Matt and I saw a group of slave women washing clothes off to the side of the trail and Matt reacted with surprise. Two of the five women were as black as I was and one was of a soft chocolate color in terms of skin color, while the remaining two were white.
I already knew the answer to his unasked question, "In the South if it was believed that a person had so much as a drop of Negro blood in their ancestry then they were considered black no matter how white they may have appeared. They were thrown in right along with all the other slaves. It would appear even that aspect of the old South has been copied over."
The mansions were growing closer and all signs of slave housing were falling away behind us.
"Because of your ancestry did you ever feel like you were entitled to some version of justice or payment to make up for what was done to your ancestors who were slaves?" Matt asked softly.
"Never!" I said roughly.
"I make my own decisions and walk my own path. I want no part of entitlement and I have no use for those who think they're owed something. You need to stand on your own two feet in life and earn your own way. My girls were perfect, but to these people they'd be nothing better than slaves. In the old South they would have been slaves even though Lacey was as white as your sister!"
Matt squeezed my arm and I glanced at him and saw understanding in his eyes as he said, "Your girls were perfect Eli and so was my sister!"
I nodded not trusting myself to speak for a moment.
"Yes she was!" I said finally.
I looked around, "She was not a slave and neither am I. No one should be!" I said my voice trailing off with the disdain that I felt for everything around me that had been built upon the affliction of people, who were looked down upon as less by others.
"Amen." Matt said.
It was a town of mansions and the question as to the need for slavery was soon answered. Nobody with a skin color matching my own was doing anything or should I say they weren't doing anything that could be called work. This too must've been how the old South had functioned.
It was pathetic whichever color side you picked. How was I going to put a stop to this?
I was just one man with a small crew.
Every Old Testament Bible story pertinent to such a thought of inadequacy came up to remind me that it wasn't going to be me doing anything in order to break the cycle of bondage, but rather it would be God and I was just a willing instrument to be used as part of the process.