See. it’s this kind of thinking that bugs me. If I said something like this – I’d be labeled a racist.

My parents visited recently, and I got my parents a room at the Renaissance. My mother happened to comment that it was the first time since living on the Navajo reservation that she’d felt like a minority. When I’d checked them in, I noticed that there were several events going on at the hotel, including a function for a historically black sorority. Frankly, as a resident of Portsmouth, it didn’t even register for me. For my mother, of a different generation and living above the Mason/Dixon Line, it did register.

I guess the sorority didn’t get the message from the mayor that while his “black picture” is “in the lobby,” the hotel is “a white hotel.” Funny, I’ve always thought it was a hotel. That catered to people. No matter the color of their skin.

I wonder what he would say if I suggested we built a hotel in Portsmouth that targeted white people. Maybe that’s what he was talking about when he said we need 25 projects like this in Portsmouth. One for whites. One for blacks. One for Japanese. One for Russians. One for… oh, hell, you get the point.