Do you remember your first protest? I do. I was 18. It was my first day on the job, working the front desk at my dormitory. I was learning how to check visitors in and out, and dole out packages, toilet paper and cleaning supplies. When a group of my peers decided to protest me.
Little did I know that the front desk was the most coveted job on campus. You didn’t have to leave your dorm to work; you could work in your pajamas, study on the job, and see all of your fellow students.
No one on scholarship with me knew why Minority Student Services would make working the front desk a Multicultural Advancement Scholarship requirement. But I’m pretty sure I was only at that job so that students of color on college tours could see other students of color on campus. My presence at the desk was, in fact, both an affirmative action initiative and a desperate ploy to address dwindling enrollment.
That’s why, even though I wasn’t paid for the job, a wave of students rolled into the lobby to protest me, holding signs and chanting loudly: “1-2-3, he didn't pass the S.A.T. 4-5-6, affirmative action shouldn’t exist.”
They were making my job nearly impossible to do by keeping the line and stopping residents from checking out supplies. I hate to say this, but I wasn’t all that shocked to see those frat boys, dressed in tight red American Eagle polos, tighter white Tommy Hilfiger jeans, and blue boat shoes without socks.
Their theme song was, “I like girls who wear Abercrombie & Fitch/ I’d take her if I had one wish,” so, I wasn’t surprised to see their counterparts, those LFO “Summer Girls” at the protest too, in their cranberry crop tops, cream capri pants from The Gap, and blueberry blue sandals, again with no socks. What's up with the no socks?!
But I was absolutely gutted to see the only other Black person in my dorm, in her Juicy Couture red velour tracksuit and off-white Jordans, blurting out at me, “Affirmative action is reverse racism! They took our jobs!”
What in the name of Condoleezza Rice was happening?
I learned from my roommate that this girl’s name was Bertha. Bertha was the first Black student to receive the prestigious Leadership Institute scholarship, the first Black student to be president of the Young Republicans on campus, and the only Black student he’d ever known to sleep soundly with a framed picture of Ronald Reagan on her nightstand.
The protest raged on like the war on drugs for the rest of my shift. The tour guides avoided my dorm that day — I’m sure this wasn't the environment they hoped to showcase.
To top it off, no one was intervening with the protesters. Not my hall director, not my resident assistant, and not my hall council president. They all were too scared to do anything about it because, “Affirmative action is a hot-button issue,” “I don't want to end up on Fox News,” and “What would my family think!”
Worried that the protests would continue, I offered to switch to the 4-7 a.m. shift. Everyone thought this was a good idea because students rarely visited the desk that early.
Wrong! It almost worked, if not for Bertha! Shift after shift, Bertha came downstairs with her makeshift sign to protest me at four freaking o'clock in the morning. Thankfully she was so tired from waking up that early that she would often find herself not standing, but sitting in the comfort of our lobby couch. And if I was just quiet enough, her head would tilt back, and she’d fall fast asleep, finally releasing snores and not steam from her nostrils.
A few shifts later, I noticed Bertha was shivering. So, I left my post to put a blanket on her. This forced me to look at Bertha. And, for the first time, I could see the ocean waves of worry dance across her forehead; I could feel the weight of a submersible under blue eyeshadow, and I could taste the salt that fell from cloudy eyes. Maybe she’d been coming to see me the whole time — to be near me, the only other student in the building whose skin matched hers. I continued the act of wrapping Bertha up like a burrito throughout the rest of the semester.
A few days before fall break, during a cold early morning shift. I thought Bertha was sound asleep until I heard her say, “Thank you, Charles,” under her breath. And her words were so sincere, so damn vulnerable, they changed me. Bertha might not have ever liked me, but I can’t help but wonder how lonely and cold her semester would have been if an affirmative action initiative never gave me that front desk job.
Charles Payne is a Madison transplant, certified teacher, and self-taught social artist from Michigan. He has a master’s degree in education.
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