Brian

I have been thinking about Brian since October.  He was one of my classmates from junior and high school.  I can't remember if he was at Image with us the year we did seventh grade there due to overcrowding. 
At the reunion I had commented on him being the only black person in my class.  And he pointed out that there were about four others.  Well after I got home I had to check the yearbook and he was right.  I don't know if they were ghosts like me or whether he just stood out more because of how long we went to school.  Honestly 35 years later and I don't remember over half the kids I went to school with.  Maybe he was just more boisterous.
What I remember about Brian is how outgoing he was.  One of the popular kids.  And how I was always impressed greatly.  This was the age long before white privilege.  He was one of a very few in a sea of white faces and yet he pulled it off with grace.  I don't know if he was ever nervous or anxious.  I know I would have been.  It could have been he was just making the best of his situation, but it sure never felt like that.  He was just Brian. 
We had a training at work on white privilege.  Let me preface this with I have always thought life is the luck of the draw.  It is just luck that I was born white in the USA and not brown in the middle east.  I think we all, no matter color, love our children.  I think we grow up learning what is normal for our culture.  And it floors me when any group says they are better because of that culture....when it is all luck to begin with.
But I sat through this two hour seminar with my mouth just about hitting the floor.  Born white I had never given thought to things not happening in my life.  I've never been pulled over for driving in an upperclass neighborhood. I assumed all education was the same.  I had just never thought about it. 
And it comes back around to Brian.  I wonder how much he experienced that stuff while growing up.  I hope not too much, but I'm not naive.  And so what I should have said at the reunion was if I was part of anything that made his life harder I apologize. That is a thing about white privilege.....you don't even know when you are part of a group taking the advantages and not seeing those who didn't get them. 
His facebook page shows a happy family and a good career.  He was very personable at the reunion.  He comes across as a man of integrity, honor and great worth.  And good, bad, luck of the draw, color of skin....he is still just Brian, although all those things had a play in the man he became.