Happy Juneteenth!

June 19, 2025

A happy Juneteenth everybody! I know it still has that "new smell" as far Federal Holidays go, but it is, indeed, a Federal Holiday. It celebrates the day that the United States of America put its big-boy pants on and did the right thing for once. It ended the practice of Slavery and ushered in a new era where, get this, people couldn't buy and sell humans and work them to death legally anymore! Huzzah! What a concept!

If you ask me, I feel that this is just as important as Memorial Day, Independence Day and Veteran's Day to name a few. Because few, is all we have here in the United States of America. (At least the ones we actually get off of work) Before Juneteenth became a Federal holiday, we only had 10 officially. That sickens me when you compare us to other nations that have dozens! Nations that know that a rested and happy worker is a productive worker. Or a worker who feels appreciated, or is honored. Like that one day we get in September...that pat on the back for working your ass off all year. So, hey, another Federal holiday...especially one that celebrates one of our Nation's most historic actions...I'll gladly take it. But there are others that are so aghast at the notion of celebrating people of color and their plight, that they lash out in anger over it.

There is nothing that irritates me more than the knuckleheaded, Fox News watching white folk who feel the need to not only poke fun at this new holiday, but seem to think it's totally okay to just spout off insanely racist things about it. The first one I heard was at the deli counter when a man tapped me on the shoulder and said, "like they don't have enough to celebrate already, now they have a day for it?!" Really dude? That's really how you feel about things? What if my wife was black? Or my kids mixed raced? You have no idea who I am. Just because I'm a white dude waiting for a half pound of roast beef I'm a racist scumbag just like you? Asshole.

It's the same people who drone on and on about another Federal Holiday that has the nerve to celebrate another man of color, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Why? Why do people feel this way? When I was still tending bar many moons ago, I had to deal with these people on a daily basis. The hardest part was zipping your lip, putting your head down and pretending like you didn't hear it. When you work on tips, this is something you had to do. It was awful. I can recall having a customer that came in every day with his mistress (yes, mistress, this guy was a gem) and he would walk into the restaurant and boldly proclaim "Happy N****r Day Everybody" every Martin Luther King Jr. Day. I wanted to punch him in the face, but I couldn't.

I really wish people would be a little more tolerant towards their fellow man, whether it be differences in color, race, creed, sex or religion. Seriously people, what the fuck? Why is it so hard for people to just be decent to each other and respect the differences in one's color or customs or traditions. We're all human beings for crying out loud. And for those of you who seem irritated and uncomfortable with a Federal Holiday that freed black people from slavery, keep this in mind...that happened in the year 1865. That really wasn't too long ago.

Think of it this way...if a slave was 10 years old in 1865 and lived 100 years, that means that if you are part of Generation X, your parents were in high school when that person died. That's just a little more than six generations ago. It may seem like something you might read about in a dusty old history book, but it's really not that long ago! The house I'm living in right now was built in 1830, so it was 35-years-old when slavery was officially eradicated here in the States. Which means at some point, depending on who owned this place, it's possible slaves once lived here in my house. Crazy when you think about it.

For once, put your self in the shoes of person of color. Walk a mile and see how it feels. When at the dinner table you see a child crying because somebody in school bullied them and said awful things only because they had the audacity to not be white! Or your grandmother telling stories about how her mom was owned by another human. Living in a tar paper shack with no running water on plantation and forced to pick cotton in the southern heat for 12 hours a day and not get paid for it. Or how about having to go to an inner city school with no funding and 50-year-old books because you made the mistake being born in a bad neighborhood and not some privileged white bred county where the high school might as well be a University?

Do it, I dare you. Maybe then you might not be so awful with your ignorance and your hatred on the next Juneteenth. I plan to raise a glass and celebrate it. Celebrate my friends of color who grew up here in a sea of white people saying and doing awful things to them and managing to keep their heads high. To be the better person and not let some racist scumbag ruin their day, or impede them in anyway. I can't even begin to tell you how insanely brave you all had to be, and still have to be. As we still have to deal with the troglodytes who spout their hatred. Happy Juneteenth everybody. I hope this had been informative.