More from the NEPIW

Here's another tale from the NEPIW (northeastern post-industrial wasteland):

In the month before I moved from the NEPIW, I lived at a friend's apartment while I packed and cleaned mine. One day, I went by my apartment to check the mail. I met up with the crazy landlord. My landlord had enlisted me as his confidante almost as soon as I'd moved into the building. The fact that I didn't cause problems and didn't question his unapologetic politically incorrect comments made him believe that I was "just like him" - a characterization that still makes me cringe. I realize that I should have revealed my liberal stripes and confronted his politically incorrect statements. I know I should have. But I was selfish. I wanted to hear just how outlandish his comments would become. He didn't disappoint.

He was cleaning Smokey Smokerson's apartment - and I got to hear all about it, whether I wanted to or not. While she lived in the non-smoking building, Smokey smoked. She smoked enough that the smoke penetrated through walls and multiple floors to reach my 3rd floor apartment. Rather than move to a building where she could smoke freely, Smokey tried to contain the smoke in her apartment by sealing off her front door. I'm not sure what Smokey's lung x-rays looked like, but I'm guessing there was a lot of smoke on them. Smokey finally moved out of the non-smoking building but not before she yellow-ed up her entire apartment. I know because I heard all about it.

Desperate to change the subject before my landlord shared more inappropriately intimate details about Smokey and her apartment, I mentioned that I broke a few pipes at my friend's apartment over the weekend. Long story. The short version is that I'm an idiot and hit the garage wall as I backed out with my driver's side door open. I'd relate the longer story, but it involves an iPod, FM transmitter, and lots of humidity - and all those details only take us further away from the upcoming punchline. My friend's landlord was very good about fixing the damage, keeping a sense of humor throughout the whole ordeal. When I finished telling this story to my landlord, he replied, "Gee, he sounds like a really nice guy. Is he Chinese?"

I stared at him for a moment, blindsided, hoping he'd explain this seeming non-sequitor. When he stared back at me, honestly waiting for an answer, I learned more about the workings of my landlord's brain than I ever wanted to know. As he worked night and day to shore up the faltering walls around his carefully constructed corner of the world, it seems that somehow "Chinese" people became "really nice." I'm not sure why I responded at all, but I said, "No, my friend's landlord is from here." I could see the wheels spinning as my landlord tried to process this information. Someone who wasn't Chinese was willing to complete a distasteful task and remained cheerful throughout. I think he's still trying to process this information.

This is why racism is so tricky. You have to be willing to throw all logic out the window, because the person you're confronting is way ahead of you on that score. But, without logic, how do you make an argument? And what would my counterargument be? That Chinese people aren't nice? That people from the NEPIW are nice, just like Chinese people? And then there's the characterization itself. I think my landlord believed that he was complimenting Chinese people, because he said they were "nice." But, seemingly positive characterizations can still be problemmatic, particularly when paired with a distasteful task like fixing a sewage pipe. In the end, I made some lame excuse and walked away.