Hey World, Meet Jan
Jan Foreman has long since gone to her reward. She wasn't famous by any stretch of the imagination, so you're forgiven for not knowing who she was. But once upon a time she did something amazing that changed the whole direction of her life (for the better, I might add). She spent her life (with her equally lovely spouse, Chuck), working to make the world a better place for others. For a big chunk of time, they worked in India as a Christian missionaries. When I tell you that, I'm aware that missionary work has, in many cases, a problematic history. But if you knew Jan and Chuck, you would understand that their efforts were not focused upon the conversion of others, but upon making the life's of the disadvantaged folks they worked alongside better. Theirs was a calling of service and not one of proselytism.
When I first met the Foremans, they were an elderly couple in my church. She was of short stature, plump, and slightly stooped. By contrast, Chuck was ramrod straight, tall, and thin as a rail. They were effortlessly kind, and carried themselves with a modest sort of elegant dignity. It was impossible not to like them.
The story I want to share with you concerns a decision Jan made in her late teens. I found myself thinking about her experience while I was considering the steady stream of hateful, misguided comments and legislation directed at transgender folks that is sweeping this country like a "Beatlemania" of toxic ignorance.
Jan came of age in a small Ohio town in the 30s and 40s. It was very cloistered, and it was very white. Another word might be racist. In any event, when she was 18, her church youth group went on a mission trip to Newark, New Jersey. Before she left, her father pulled her aside and said: "If there are any of 'those' people there, you call me and I'll come get you." In this particular case, you can probably guess that 'those' meant people who were Black. Jan, purely a product of her upbringing at this point of her life, said she would.
Well, you can guess what happened next. There sat Jan, in some church basement in Newark, surrounded by 'those' people. She found herself struggling with what to do. On the one hand, she had the indoctrinated hatred of her upbringing, based on ignorant hearsay, but on the other she found herself liking the Black youths she was meeting. In her telling of this story she always reflected upon how her experience with her new friends was so different than what she had been told to expect.
Would she call her father or not?
Jan: This tiny, young ,white woman from small town Ohio - who had been fed a steady diet of vitriolic stupidity about Black people all her life - decided not to call her father. She stayed in Newark and made new friends whose skin was a different color than hers.
I've often wondered what might have happened to Jan had she called her father. Would she have become the wonderful, big hearted, generous soul that I met in the twilight of her years? A person who toiled to make the world a better place for others? We'll never know. But in a moment of choice, she allowed herself to be swayed by her own experience rather than falling back on bullshit lies. I've explained my experience as a trans person on this blog ad nauseam for a variety of reasons. One of which is that someone who has never met a trans person might recognize my humanity. And perhaps begin to understand that I'm a person not much different than them. The challenges we each face might be different, but the trying to overcome them is often very similar.
So world, I encourage you to be like Jan. Embrace new experiences, allow yourself to learn new things, and maybe allow preconceptions - based on nothing but fear and ignorance - to be washed away.
