My Partner, His Privilege

Happy November. The month of thanks. The month where it is truly supposed to feel like fall around these parts, and the month of my anniversary with my partner. We have almost been together for seven years. Seven years of friendship, of partnership, and disgustingly romantic, saccharine moments that would make even the writers of Disney Princess movies of old barf up their breakfast. There is a beautiful bubble in which we live in harmony and in domestic pre-martial bliss. In this beautiful bubble, we watch Disney movies while eating pizza on the couch, we cuddle for three hours on Saturday morning, and we slow dance with each other as breaks between our respective evening studying. But outside of this bubble is where our problems surface. Outside of this bubble, we have to deal with the realities of our relationship dynamic. The realities that are rooted in but not limited to, his white cis hetero male class privilege, my daily anxiety that comes from the standing at the intersection of Black and Woman, and our vastly different family background dynamics that go way beyond race. I have lived with the burden of my partner's privilege for a very long time. It is not his fault or his choosing that he doesn't have to worry about getting stopped by the police, walking to his car at night, or worrying that he has to change his dress and speech to give himself a fighting chance for a job opportunity that he is extremely over qualified for. People assume that he is intelligent, competent, and valuable just for being white. I am a brown skinned Black Woman and although I have some privileges due to my class, education level and perceived attractiveness, I can not afford to not be on my best behavior. I have to work three times as hard in the hopes that I will earn 1/3 of what I deserve. Preparing to meet my partner's family for the first time was such a traumatic anxiety inducing time for me. I agonized over the state of my hair, my outfit choice for weeks. When one meets one's partner's family, there are expectations on both sides. But when you add race to the model things get far more complicated. I know that my partner's parents did not anticipate him ever bringing home a non-white woman, let alone BlackWoman. From what my partner told me, they had very few experiences with people of color and oh "they were kind of racist". And so in February of 2010, when we were driving down 95 N, I could not understand why my partner dismissed my complaints and heart palpitations. How could he be so nonchalant? But now, I know better. It was his privilege. He was completely blind to what I was going through and it hurt me to my core. Fortunately, the first few meetings with his family went well and many years later through work, communication and understanding, I include them as chosen family until they officially my family through my marriage. Did my partner help me? Absolutely not. The reason his mother and I have a great relationship filled with respect and understanding is because I did the fucking work. I reached out to her, I called her, I spent time talking to her for hours. And you know why? Because that is what my family taught me. When you are serious about someone, when you begin to entertain the slightest possibility of marrying them, you get to know their family, you get to know their close friends. Because when you love someone you learn to love the people who loved them before you. My partner and my father despise one another and this deeply hurts me. To be fair, my own previous complications with my father in the context our separate relationship did not help the situation, but my partner could have always chosen to put in the work. Just like I did with his mother, his father, his sister, his childhood best friend, etc. But again, my partner's privilege. He does not have to do anything that he does not want to do. He does not have to see anyone he doesn't want to see and he carries no guilt about it. When my partner goes with me to see my family, it is a whole different ball game. My family is not casual about our reunions. We show up with pressed clothes, we speak cordially and respectfully. We like to take pictures. When we invite someone into our space, we come correct. This what we have been taught. This is what is expected. Speaking of appearances. Let's talk about our physical dynamics. And, forgive me, but I am going to be very frank. This is a following of paraphrased opinions that have given to me to my face and behind my back. My partner is short, hairy, and about average weight (Hollywood would say he is pudgy) pale skinned with dirty blonde hair and hazel eyes. I am above average height, symmetrical in the face, slender with brown skin and dark brown eyes. Outside of my father's polarizing opinions, many people have said that I am out of his attractiveness league. Black men especially older black men often give me looks ranging from shock to extreme disappointment. Their frowns and eye brow raises seem to say: How on earth can a woman of such good stock settle for so much less?  And yes I am well aware of the hypocrisy and misognoir that belie their stares. I do not inherently belong to anyone but myself, but the stares and disapproval still hurt sometimes. My partner's uniform is a geeky relaxed fit graphic tee, and distressed jeans. Doesn't matter if its June or January. Unless I ask him to put on a nice shirt, or we are attending a wedding, this is him. As for me, my style can be described as quirky, whimsy feminine, like a Black Jessica Day. But back when we first started dating, I did not wear a full face of makeup, pencil skirts and fit and flare color blocked dresses. I dressed like him: graphic tees, and distressed jeans, sometimes even with holes in them. But my sense of style evolved as I got to know myself and discover how multifaceted I truly was. And you know what, I damn well like being dolled up! But I would be lying if I neglected to say that for me, wearing makeup, and looking chic was not a weapon of social survival because it is. Imagine if my white partner dressed like a J Crew model and I wore oversize graphic tees, old jeans and worn tennis shoes. People would perceive our dynamic a lot differently. I could imagine white women saying, wow. What a disappointment. He leaves our race with all of our inherent goodness with our women being the pinnacle of beauty and femininity for that piece of trash. Look, at that sad limp ponytail! Now imagine if this reversed dress dynamic happened at my partner's childhood best friend's rehearsal dinner party. In this scenario, my partner would have mortified because in reality I am still extremely mortified that he showed up dressed so casually. Every other man present was in a shirt and tie (some had blazers) all of the women were in pencil dresses or cocktail dresses. I was the only black person in the room who was not the waitstaff. There was extreme pressure on me to show up and show out. There was an unspoken understanding that our wedding is likely the next wedding that these people will attend. I am likely the next Bride that they will see walking down the aisle. So again, there was immense pressure on me to perform. I felt that by dressing nice I was showing respect and support to my partner, his best friends getting married and their respective families. Which now brings me to current state of our popped bubble. Yesterday I attended a very eye opening forum on police brutality with my fellow black graduate students. It was a conversation that was long overdue. The event started late (because isn't that what happens when black people plan events) and it went over due to the polarizing nature of the discussions. So, yes I am at fault for coming home later than expected and maybe I could have done a better job of communicating the change in schedule earlier. But, I did communicate, I did apologize for not being more expedient in communicating. However what I will NOT apologize for is seizing the opportunity to have engage in fellowship with my black colleagues and black mentors. It was a shame that more white people did not come to this event. But it all goes back to privilege. White people decide some event, some movie, or some place is too black and decide it was better for them to stay away. You know why that is? Because they have lived a life of privilege, of relative comfort (even the poorest whites have more privileges than their POC counterparts) and most importantly they have lived life as the majority. They live in a bubble just like my white partner. The bubble that says "things will get better eventually" "not everyone is like that" "I don't understand what race differences and gender experiences have to do with anything" "No one has a problem with me and I do not have a problem with anyone". And guess what, white people you are extremely fortunate. But what you do not know is that through systematic oppression through government and societal structure, is that POC have been forced to keep your bubble from being burst for hundreds, nay may even thousands of years. And so, to conclude, my partner can be upset about me being late to come home and shoddiness of my communication, but I have a right to be upset about his lack of empathy, his crippling privilege, and increasing indifference. I wish for once, he would protect my feelings. I wish for once he would open his eyes to my increasingly vocalized pain. The pain that comes from being raised in a broken home, the pain that comes from my crippling student debt, the pain that comes from being worried about my siblings as this country is continuing to look more like 1956 than 2016, the pain that comes from being reduced to a piece of ass by men who would not dare to bring me home to their mothers, the pain that comes from the misogyny and benevolent sexism inflicted upon me by my father, my grandfather, my cousins and uncles. the pain of having nightmares about my precious children being rejected and or exotified by antiquated societal expectations, and finally the pain that comes from always having to prove myself to be worthy of love, recognition and acceptance.