Often, when I am on my tours for seesomeworld.com, I am the only Black person present other than guards or cashiers at the venue. It is what it is.
So. I'm at the [redacted] Museum in Miami and there are two guards argue- whispering playfully. It's a heated discussion and they are laughing quietly. I've worked retail. I know the drill. I pay it no mind and keep looking.
I'm walking out of the exhibit when the guard says, "Miss, excuse me, Miss?" I turn around. He asks if I can come closer. My first thought: Is there a stain on my dress?
I go over, preparing to be mortified.
He says, can I ask you a question? I say, sure. He says, in Kings of Comedy, when Bernie Mac is talking about the kids, which kid says, "him downstairs?"
I start laughing because he don't know me, and I don't know him. And he didn't ask me if I've seen Kings of Comedy or if I know who Bernie Mac is or if I've heard this joke, because I'm black and he's black, so this is somehow a given.
The other guard nearby, a woman, loud whispers, "it was the little boy, right?"
I laugh. The male guard says, "no, it was the girl, right?"
Me: It was the girl. Cause the little boy wanted the milk and cookies. And he couldn't get it because Bernie was downstairs. The little girl told him he was downstairs.
Another guard, down the hall guarding a different exhibit, loud whispers: "what'd she say? It was the boy, right?"
Now, I'm loud whispering, down the hall back to her: "no, the girl!"
The male guard: "Miss, please could you do me a favor? We can't use our phones on duty. Can you watch the video and tell me? We've been arguing about this all day. I KNOW I am right. Please?"
I tell him I'll do it and be right back because now I want to know!
The lady down the hall beckons me to her exhibit since so no one is in there, and I pull up the video and play it without headphones.
Without going to YouTube, who said, "him downstairs?" The boy or the girl?