I guess I'm not meant to understand

I don't get the fences and barriers we put up between us. It seems like the more possibilities there are for sameness, the more we try to find our differences and put ourselves in these little cubbyholes.

I do it, I'm guilty.

Black. White. Asian. Republican. Democrat. Christian. Jew. Muslim. American. Everyone else. Likes dogs. Likes cats. Hates all living things. Has an mp3 player. Drives an SUV. Drives a hybrid. Vegetarian. Carnivore. Skinny. Fat. Oily skin. Dry skin. Pretty people. Ugly people. Party people. Librarians. Librarians who party. Pro-choice. Pro-no-choice. Gets their news from The Daily Show. Gets their news from Fox. Left-handed. Right-handed. Gay. Straight. Confused.

I just get the most frustrated with the racial labels My neighbor going on about a young man visiting her daughter. The young man is going to a school that is predominantly black and when he comes to visit he sighs "It's so nice to be around white people." My grandmother talking about my uncle's wife and saying that "she may be black but she's a good woman." As if this is normally exclusive. My husband saying that I take these things too seriously. Or live with my head in the sand or something.

I get that we like to be around people who are like us. But it never fails to frustrate me. Even in my own behavior. I'm not any better -- I just reach a teeny bit outside of my own box. But even I for all of my soap-boxing have no close friends who are truly different from me.

And why not?

I guess it's the comfy blanket. It's easier to wrap yourself in views that are the same as yours, so you can comfort yourself in their authenticity. No matter how crazy we think the other guys way of thinking or acting or being or doing is, he thinks the same thing about us. We think we have it down. We think our way is the best and if only he had it like we did, then it would all be good.

Don't you think he thinks that too?

I just don't understand what it's going to take for us to all be on this same page. How does it start? Does it just have to ebb away gradually over time? In another 2000 years, will we finally see that we all have one thing in common across the board --

we all think we are right.