Martin Luther King Day

So today is Martin Luther King Day, which does mean something a little more than there is no mail delivery today. It means the Timberwolves are playing at noon, so finally I get to see a game that my husband is missing because he's working.

In all seriousness, my older son is eight now, so I figured he was old enough to have a real discussion about who MLK was and why he is important. I hit my all-time favorite source for anything, wikipedia.org, where I found a complete transcript of the "I have a dream" speech as well as a Real Player video version of the entire speech. Up until this point, I think the most I've ever seen was just the very end of it. It's well worth seeing the entire ten minute speech (who doesn't have ten minutes?) to appreciate what a powerful orator MLK was. But you'll want to have that transcript handy, some of it is a bit hard to hear.

I had to pause the speech a few times to explain segregation, discrimination, and the civil rights movement. Aidan nods along, yes he understands what I'm explaining, and listens to the whole speech (which is a long time for him to sit still, particularly since it was a challenge to make out the words).

As usual with these teaching moments, it all came crashing down. We only had a halfday of school so Mom could watch the game, and of course the sportscasters are observing the holiday by interviewing players and coaches about what MLK means to them. Aidan watched them talking to the Timberwolves coach Dwayne Casey:

And Aidan says to me, "So, is that a black man?"

See, when I was talking about segregation and discrimination and the civil rights movement I had neglected to defined the terms "white" and "black". I can understand his confusion, looking around his world it doesn't look like two distinct groups. He has a cousin of mixed race. The kids he plays with at the park come from all over the world. He's played with kids from Russia and Chile and India as well as China and Africa (quite a few with parents that don't speak English). He sees a lot more diversity than I ever did at his age, and I went to a public school. He doesn't see two distinct groups; he just sees a spectrum of colors.

I think Martin Luther King would have liked that.

Oh yeah, and go Wolves!