HAPPY BLACK FRIDAY!!!!!

Several years ago, me and The Rascal were working in a lease in a building that had many mental health and psychiatrist offices. Because us painters are a creative bunch, we referred to it as "the crazy building". It did have that vibe to it.

It was Good Friday. That's a Friday like any other Friday to me being as how I'm not religious. I got into the elevator and a young black girl smiled at me.

"Too bad you have to work today" she said.

I replied that it was too bad I had to work any day but, that was the way life worked.

"Too bad you have to work today", she reiterated.

OK. Why?

"Because it's Good Friday!"

I explained to her that it was just another Friday to me, not being religious and all. But, conversation being what it's supposed to be, I asked if she was working.

Indeed she was. Well, that's too bad, I said, thinking I was commiserating with my elevator friend. I wasn't. She informed me she had no problem working on Good Friday. OK....

The door opened and I got out. I wrote it off to the building I was in. Once in the lease, I amused The Rascal with the odd conversation. He too wrote it off to our location. Just weird.

Well, it got weirder. Short time later, the black kid cleaning up the lease for the GC approached me and stated that it was too bad I had to work today. This bemused the shit outa me as obviously he had to work today too. I mentioned that and he again said that it was too bad I had to work that day.

What the what? I had never thought of Good Friday as a "white" holiday. No black person had ever described it as such to me before or since. But it happened again in the lobby of the building with yet another black woman. It was too bad that I had to work on Good Friday but business as usual for black folks? I can be a nice to a fault guy but, I'm not necessarily shy. I pursued it with all these people. I really wanted to know why it was a tragedy that my non-religious ass had to work on Good Friday. Sheesh- we're not talking Easter fucking Sunday. None of these people cared to elaborate. Candid Camera had been off the air for years and this was in the late 90's, long before internet pranks took hold. I probably looked around for cameras just the same. Just bizarre,

I'm not working today. If I get out and about and go anywhere (NOT church) and I see any black folks, surely they'll nod knowingly- nice that white fella got the day off.