Post 1-Who am I

I have always enjoyed learning about my heritage for many reasons. I suppose I should begin by saying that I am a mutt. I am Polish, Hungarian, German, and I have ancestors from a former German territory called Alsace-Lorraine. Which also makes me Alsace-Lorrainian or something. There's also a story in my family that my Great-Grandpa Archie used to say we were Irish so he could celebrate St. Patrick's Day. But that's another story. I mostly identify with the Polish part of my heritage. I've visited the town of Lena, Wisconsin (current population:500) and I've seen the farmhouse and big white barn that were built on the land where my Great-Grandma Vicky and her 13 brothers and sisters grew up. Their father spoke only Polish--something that my Grandma has said terrified her as a kid. In that house, my Great-Grandma shared an attic for a bedroom and she told us how the snow would drift in on their faces in the winter. They would make Polish sausage from scratch, and we still have and use the grinder and sausage-stuffer that her mother used. I think I identify myself mostly as Polish because that is the side of the family I know most about, like how my Great-Grandmother's job was to cut the heads off of chickens and pluck them for the family to eat--something that proves she had a much stronger stomach than I do.

I honestly can't remember the exact moment when I became aware of issues of ethnicity and race. I grew up in a tiny farming community on Lake Ontario called Kendall. I think there was only one Black kid that went to our school, but I can't remember thinking he was strange or different. I just knew him by his name. The town I lived in was virtually all White. I suppose when I moved from that town to a larger suburban town with a much larger suburban school, I began to at least notice the ways kids of different color interacted, or didn't. I remember in school the White kids stuck with the White kids and the Black kids stuck with the Black kids. I'm not saying it's the right thing, it was just the way it was there. I'm hoping future generations will erase the lines in school lunch rooms and actually get to know each other for what's beneath the surface, even though in high school, the surface is for the most part all anybody sees.

Even though I grew up in that town, I can't remember being taught anything negative about racial issues; of course, that could be because there was no diversity to speak of anyhow. My parents always taught me to really know someone by what is beneath the surface. My views have not changed; however, I think I have become much more aware of what other views there are. I remember seeing the Schoolhouse Rock video in 7th grade talking about the Melting Pot. I guess now I realize that that Melting Pot meant that America was to be not a diverse nation, but one that attempted to purify and stomp out so many cultures for the sake of promoting the "approved" culture and way of life. I've learned about slavery, the Eugenics Movement, and scientific racism and seen the horrors that negligence, ignorance, and hate can produce, and I think I've learned that we cannot ignore the problems or pretend they aren't there. We can't pretend we are progressing when we're not because we are blinded by our own proclamations of progress. I can't say that I have directly witnessed any instances of racism, but I have tried to educate myself on the topic of racism because it shouldn't just be something people of color try to overcome, but something we as a human race need to work toward eradicating. I think we first have to admit that great injustice and struggle exist and then begin the process of change.