Someone's Beloved Son

College and university campuses are transformed to summer program camps for junior high and high school students when classes are not in session. You can't help but feel the excitement of these adolescents as they experience their first taste of college life, and I imagine for many, their first extended stays away from home.

A group of these teens invaded my writing space during lunch recently. I thought about moving when I heard their loud voices approaching, but I had the good chair, in the nice corner, with the perfect amount of light and sun. I decided to wait them out, since I had snagged the perfect spot and was reluctant to give it up. After all, how long could they stay and how loud could they be? Apparently, they had plenty of free time and they could get extremely loud! I heard and learned more about 14 and 15 year old life than I ever cared to know. I filed the information away for future reference, hoping it will come in handy when my own daughter is an adolescent.

There was a young African American man in the group, the only one of maybe a dozen kids. I had the motherly urge to tell him to fix his sagging pants, but I resisted. I watched and listened to him interact within the group; he was funny, and smart, and charming. He was also polite, and loud, and outgoing. A cell phone rang and everyone immediately moved to check their phones, myself included. This young man checked his caller ID, answered the phone, and moved away from the group to talk, ultimately sitting at the chair closest to me.

I could hear his side of the conversation. It consisted mainly of "yes, Mom." But it was said with a smile, and with tenderness, and with obvious love for the mother on the other side of this phone. This was someone's beloved son; some mother somewhere had sent her precious bundle away from home to enrich his life and open up doors of opportunities for him. I caught the quick "I love you, too" that ended the phone call, along with the look around to make sure that no one else saw him.

This young man returned to his group and after another raucous half hour of so, the whole lot of them departed my writing spot. I have no clue who this young man's parent/parents may be, but whoever they are, I want them to know that they are raising a wonderful child. I wish that the whole world could have been exposed to this brief vignette of adolescent life.

Contrary to what the world wants us to believe, most young black men are neither thugs nor criminals. Sagging pants or "urban" clothing tell you nothing about someone's intellect, or work ethic, or life potential. In a world in which the odds are so heavily stacked against you from birth, through school, and into adulthood, it is difficult to dispel negative stereotypes about who black men are and what they can and have accomplished despite some enormous odds.

For a brief time, I had a glimpse of a young man moving through the world and interacting with his peer group. Not a thug, or a potential criminal, or a threat - but a child, loved by God, made in God's own image, and someone's beloved son. And it is that image that endows a person, whether a president or a prisoner, with a full portion of his humanity, instead of a partial caricature of his identity.

© Yolanda Pierce