fiction far away from my top priority.
I woke up this morning.
I got dressed for work and then I hurried to the car.
I got to work and made my breakfast.
Before lunch, a few people around me mentioned that they were going to a Cinco de Mayo happy hour. The "holiday" of Cinco de Mayo has become a racist embarrassment, but the blatant racism of wearing oversized sombreros and fake mustaches, all while drowning in tequila didn't really concern me. I wasn't going to happy hour.
The work day slowly ticked away, and two people in another department decided to have a very long conversation right behind my desk. It doesn't matter what they were discussing; it was boring and not work related. It was, however, rude that two people would plant behind someone's work space and chat for at least 20 minutes.
I messaged someone to blow off some steam. Their response was to ask their ethnicity (to be specific, “Are they from a country that isn’t the USA?”). I kind of laughed, but I also was alarmed because it's irrelevant. It's actually not just irrelevant; this was actually racist. They didn't ask about ethnicity to confirm the identity of the people having the conversation. This had nothing to do with anything other than identifying if there were any “stereotypically rude" ethnicities that I could have encountered.
The final piece of the puzzle (guys, I actually stayed on prompt!) came from a relative of mine.
While I am not close to my extended family, I am friends with a few of them on social media. She messaged me asking for help. In one very long digital breath, she stated that a boss of hers was clearly upset with her, and that she had always done excellent work but the boss hated her. She then asked if this was because her boss was Jewish, but not just Jewish, but part of some Jewish cult.
Side note: My family has been mostly understanding of my wish to convert to Judaism. It's something that, given time, I will one day achieve, but for now, I am "spiritually Jewish" but officially no such thing.
When I said, “No, your boss does not hate you because they are Jewish (and you are not),” she wanted to confirm if it was true that Jewish people hate fat people.
I think a simplistic approach to this would be to say that obviously my relative is just very much uniformed. I stated, without malice, that no, Jewish people don't aggressively hate fat people.
Later, I began to think of everything that happened today and it brought me back to this morning. What my day actually started with was:
I woke up this morning. I didn't think about racism.
I got dressed for work and I hurried to the car, without thinking about racism.
Most moments of most days, I don't think about racism. I don't think about the small things that occur each and every day to people that do not negatively impact me, personally.
Often, I just move on with my life, because small amounts of racism where nobody gets hurt... happen. It's even past me being simply able to ignore it. There are often times that I partake in these little moments of racism. The song "Everyone's a Little Bit Racist" has become a battle cry for my generation. I have been performing in The Rocky Horror Picture Show for over a decade, and part of the "charm" is the offensive nature of the participation. Every demographic that can be taunted at Rocky, is taunted at Rocky, and in a very bizarre way, this is what makes Rocky as inclusive and far-reaching as it is. At least from my seat of white privilege.
I'm not going to stop doing Rocky. I'm not going to stop going to work, and while I am going to "unfollow" any relatives on Facebook, out of respect for family accord, I will probably not even block racist relatives.
What I will do, is strive to wake up every morning, and think about racism. Go to work and think about racism. I am going to go to Rocky, and movies, and be on Facebook, and all the while, I will remember that racism is not just an occurrence in life. Just because I am not the person it's directed at, and just because I’m not the one saying it, doesn't mean that it doesn't affect me.
My unsolicited advice: Celebrate holidays with respect. If someone is being rude, don’t assume it’s because of because of their ethnicity. If you have interpersonal conflicts with someone, it’s highly unlikely that it’s because their religion hates fat people.