From the Archives: The Color of Sand

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And onto the post for today. Viva la archives!

Can I tell y’all how the Malibenz is sick. She wouldn’t start. And then she did. Went to get gas and she wouldn’t start. Then she did. I’m hoping it’s just a battery. I was reminded that I have the same battery I had in her when I drove her off the lot…Five and a half years ago!!!

I’ve only had two men ever mentioned my shade of skin. There was one who said his family liked me more than his previous girlfriend because I was “light enough”. This would also be the same man who once parted my hair to see the natural texture stating, “Don’t want the kids to have nappy hair.” Before him, there was a darker man my freshman and sophomore year of college who, in about the first month we knew each other, said, “You’re the lightest girl I even been with.”

There’s also one particular conversation about color that sticks in my head. In 1999 I sat, receiver at my ear, as a women deliberated about letting a certain woman be in her wedding because, “Ugh, I mean, she’s my girl and all. But she’s so dark. She might mess up my pictures. I’m not paying all this money for a big ink spot to be in my shyt.” If you were to look in my photo albums, you’d see someone who always has on make-up that’s about two shades lighter than her skin. Boy does the difference show up in pictures. That would be her. And she doesn’t think her thought process is loony because she was taught, “Don’t be friends with dark-skinned girls. Watch ‘em cus they’re evil and sneaky.”

It wasn’t until I came to Washington, DC that the shade of a Black person’s skin seemed so important. When I was in high school, my two road dogs were Sharon and Joyce (fake names). To make a long story short, Joyce, to the untrained eye, could easily pass for white–blondest hair, bluest eyes. Sharon, it was rather obvious that she was something other than 100% Black. Skin the color of unfinished pine, light-brown eyes, and reddish-brown hair. And even with my rolling with them, the color thing never seemed to be an issue. Hell, until I got to Howard, I didn’t even know where light, brown, and dark began and ended.

This week I was talking to two linesisters separately and they both brought up this whole light/dark thing. One, S is undoubtedly dark and the other, T, is about my complexion. S’s boyfriend is also dark. They will marry and have dark children. And she shared with me how cruel kids are and how she is “concerned” for her own. Wow. In 2005? The other, T, lives in the deep south and thinks that her complexion has a lot to do with her being single and getting limited attention from men. Wow. In 2005? She says she gets past over for women who, aside from their light-bright-damn-near-white skin, are swamp donkeys. Which might be true because I have this one friend, she’s pale. I mean, damn near transparent. She’s over-weight. Fuggit!! She’s fat. And by most accurate accounts, looks like a bleached Ms. Piggy. But if you tell her she’s not the bee’s knees, she would think you’re just hating. Further, men specifically men from the islands and south, overlook her girth and snout. They cling to her like she’s an attainable Halle Berry.

I’ve seen Imitation of Life (both versions), School Daze, and Yellowman, the play. For the life of me, I just don’t get it. How can the complexion of a Black person’s skin still be such an issue in our generation? I know that it comes from slavery and what not when the mixed slaves were treated better. But really…Is there a ‘better’ when you’re a slave? Some worked in the house while others were even educated. I wonder how much of those benefits were due solely to their skin tone and not to them being related to the slave masters. I guess I’ll never know. Are we still getting benefits from white people based solely on our lightness or darkness? Or is this just one of those things we’ve hung on to? Are lighter Blacks seen as more attractive? Or is this something that has been drilled into the darker Blacks’ heads? I can’t tell. Maybe I’m just naive. Maybe it’s because I fit neatly between the two extremes.

People have tried to explain that it’s one of those nasty little things that one generation passes to the next. But isn’t it every generation’s job to notice that a stupid pattern of thought has been internalized? Therefore, isn’t it our generation’s job to look logically at the whole light/dark thing and see how ridiculous it is? So why is that not happening? Dark skin people who were ostracized as kids might take all that out on the random lighter person they meet (see groundless ‘issues’ Babs had with Sara on Making of the Band’s previous season).

Right now as you’re reading this, you know if you have issues. But just in case you don’t, ask yourself the following:

1. Do you classify someone’s level of attractiveness with the first two adjectived being ‘light’ or ‘pretty’/'long’/'good’ hair?


2. Do you say things like, “S/He’s fine for a dark girl/guy?


3. If you are a woman, do you assumes other women think their better than you simply because their skin is lighter than a paperbag?


4. When making jokes or insults, is skin color the first thing you go for?


5. Are you narrowing your mate pool to people of another race or light enough?


6. Does someone’s complexion translate to worth to you?

This is the part where I should say that everyone should get over it. But before we can get over it, I think we have to acknowledge that it exists. I don’t have any immediate ideas on how to clear up the whole light/dark thing.