“I’m patiently waiting for the day the Lord opens people’s eyes so we can finally unite as one and treat one another with the utmost dignity and respect… late night thoughts.”
That profoundly thought-provoking statement was written by Jared Jones, a 22-year-old recent college graduate who has just entered the workforce. I’ve known Jared and his family for a number of years, and my encounters with him have always been very light and free-flowing. We generally crack jokes with one another, and we’ve even teamed up in spirited fun to give others in his family a hard time.
Jared posted the comment on Facebook, and it instantly caught my attention. I can’t recall the two of us ever having an incredibly deep conversation, so when I read his post, the seriousness of his words and the depth of the message made me pause. My first thought was, “Wow, he has grown and matured so much.” I was proud of him.
As I read and reread his post, the over-analytical Shannon arose. I wondered what he experienced — directly or indirectly — to make him write the post at that particular time. What was going through his mind? And what other late night thoughts did he have that were as deep as the one he’d posted?
Rather than continue to wonder, I called Jared and asked him every question that occupied my brain since reading his post. Sometimes older adults dismiss or ignore the perspectives of younger generations. That, my friends, is an incredibly unfortunate and counterproductive thing to do. Sometimes we have to go directly to the horse’s mouth to see what he wants to drink — not force what we want onto him.
I had a lot of questions, and I was interested to see what someone of Jared’s age thought. It was an enlightening discussion.
My first question was what led to that post.
“I was just thinking about things in media and on Facebook. (I was) reading posts about people with different ethnicities and how they talk crazy about each other. To me, we would be in a much better place if people just got along.”
My next question: Why do you think people don’t get along with one another — particularly people of different races?
“Because they don’t understand (where the other person) is coming from. Someone bases things off their own viewpoints and perspectives. They don’t see the broader picture. They see things in certain media, but that may not be the exact truth.”
I followed up by asking Jared how he felt when he saw negative images portrayed in media that weren’t reflective of him, yet some people place him in that category because of the color of his skin.
“It saddens me because we are constantly portrayed as unintelligent misfits. Hardly ever do I see media outlets displaying all the good things we do for our communities.”
Shortly thereafter, Jared sent me a text with a picture of African-American actor Wendell Pierce. Included with the picture was a caption that read, “…Pierce, a native of New Orleans, has quietly built 75 homes in the historic African-American Pontchartrain Park neighborhood where he grew up. After Katrina he rebuilt his parents’ home, then his neighbors. …He plans on building 100 more homes.”
At this point in our conversation, I heard the resignation in Jared’s voice. Part of it, I joked, was because he had just gotten off work, was tired, and he is still getting used to working in the real world. The other reason he had resignation in his voice was probably because he is feeling the burden of injustice, discrimination and hatred. Those are very adult feelings, and now that Jared is an adult, he better be able to see things as they are, in their most raw form.
In seeing things in an authentic manner, I asked Jared if he is optimistic that things will improve for America in general and Blacks in particular.
“You try to put positive energy into the universe and hopefully it will come back and reflect positivity. But I really have no idea. If we keep going down the path we are going, it’s not going to end well for any of us. We — American citizens — overcame a lot of tragedies in the past. Blacks — we come so far but we are still so far behind. We still have work that we need to do. I wish we can all get together and realize that we won’t survive in the long run if all this violence keeps happening.”
Jared says he most often has his deep thoughts at night when he’s unable to sleep. “You just think about stuff,” he says. And it gets heavy at times.
As we wrapped up our conversation we discussed the upsurge in crime, not only in Indianapolis, but seemingly everywhere. Since many of today’s criminal offenders are in Jared’s age range, I was interested to know how he would encourage someone his age who was not an upstanding citizen to end the violence.
“If I could influence them, I would tell them to find something they are good at that is not street related. Try to grow their empire based off that instead of trying to get it off the street life. I would tell them you can make something of your life.”
By the end of our conversation, I had mixed emotions. I was proud of Jared’s evolution into manhood, and I felt reassured that he would be OK in life. But I was also sad that at such a young age, he had to deal with such ugly realities. Part of me wished he didn’t have to be exposed to the harshness of the world, however, the other part of me was proud of the fact that he is well on his way toward helping to combat the ills we currently encounter.
