Thanks, Sherry Kappel. You know I had “survival” in there originally around the sentence about society’s racism. For me, the “representing” falls into the enormous bucket of offensive things. All very true. There is enough in this life for any Black person, in this case, to feel this way. I’ve also started to read about generational trauma, so there’s that too. In this piece, I almost included masculine men, as I perceive them, and churchgoers, in general, to include older Black people. I also make assumptions when I’m in those groups, and I feel a certain kind of way. The coping mechanisms of eating, smoking, drinking, anticipation, and avoidance are not working and they are harmful. In these situations where nothing happens, I still walk into the next one feeling the same. I desire to understand the reality that some of these strangers are quite possibly what I would think but without allowing my prejudging to affect me. So far, I’ve been allowing my thoughts to run wild. Hah. The self-talk did help, so I am going to try that again. Thanks for your response!