Guest Column - Vicki Wilson

November 1, 2020

This past year has given us so many things to think about, beginning with a worldwide pandemic but then moving on to a renewed focus on racial unrest and phrases such as “white privilege", which to be honest, I don't think I had been aware of until then. The concept itself, somewhere in the back of my mind, but not the phrase.

I grew up in Wilmington, Vermont a very small town in a very homogenous State. I knew very few (if any) people of color when I was very young and only when I went away to college in Florida did I have even have the opportunity to interact with any. In fact, my town was so small and the folks so alike at least in physicality that I remember as a young girl seeing a man with long hair and telling my mom I thought I had seen Jesus! She was able to straighten me out on that, but I still remember the incident all these years later.

Flash forward to 2020 and I belong to a Rotary Club that has a taskforce designated to address Diversity and Inclusion. We have been talking about how these ideals are not limited to the matter of skin color and as a child of that small town in Vermont, I can say that there are a number of other ways people can feel different and left out.

It may sound trivial, but as a chubby, awkward girl I was without fail the last child picked to play on any team sport you can imagine, kickball being the game that stands out in my memory. Wilmington is in the Mount Snow region and I was one of few kids in my class that didn't learn to ski. My mom and dad worked very hard, but we were more lower than upper middle class so my clothes were not always the latest styles. Add to that the fact that my family went to church each Sunday, said grace even at restaurants and were considered pretty “square" and you have an idea of what my life was like back then. It may sound like I'm having a pity party. I'm not. I am unashamed of all of this because I believe it has made me stronger, more compassionate and more empathetic than I would have been otherwise.

And that is what will make a difference in our world in the end. I'm glad we have a Diversity and Inclusion Taskforce because I'm hopeful it will spark meaningful discussion but true change will only come when change takes place in the heart. The more grace and empathy we extend to those different from ourselves, the closer we are to not needing a Diversity and Inclusion Taskforce.

Author: Vicki Wilson
Sally Sugarman (Club Member & Windmill Editor)