Bleeding Hearts

I am reading a book right now about a story that took place before the Civil War. It is about the son of a slave owner of a big plantation.

The son was a big disappointment to his Dad, for he believed the slaves should be treated as equal! He refused to give in to the belief that his Dad and others held about them.

One day he witnessed his black friend getting whipped, punished for stepping in to save his Mom from getting raped by one of the overseers.

He couldn’t stand to watch and he ran. Ran to the river, as he heard his friend’s screams. He sat there as it started to rain. It rained hard, like a torrential rain, and he sat there drowning. He didn’t mind the rain, he was drowning in a sea of pain!

That part of the book just really got to me I can’t imagine how life was back then.

Pain for the numerous black families torn apart from each other and for the unimaginable they endured!

Pain for another group as well. For the whites who didn’t want to be in the family they were in. Who saw the wrong being done and felt all mixed up inside but didn’t know what to do. Didn’t know what to do, for though they were constantly being told one thing, their heart was telling them something else.

I once had a dream that I still vividly remember. I was being chased through the street by a mob. They wanted to lynch me. They wanted to lynch me for I was black. I remember the strong fear I felt as I ran and the desperate rubbing of my face and arms wanting to be white again.

I didn’t know how I became black. One minute I was riding in the bus as a white person and the next minute I turned black as soon as I stepped off the bus and that’s when the mob saw me.

I was screaming and thinking how unfair this was for I couldn’t do anything about my color. I frantically prayed to be white and finally I woke up and I was out of breath. Yes, I got up to look in the mirror, for the dream seemed so real.

For just the few moments of a dream I felt the sting of prejudice and it was horrible! Nobody should have to be ashamed of who they are!

I worry about racial tensions being on the rise again. I long for people to realize how similar we all are, instead of being so caught up in the differences!!

We all have hearts that want to be loved and accepted. We all have hearts that can break and when we bleed we all have red blood.