Experiencing Bigotry

During the 70's at the age of three my mom and I were new to this country. My Filipino father had brought us over from the Philippines. We didn't have a car at first and when my mom and I wanted to go out we simply walked to the shopping center nearby while my dad was at work. One of the stores we'd frequent was People's Drug. Mom would sometimes treat us to a meal or a piece of pie at the counter. Once when we sat down next to a much older man, he looked at us with contempt most likely because we weren't white or like him; and mind you I was an adorable little girl that many fawned over. I don't actually remember the incident, but my mother has brought it up through the years. This bigoted man actually got up--and moved. How sad that not even a cute little toddler could warm this man's heart. And little did that man know that my father was serving the United States Navy and was a Vietnam  Vet. My father had brought us here so we could have a better  life, the American Dream, just like that man's ancestors did. We lived in Portsmouth, Virginia and in Navy housing at the time. I have much fondness of those places and time in spite of what happened and any racism I encountered later. I was my daddy's girl and my mother's too. And together along with my brother we made a life here in Virginia.

Olivia McGuire

Author's Note
My father died several years later from cancer when I was just ten. I am a published author and have been published in Medical Literary Messenger, The Arizona Republic and Phoenix Gazzette, and Cafe Eighties.