"Tell me about your experience with this man."
I no longer hear him but I see him everywhere; most of all his eyes. He was a white man. When I met him he had wavy brown hair. The last encounters that I had with him he was bald. He had shaven his head. He said that he was going into service. Every time that I saw him he let me know that he was going out of his way to help me because, I, according to him, unlike the other kids in the neighborhood was one of the few good ones. I didn't know what he meant. I felt it and then believed it. I think that you would've believed him too, but that is beside the point. He was an adult and from my experiences in school I had learned not to question or far worse doubt adults, especially white adults.
My path was inverted and-so I descended. Obedience and good behavior had to be upheld. I believed it-I believed him until I looked into his eyes. It was pointless to attempt to sanitize an image that was changing, he was exposed. His eyes betrayed him as did mine. It was a lie. If you work harder then you'll fly beyond the sun, but you were taught that your wings would melt right-off. So now, you stop. Then you jump, then you run, now you walk and then you get used to crawling. You end up believing that you can only crawl. This was the path that I was expected to follow and walk.
"Is that why you joined?"
I thought you wanted to hear about my experience with this man.