The opposite of love

During my senior year at my all-white parochial high school, my social studies teacher arranged for a handful of us to meet with a handful of African American students from the local public school. We met in the cafeteria of my old elementary school and talked about our lives. It wasn't long before we realized we had a lot in common.

But we also came to realize that though we lived in the same city, we lived in different worlds.

The story that sticks in my memory, all these years later, was of an African American family moving into a predominantly white neighborhood and, within days, losing their dog to some fool who wanted to scare them away. The poor dog was doused with gasoline and, well, you can imagine what happened next.

I still remember the stoic look on the African American student's face as he told this story. Things got pretty quiet after that.

A few hours later we went our separate ways, changed -- if only a little -- because we'd made a connection with people who weren't like us and had, perhaps, begun to let go of fear.

The other thing I remember about that meeting in the spring of 1968 is that it took place just days before the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was gunned down. It might have been the very same day, though I suspect that's just my memory playing tricks on me. The date doesn't matter. The lasting impression -- that we are all human beings meant to share this world -- does.

God rest the souls of those taken from this world out of fear, the opposite of love.