THE SKIN I’M IN

I was born and spent my life, until I went off to college, in the heart of New York City. I lived in a neighborhood of small apartment buildings and brownstones, and at the end of my street, there was a lovely park that led down to the Hudson River. I went to a small school and was surrounded by people who were very like me. We were conscientious students, being told repeatedly, how important a good education was. My father would say, “They can take everything from you but, they can’t take away what you’ve learned.” And while this may sound like an idyllic world, there was one thing (though I didn’t know it at the time) that was missing… diversity. Just about everyone I knew or met or interacted with was just like me.

And then, I went off to college. I attended a university in Ohio and discovered on my first day there that while I had grown up believing we were all very much alike, that was most definitely not so. As I unpacked my bags with my two roommates, I noticed there was a line of girls walking past our dorm room, obviously checking us out. I later discovered that they were checking us out because we had a different religious background than theirs. (That was probably why we were chosen to room together.) One of the girls exclaimed somewhat incredulously, “They look just like us.” It seemed that they too had grown up in an insulated world.

Over the years I have had the extreme joy of interacting, working with, and becoming friends with people of diverse backgrounds. What I’ve discovered is, despite the skin you’re in, you are – wherever you come from – however you worship – how you wear your hair – whether you cover your head or not – what language you speak – very much like me. You cry when you’re sad and smile when you’re happy. You understand pain and hate, and you understand kindness and tolerance. You want what I want – to live – to be – to thrive – to worship – to provide for your children – to love and be loved. You want, as I do, to be accepted for who you are, how you treat others, the generosity of your spirit, not because your skin is white, black, brown, red, or yellow, or you speak the “right” language or pray in the “right” house of worship.

I recently had a friend tell me that she enjoys my newsletters because they “sound” just like me. I can’t imagine a greater compliment. Isn’t that what we are all hoping for – to be viewed and understood, to be respected and heard – not because of where we came from or what we look like but, because we are who we are – we are the energy that rages and rants, whispers, and cajoles within the skin we’re in… What we look like on the outside is not even a pale shadow of what lives and breathes within us.

I think we can all agree that the world is teetering on the brink of disaster. People are dying by the thousands of starvation and draught, and fires and floods are destroying millions of acres of land and displacing millions of people, and the air is becoming unbreathable and the sky is turning yellow with smoke from distant fires, we are hurling bombs at one another and killing one another in the name of religion or white supremacy or some other god-awful thing. We still hate one another. We are still intolerant of one another. We are still unwilling to look past what is seen to what lives within.

My friends, the skin we’re in is the same skin – it will grow old and wrinkled and eventually it will, as all living things must, turn to dust. We are here for just this brief, fleeting moment in time – should we not be spending it loving and caring for one another instead of looking for reasons to hate one another and devising more efficient ways to kill one another? It is, I believe, the question of our time and the answer will shape the world for those who come after us.

THE SKIN I’M IN

…is

fragile as fine glass

it shatters
it tears it blisters

and

it bleeds

it’s torn by

words hurled like stones

breaking through

fracturing

bone

I

find myself silently

screaming at the mirror on the wall

at those passing in the hall

at everyone I know and all

the nameless faceless people

I will never know

who

unfurl hate like flags

would silence voices different

from their own judge you

by the color of your skin

I can’t

begin to understand

I cry

I die

a bit with every bomb

that drops

with every bullet shot

with every hateful word that’s flung

at someone who I know

is just like me

white red brown yellow black

their souls chained

their lives constrained

by the sin

of being born

in

to their own skin…

Susan A. Katz (All rights reserved)

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