Two cherished songs we learned in Sunday School were “Jesus Loves Me” and “Jesus Loves the Little Children.”
“Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight” sent me straight to my crayon box.
The white crayons didn’t match me.
The black crayon didn’t match Annie, our beloved housekeeper, and no one was red or yellow.
Mother explained the colors were symbols for people around the world.
The deeper point emerged, we are to love God and everybody else, too, a choice for the heart.
Often watching Annie make a sandwich for Joe, her truck driver husband, I enjoyed visits with him on the back porch, learning about all the places he had seen.
I wanted to invite my friend inside for dinner with us, but our tiny Delta town near the Mississippi River labeled everyone as either black or white.
Although Mother and Annie were skeptical, Mother finally agreed to let me have dinner with Joe one night.
We sat on the back steps one evening.
Inside, Daddy asked, “Where is Lonnie?”
He later called, “Come on in Lonnie, we are having dinner.”
I answered at the screen door, “No thank you, I’m having dinner with Joe.”
After several tries, Daddy finally gave up.
We had a peaceful protest, with no hatred, anger, violence, nothing damaged and nobody harmed.
If a 5-year-old could pull that off decades ago, 21st century so-called adults could do that, too.
Lonnie Oglesby
Port Angeles