Walking Home Essay, Research Paper

Brian Dagenais

Mrs. Bartels

Period 1 English

13 February 2001

Walking Home

I was raised in a good a neighborhood. A neighborhood were people watched

other peoples kids to make sure they did not get into trouble or hurt themselves. I didn?t

even hear of people getting beat up or get hurt because of the color of their skin. My parents taught me not to judge a book by its cover or in other words not to judge a person

by the color of their skin but to judge a person by who they are in the inside.

When I got to middle school someone told me about ?Cracker Day?. He told me that it was the last day of the school year and was when African Americans beat on the white kids. At the time I thought it was myth or something you tell a new guy on campus to scare them. That all changed when I got to seventh grade.

It was the last day of school and it had just rained, it was moist in the air. I was

walking my girlfriend Missy home. She was in eighth grade at the time and she was

almost perfect. She was great looking and popular, funny but she wasn?t to smart.

When I got to her house she gave me my first french kiss. I was the happiest I had ever

been. I felt like I was on top of the world and nothing could bring me down or at least

that is what I thought.

I said goodbye and started walking home. I walked about a mile when I a notice a car that passed me by slowly a few times. It followed me for a couple of more blocks. Then it came to a stop and I looked around to see if anyone was around. There was no one and then I got real scared. I started walking faster. Four African Americans kids who are older and bigger than me got out of the car and started walking my way. Just when I was about to take off running, I heard one of the one say, ?Lets get the cracker!? I took

off running but I wasn?t fast enough to get away. One of them grabbed me and hit me so

hard that I hit the ground. They all surrounded me and stared calling me names like

?Cracker? but I didn?t hear them because I was too scared. I stared yelling but they said

they would hurt me more if I didn?t shut up. The only clear thought that I had was I am

going to die. I remember them kicking me and hitting me. Then I got knock out or I

passed out because I was so scared.

The next thing I can recall is, that I was in the hospital with a broken arm and

stitches on my chin. The cops told me how lucky I was that someone had called and told

them what was happening to me. Then they asked me did I know why the kids did this

to me? I didn?t know until I really thought about it for a while. Then it just it hit

like a pile of brinks. It was simple, they beat me up because I was white. All four guys

went to jail for a year. For a few mouths after that, I never walk home alone and it was real rare that you saw me alone anywhere outside, always afraid it might happen again. Feeling insecure where ever I went until it finally dawned on me that not every person thought the way those four guys do and there are a lot of really good people out there. I also learned that day that don?t matter how good your neighborhood is or what your parents teach you, there will always be racism and there is very little you can do to stop the way they think. I learned that racism come in every color. The most important lesson I learned was never to judge a person by the color of there skin.