Tuesday, January 8, 2008


The county's oldest employee paints a wall in the county executives office. He talked about how when he was young he had to leave Maryland because the racism was so bad, and only decades later returned and took a government job. I guess things had changed, but he worked 30 years and was still painting some white guy's walls. Not to take away from him, he had pride in his work, and not an unaware pride. A pride that seemed to come from recognizing the ingrained racism in America and living a decent life in spite of it. This piece made me feel like I did at the submariners funeral, honored to be telling the story.