On Change

We experience life through a microscope. An extreme closeup that’s hard to step away from. Things blend together. Days blur into weeks and months and years. And somewhere in all that, we stop noticing that the world around us is changing.

But it’s changing.

I met a racist couple the other day. They stopped me as I was clearing dishes, that third plate wobbling nervously on my forearm. They told me they were from Sydney, and wasted no time explaining how their city had gone to shit. Apparently, it was because of the immigrants. All the damn immigrants. The houses and neighborhoods of their youth were gone, replaced by tenements and apartment complexes where foreigners were crammed in shoulder to shoulder. Gaudy public buildings where they sat glassy-eyed through pointless English classes. Restaurants that wouldn’t recognize Australian cooking if it crawled, covered in weetbix, down their throats while they slept.

‘When I was a kid it was Greeks and Italians.’ The gentleman of the couple was older, late 70’s. He had a piece of corn stuck to the side of his mouth that I kept thinking was going to fall off but never did. ‘The Europeans assimilated. They became Australian. Adopted our way of life. They learned the bloody language. These new immigrants? They’re all Chinese. Indian. They live here for years and don’t speak a word of English. They’re taking it over. That’s what they’re doing. They’re taking Sydney over.’

I stood and listened like a good little hospitality worker until my fake smile was wavering as much as my plates. Eventually I managed to escape, but what he said stuck with me.

They’re taking Sydney over.

As if Sydney had been co-opted. As if the city could have been protected if only it was walled off from outside influence. It made me think of my own country. The countless Americans who would see a wall built to separate us from our neighbors to the South. As if that would keep people away. As if that could keep things how they are or return them to the way they were, frozen in polished, golden amber just the way we liked it. The old man had this idea ingrained so deep in his mind it was like a vault, and he allowed himself to crawl inside it and curl up, so anything different made him bitter. Had him bitching to the waitstaff and clinging to the impossible like that kernel of corn stuck to his saggy, waggling mouth.

I wanted to tell him the healthiest dogs aren’t purebreds, they’re mutts. I wanted to tell him the healthiest forests aren’t made up of one single breed of tree. It’s variety makes a forest healthy. In my opinion, it’s variety that makes societies healthy too. We’ve seen what happens when one idea gets pushed too far. Stalinism. McCarthyism. Different opinions are what tempers ideas into manageable shapes. Chips away the weak spots until it becomes something beneficial for the whole.

If you didn’t know, I’m getting ordained next summer so I can perform a wedding; maybe that’s why this post is so preachy. And I know that 600 words is an oversimplification. But for fuck’s sake guys, the world changes. Cultures shift. The world isn’t going to be dominated by white males for much longer, and I for one, am excited. We’ve had our chance and look what we’ve done with it. Nothing stays the same. Learn to embrace it.

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