The "Election Elephant" in the room

Today my International Business class was devoid of all my African American classmates. I was the lone ranger today in a class full of Caucasians. Among them sits our two female foreign exchange students and the one male from Canada, the females are from the Netherlands and Paris. When class started everyone was kind of quiet which is extremely unusual. I clearly saw and felt the elephant in the room. It was sitting sexy with its legs crossed on a desk top in the middle of us all. You could tell there was so much to be said by I truly feel my presence was the hold. Not in a bad way but since I was the only black I don't think they wanted to offend me. I don't know, I could be wrong but they are all cool people.

So what happens next? My precious classmate from France asked why does America vote but use an electoral college to decide the president. I shifted in my seat because I felt this was going to be GOOD! The professor tried her best to explain the process and thought behind this system. The young lady from France sat attentively, listening to what the professor said without interrupting one time but as soon as she could she did. With a genuine look of disgust and as cute as she could, she said "that's just stupid!" That was my laugh for the day.

Those three students ended up doing the most talking about the election: sharing their concerns and how their country handles elections. The young lady from the Netherlands shared a hate experience she'd had with some of the male students at the school. Because she did not support their candidate, she became the recipient of a barrage of insults and told to go back to her country. How horrible is that?

OK, back to me, it was a disturbingly odd feeling in the air through out the entire classroom. As the conversation continued on with an interjection here and there from the rest of the class the tension seemed to grow. Maybe it was just me but they all seemed uncomfortable, I was fine. After they would say something they would look at me as if to see if I'd been offended or if I was ok with what was said. Y'all it was a strange feeling, one like I've never felt before. I almost felt bad but I left that elephant right there sitting sexy.

Is this a little of how white America has felt for the past 8 years? I hope not because I do not want to go through this anymore. Treat me like you did before Trump became President Elect. This was the first of many encounters like this I am sure. I intend to document them all. Stay tuned for the #ElectionElephant number two!