Love is (color)Blind

The older I get, the more I notice that less and less Filipino guys approach me. I told my homie this and he asked what race usually does, and I said African American. Yet, the last dude I dated was Italian. Which is funny, because although I could care less what ethnicity you are as long as you're good looking, I do have an affinity for Latin guys.

But that's beside the point. The conversation eventually sparked a more in-depth one regarding interracial dating, and our observation of how certain races tend to gravitate towards others, i.e. Blacks and Filipinos. After some brainstorming that was reminiscent of my days at SF State, we came up with what I thought was a fair, and well conceived explanation (although I'm sure not a breakthrough) that was broken down into three layers as followed:

The most obvious and superficial layer of them all: appearance. Not of the actual person themselves, but more so what they choose to adorn themselves with. The clothing, shoes, hair, makeup, body art, etc. While people may not be attracted to the familiar, they are definitely more comfortable with it and more inclined to approach them due to the assumption of having similar interest, which is the second layer. 'Cuz if I'm wearing Js and he's wearing Js, there's a possibility we may both be fans of basketball. And if he has tats and I have tats a good ice-breaker might be, "Nice ink, who's your artist?" Now if you want to take the similarities even further, it brings us to the third layer of cultural upbringing. The reasons why we like certain foods, attend the same functions, enjoy the same sports, watch the same movies, buy the same brands, live in the same areas, go to the same schools, and have experienced the same types of discrimination even though we are of different ethnicity (I could elaborate some more but the third layer can be a post on its own lol).

Now, the above obviously is not fact. It's just what I've noticed, and what many I have asked agreed with in reference to growing up in the cosmopolitan we live in. And it all makes sense until you come up to me based on the fact that my nose is pierced, and am wearing a Crooks cardi and Tims (unlaced, tongue out of course) only to find that I'm 29, bumping Brooks and Dunn on the Ipod, and on my way to lacrosse practice. Because some people are more than meets the eye, and real love looks beyond the facade.

That probably sounds like an overly optimistic thing to say considering that there is still racism in the world today. But I've been blessed to have a family that doesn't care about that, and lucky enough to not have experienced the scrutiny of interracial dating. I love seeing "unlikely" couples together because it shows that their love for each other is beyond physical appearance.

I feel that love is so hard to find in the world, that when you do find it, it should be cherished regardless of who you find it with whether they be black, white, brown, or purple with polka-dots. The men I've loved are all different. Yeah, they may all have worn 50/50 fitteds, and listened to hip-hop, but the similarities end there. The main thing they possessed was ambition. They all had a passion, thus, I had a passion for them. One that went deeper than where they were born, how they were raised, or the color of their skin.