times were simpler... slower... people engaged in person... people went out of their way for each other... society held each other accountable... I should have been born around 1918~1920 or so. or maybe 1945... to live in the heyday of this nation- and no, not everything was right there were things terribly wrong, but... it was better than the pure hate today.
my great uncle was born in the piedmont area of NC in the 1880's... he lived to 103 years old. i grew bored with him and his stories as a kid and i truly regret that. he KNEW former slaves and worked shoulder to shoulder with them in the mills... he grew up with their children... he was a white man from the other side of the tracks, literally, in burlington, and had connections from both sides. when his brother, who was a few years his senior passed somewhere in his 60's, the people in attendance of his funeral were numbered in the hundreds- from rich to poor and all colors of the spectrum.... he was known far and wide as a supremely fair man, just like his brother, and was sought out when things got squirrely between races, and that wasn't really race so much as an economic divide.
it was meddlers from outside that projected all the issues of race and came to town to fix them according to him. he said the money split the societies- and at a party on his side of the tracks race wasn't an issue.... neither was money... people took care of each other. they were wholly and completely disregarded by those who were wealthy, and even by those who found wealth after growing up on his side of the tracks. it was all about social status.
but things were simple. slower... people engaged in person... people went out of their way to help each other... it wasn't perfect... and i miss what i saw of the tail end of that, and i sure wish i would have listened to his stories more.
