Pitt Bulls

I thought about table dynamics for our annual fundraiser gala.

we quite easily compartmentalized older college kids and recent graduates from the up and coming youth still tender in their high school tenure.

we created a table for long enduring couples and individuals who would appreciate the tranquil of older adults, but not yet elder.

and then there was us.

and the more names i wrote down for our table, the more i realized that there was one odd man out and that would be my date. 

we are a table of Pitt bulls. 

and a Pitt bull he is not.

He looks like us, but his energy, his aura is not of ours. 

I’m trying to think of why this dynamic frightens me.

im afraid that he won’t pass. 

he looks like us, but as of now, he doesn’t show signs of being bred like us. 

where typical table conversation poses the rhetorical inquiry of “why didn’t they just put $ on his head” 

and if not said, it’s a normalcy we carry in our being.  

It scares me, that this is the identity i fall under when arranging people to tables and clusters. 

That we, at our table have survived such social travesty and yet we’re here - carrying a world of pain, and still creating spaces of beauty, still have the capacity to spread love and joy.

and still, still, still, Still — PITT BULLS.

pitt Bulls in suits, Pitt Bulls in gowns.  

pitt Bulls none the less.