Suburgatory

Suburgatory Read Online Free PDF Page B

Book: Suburgatory Read Online Free PDF
Author: Linda Keenan
her racist statements when encountering a black dad in town today, but rather than finding her offensive, the dad found her to be delightfully funny.
    Kellie Alda is a kindhearted and irrepressible mother of two who is so disturbed by racism that when she actually interacts with a person of another race—which is rare in this community—she can’t stop herself from injecting her darkest racial preoccupations into the conversation.
    She first saw Deshaun Watson and his daughter Amahlia while standing next to them at the annual marathon.
    â€œOh hi! Good morning!” she said, holding the hands of her twins, Peter and Emma.
    â€œSo . . . What’s a black guy like you doing in a place like this?” she asked, laughing nervously.
    Watson stared at her quizzically. “Just showing my daughter the marathon.”
    Five-year-old Peter looked up at Watson very gravely and said, “Are you a jigaboo?”
    Alda’s hand went to her mouth. “Oh my God! Peter! How mortifying, I’m so so sorry. I’ve been trying to teach Peter and Emma about the history and legacy of racism, which is a hugely important issue to me, so I was telling him all the nasty names for brown people that they should never use: sambos, coons, coloreds, negroes, blackies, jigaboos, jungle bunny, macaca, and you know, the big one, the N-one.”
    â€œYeah, Peter, you might want to forget those other words and just stick with ‘black,’” said Watson.
    After a few moments, Alda leaned over and said, “I hope seeing this doesn’t bother you.”
    â€œSeeing a marathon?” asked Watson.
    Alda said, “Well, maybe I’m just really sensitive to race, but it’s like a white power rally to me. There’s a few black people being chased by an army of white people. I mean, I know it’s a marathon and all but doesn’t it look a little weird to you? Like they’re out to run down and lynch those poor Kenyans? Not that these Kenyans are poor. I’m sure they are rich in Kenya—I’ve seen them running on National Geographic—I mean—oh my God—I mean, on ESPN. They don’t wear shoes, but it’s by choice—better for running I guess! It’s not that they can’t afford it, hahahaha.”
    Alda never asked Watson what he did for a living, because, “I would just never want to ask a black gentleman what he does for a living. I mean, you don’t want to make them uncomfortable if they aren’t working, or doing something, you know, well you know, something else. This guy did seem kind of like a Mr. Mom. Which is great because, you know, black guys aren’t always so great on the dad thing let’s be honest. . . . What a fine man.”
    Later on, she saw Watson again at the park with Amahlia. Their familiar greeting attracted the interest of other park-goers. “Those moms are whispering and trying to hide their pointing! How disgusting, how utterly disgusting,” said Alda, convinced the other park-goers were racists. “A white mom and a black dad can’t talk to each other without thinking about, you know, interracial porn? No, even worse, I bet they are thinking about Civil War slave porn, which is the sickest thing I’ve ever seen. It was so dirty and wrong and I just can’t ever get it out of my head . . . and that slave’s upper body, wow, just wow. . .”
    Watson beamed at her in sheer amazement. “Wanna come back to my house? We’re going to get takeout,” he said.
    â€œGee, well, hmmmm,” Alda thought. “Of course!” She whispered to this reporter, “How could I say ‘No’? He’d think I was scared of him, but I wasn’t, of course!”
    As she put the address in her car’s GPS, the system began guiding her away from the park and her own relatively modest neighborhood, and slowly but surely the houses got bigger and bigger until they pulled up
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