Dear editor:
I came back to the United States in 1973. It was the country of my birth, but one that I did not really know. My family had moved back to Italy for family and business when I was very young, but as a fledgling adult, I wanted to know the country of my birth better.
My mother's parents lived in Florida and offered to help pay tuition to a small Catholic school in central Florida. In those days, the area was still very much "The South": rebel flags a flyin'; jacked up muscle cars and a church of choosing on every corner.
A fellow student gave me a tour of the area. Culture shock set in. At the "walk in" movie theater, there were two lines to get in, front door for whites, side door for blacks. The local game room and lounge (a concept I was completely unfamiliar with) was exceptionally boring. Half asleep drunks hunched over glasses of beer. But from the backroom behind the bar, I could hear guitar, banjo and harmonica music. "Let's go back there" I said. "No, you can't, it's only for the coloreds."
Hmm. I had heard something about civil rights and segregation and riots, etc., but from across the Atlantic, it had sounded like that was all settled. Guess not.
The pinnacle of my education though came when we went to the local, quintessentially American cafe. Long counter with chrome spinning stools, a few booths and coffee perpetually brewing. Behind the counter a griddle sizzled with bacon, ham and eggs under the watchful eye of a sepia-toned profile of Jesus. At the end of the counter, an elderly (I was 18, he was probably 40) black man was finishing his breakfast.
When he left, the waitress, probably the owner, took his plates, cup and utensils and threw them in the trash. In my incredulity, I asked why she discarded perfectly good items. She sighed and gave me an answer I can never forget, "I know I have to serve them now, but there is just something you can't wash off."
So lately when I hear certain "Christians" shaking Bibles and demanding religious freedom laws allowing them to refuse service to people of their choosing, I think back to that little cafe. I wonder, did the owners hang on to their "No Coloreds" signs and has this latest religious freedom fervor raised their hopes of dusting them off and nailing one back under the sepia-toned profile of Jesus?
Mario Caruso
Hot Springs
Editorial on 04/28/2016