The Reverend Jesse Jackson paid a visit to the High School I was enrolled at when I was 16 years old. He was there promoting "Operation PUSH," an organization he was part of that promoted racial harmony.
He singled me out in the crowd at the assembly (which wasn't hard as I was one of nineteen or twenty white kids there, in a sea of 1,000 or so African Americans kids.
He said to me, our hands gripping each other, "I appreciate your support."
Back then I beamed, proud to have had a momentary contact with a man that had a large influence on the community in which I lived.
It took me years to realize he says that to everyone.
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