Sauna Talk is a Lot Like Locker Room Talk
"Well, that's racist."
Nine sphincters tightened. Nine old, wrinkly, half-naked white men almost held nine sets of breath.
I looked him in the eye. "What about that is racist?"
"You made that shit up, man."
"So, I'm a racist and a liar?"
"That ain't what I'm saying..."
"Well, that is what you said. That I'm a racist because I made something up that you think is racist. Is that what you're saying?"
"Uh. Nah. No. I'm not saying that."
I like my gym for a few reasons. It's big so there's a lot of room and a lot of equipment. There is a dry sauna, wet sauna, hot tub, and pool in the back to chill out after a workout. Almost everyone there is there to work out, not socialize, and I prefer to be left alone when I'm sweating.
I tend to stick to the wet sauna. No one talks in there because it's full of freakin' steam. Once in awhile, I'm feeling the dry sauna but it's always a craps shoot as to whether a conversation will be under way.
I walk in. There are nine old white guys in towels sitting and staring. In front of the door is a six-and-a-half-foot black man—maybe 30 years old—weighing in at a guesstimated 250 pounds. This cat is big. He seems to be holding court with the rest, slightly pacing back and forth and deep into some point about "women these days."
I sit on the end, cover my head with a towel and try to just sit and sweat.
"...and they all act like, excuse my language, 'bitches' and 'hoes.' Pictures of themselves half naked, walking around the Strip like hookers. OnlyFans pornography. Women today just have no class, you know?"
I laughed. Quietly but audibly.
"What's funny?"
He asked, it would've been rude not to answer. "It just occurs to me if you take away the incentives, the behavior may change. If you stopped ogling the Instagram accounts of barely dressed college girls on beaches or paying to peek in their OnlyFans accounts, maybe they'd dress to your tastes."
Silence. I lowered the towel over my head again.
The Reverend started back up as nothing had been said. "You know that people are celebrating genocide this week? Thanksgiving. An American party when we gather around and toast to the murder of the Native Americans. I'm part Indian and no Native Americans celebrate Thanksgiving. That's a white man's holiday."
He looked over at me. "You have anything to say about that?"
I sighed. "Well, the celebration of the harvest has been practiced by every agricultural society since recorded time. They celebrate a version of Thanksgiving in almost every country in the world. Also, I'm almost 100 percent certain no one is eating cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes reveling in the death of anyone. I also did some recent online research for an article I wrote and I read that some Native Americans celebrate the American Thanksgiving, some use it as a day of mourning, and some ignore it altogether. I could be wrong but that's what I read last week."
"Well, that's racist."
Nine sphincters tightened. Nine old, wrinkly, half-naked white men almost held nine sets of breath.
I looked him in the eye. "What about that is racist?"
"You made that shit up, man."
"So, I'm a racist and a liar?"
"That ain't what I'm saying..."
"Well, that is what you said. That I'm a racist because I made something up that you think is racist. Is that what you're saying?"
"Uh. Nah. No. I'm not saying that."
"Oh. OK." Back under the towel.
The pause was a bit longer this time around.
"You know how in schools these days, they don't even teach about slavery. All these crackers trying to stop schools from teaching about the black experience in this country—calling it CRT—are a bunch of white supremicists fighting to keep their kids indoctrinated."
He looked my way. The rest of the men offered up some thoughts about remembering back in the 60's seeing ‘whites only’ drinking fountains and the horrors of human beings in general but he kept his eyes on me.
"Do you agree that schools should be teaching about racism?"
"Oh, absolutely. I'm from the eighties and I remember specifically being taught in elementary and high school about slavery, Jim Crow, and the Civil Rights movement. In Kansas and Arkansas at that. My sister is a high school history teacher and I know she teaches about systemic racism in her class. I can't say what other schools teach because, well, I haven't stepped foot into a public school since I was a seventh and eighth grade music teacher in Chicago. When was the last time you went to a school and checked out what they were teaching?"
"What? I can watch the news. I can read about it."
"So you feel confident that without any serious inquiry you can verifiably state that in public schools they don't teach about the black experience? Cool. I'm not that confident in my opinions."
At that, like a bell went off, the nine other men all started getting up and excusing themselves from the sauna. In less than a minute, the Reverend and I were the only two left. He finally sat down.
We sat in silence for maybe three minutes.
"Excuse me, man. Did I offend you?" he asked.
"Not at all," I replied. "Did I offend you?"
"No. So we're cool, then?"
"As far as I'm concerned, we are most definitely cool despite the fact we're sitting in a sauna."
He laughed. I laughed.
When we both decided we'd had enough heat, we both exited together and we walked into the locker room.
"See you around the gym," I offered.
"Better believe it," he responded.
I've since thought about this interaction and how many different ways it could have turned ugly. I believe if either of us had made the choice to be offended by the other, while it is unlikely things would have turned violent (a circumstance that I would certainly have regretted if for no other reason than he'd have beaten me like a step child), it might have been louder and representative of our current societal paradigm.
Yet we both made a different choice. Rather than be offended, see one another as the Other, we asked questions, we were polite but honest, and we listened to each other.
I can't claim to be proud of the moment necessarily but I can say that this is the sort of interaction I wish we all could choose. This is the world I want to be living in.
Except maybe wearing pants and not sweating.
