A Beautiful World

When I was a teenager in the mid 70’s, I just got out of my car and started walking up Main Street in my home town of Grand Junction, Colorado, when I saw the most beautiful, little 3-4 year-old-girl. I’d never seen a child with such beautiful hair, coloring and features. Her parents were a young mixed-race couple, both beautiful individuals, but their child could melt your heart.

At that time in Grand Junction and the surrounding communities, the population consisted of, mainly, Caucasians then Hispanics. There were very, very, very few Asians or Blacks. At my high school, Central High just outside of town, I could count the number of Asians and Blacks on one hand. I didn’t think much about it, at the time, but I did try to search out friendships with other ethnicities.

Growing up in the 50’s and 60’s, on the TV I watched all the racial unrest in the South – the hatred, the protests, the speeches, the killings. It was something I just didn’t understand.

When I saw that beautiful, little girl, I didn’t think “mixed race;” instead, I fanaticized at how beautiful the world would be if we were all a blended race and culture. Then, no one could hate someone else simply because of the color of their skin.

As I’ve grown older, I still don’t understand the hate of racism. I now know that having a blended world race would not make the world a beautiful place. Beauty is not how we look on the outside. Beauty resides inside each and every one of us; it just resides deeper in some. Some of the most beautiful people in the world have a rough exterior, but enough kindness and sympathy to wrap the world in love.

Today, my beautiful world would begin with a human race that accepts each other without regard to race, ethnicity, gender, financial status, or religious affiliation. That acceptance would eliminate the “radical” hate and religious groups because they wouldn’t have a foundation on which to stand.

Yes, that would be the beginning on my Beautiful World, true acceptance of the rainbow of beautiful brothers and sisters around the globe.