Fitting In by Not Fitting In

I applied to the Xposure Journalism Workshop in March, was accepted in April, and attended from June 10 to 21 2007. It used to be called the Dow Jones Minority Journalism Workshop, but the program lost its sponsorship, changed names, and started accepting everyone. When I arrived on the Western Kentucky University campus, for registration and a meet-and-greet, I wasn’t paying attention to the other workshop participants. At the barbeque party the workshop directors threw for us I noticed, amidst the smoke of the grill and the plates of hotdogs and hamburgers, something that immediately set me apart from everyone else: my lack of melanin.

It’s okay, I thought. I can get along with anyone, no matter the race.

After the barbeque party, we made the trek to the residence hall we would call home for two weeks. I hung back from the rest of the group, silently contemplating how I would try to fit in. I used to have this habit of developing personas based on the people around me, so that I would be accepted. As I combed through all the personas I had used in the past, I came across one I had never used: myself. Over the course of the workshop, I came to the realization that this “persona” was the best I had ever used.

When my roommate, Johnathan, and I got to our room, we unpacked and talked. His heritage was black and Hispanic; mine wasn’t. We had so many similar interests though: a common affinity for Japanese culture, similar musical tastes, and a shared appreciation for writing. We were different, but nobody would be able to tell if they had heard us talking that night.

The next day, I became more acquainted with the other workshop participants. We talked over eggs and bacon in the morning, in the class room in between lectures, and in the cramped rooms of the residence hall. That first official day of the workshop was an almost non-stop gabfest. The workshop directors thought it was because we had to write profile articles on one another, but it was more than that.

The following day, during the time I wasn’t listening to a lecture or writing, I talked to Johnathan and two girls. Nirasha and Tiffany were their names, and just like with Johnathan, I learned we had similar interests.

A few days later, after a week of nonstop listening and writing, we used our Friday evening to go to the mall. Johnathan and I, along with another boy I had come to talk with frequently named Daniel, traversed the mall together. We looked like the strangest mixture of people but we knew that we were really one homogenous group. We were different, but nobody would be able to tell if they had seen who we really were.

Two days later, on Sunday, Johnathan, Nirasha, Tiffany, Daniel, and all the other workshop participants decided to hold a prayer service, in lieu of going to church. I didn’t attend because I didn’t normally attend church or other prayer services. That fact didn’t alienate me from them, or lower their respect for me. Everyone understood that even in a group as tight as ours, we wouldn’t always be exactly the same.

As the workshop was coming to a close we began preparations for our goodbyes. We could hear them rattle around in our brains; they kept coming close to our lips, but we didn’t let them out yet. Our bodies started bracing themselves for embraces, and our eyes dammed up our tear ducts for the eventual torrent.

Before the workshop I had rarely truly been myself. Johnathan, Nirasha, Tiffany, Daniel, and everyone else in the workshop brought out who I really am. We had shared interests, common experiences, and similar personalities, but we were different in several ways. Race was the difference I had immediately noticed at the barbeque, but there were other diversions. Those differences didn’t matter though, because those differences are what made us get along so well. We all managed to fit in by not fitting in with each other.

And in the end, we were different, but nobody would be able to tell if they had watched us those twelve days.

By Noah Frederick