When I heard about the 777 Writing Challenge, I thought “How hard can it be?” All I have to do is pick one of my MANY unfinished works in progress (WIP) and post 7 sentences from the 7th page appearing 7 lines down. My problem is that I am way too picky and every time I decided on a piece, I would find a reason not to post it. This has gone on for a few weeks now – so better late than never! Here goes…
Have you ever felt mistreated or victimized and no one came to your aid? It’s a terrible feeling of helplessness that can stay with you for years. The following is an excerpt from an essay called “The Token” that is written about the first time I experienced blatant racial prejudice as an adult. It seems so random to pluck a paragraph out of the middle of the piece, so here’s a little background. I was on my first job after graduating from college with a Masters of Business Administration (M.B.A.) degree and a 3.8 GPA to boot. However shortly after being hired, when I was introduced to an older white co-worker, he instantly replied “I’m glad to see tokenism is alive and well here at the airline”. To him, there was no way that I could be qualified for the job when I was actually over qualified. Looking at my brown skin, I couldn’t be anything more than a token – just a show piece.
When I told my supervisor about the pseudo apology from the old fart, he was satisfied and pronounced the case dismissed like a judge on the Supreme Court. I was totally disgusted and far from satisfied. There was a restlessness on the inside of my stomach that could not be calmed down like the Hulk was in there trying to get loose. I had to do something, or I would explode so I marched down the hall to the Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) office to file a complaint. The airline only had one Black vice president in the entire company and the EEO VP was it. Since he was Black too; I was confident that he would be my savior and my redeemer in this awful situation. Surely, he would understand how wrong I had been treated and I would be vindicated, right? Wrong. After recounting my verbal altercation with old fart in painstaking detail, the VP opened his script to the last page where my Supervisor left off and said, “I think it’s time for the healing process to begin.” Those words hit me like a ton of bricks. And, I knew then that I was out on a limb all by myself with no safety net and no one to come to my aid. To this day, over 20 years later, I hate to hear those words “Let the healing process begin” for any reason. I wanted to vomit all over his desk. Instead, I did what any self-respecting 20-something young lady would do who’s run out of options; I went into the ladies room and cried my eyes out.
Robin Writes 
Well written snapshot. The shame of the piece is that it is actually true! I wish I could say that I have not experienced the same treatment but I can’t. Perhaps there is a bit of cathartic relief when we are able to truthfully write about the mistreatment.
Thanks for taking the time to accept the 777 Challenge.
Hi Patricia, Writing is definitely cathartic for me. Thank you for taking the time to read the post and leave a comment. I hope that you are finding the time to continue to write. Take care!
Robin, I am writing a little. Recently, I created another blog on WordPress for my writing inspiration pieces.
Robin, I would love to read the article you talked about in class on Thursday evening. Let me know where I can get a copy or include me on your distribution list. I really didn’t understand if it is a blog post, book, article or another media means of distribution. Keep writing!
I will email it to you Patricia to get your feedback. It is an unpublished article. It could be a blog post, but I wanted to submit for publication first. It sounds like it might be too late for 2015, but I will still give it a try. Thanks for the encouragement. Will I see you Thursday? I hope so. Keep writing. 🙂