The first time someone called me a nigger, I was 5 years old. It wasn't in the appropriated, yet never appropriate, "endearing" way. It was the more traditional, down south, Confederate flag type of name callling. It was a relatively cold, winter day in Iowa, but the sun was bright. I was outside playing with the red-headed neighbor girl who used to take her clothes off and run around naked no matter the temperature, but on this day she had her clothes on.
We were playing peacefully when two white boys climbed the fence that separated their street from ours and asked the little red-headed girl why she was playing with niggers, mudd babies, and so on. The little red-headed girl told them to take back what they had said. She told them that my sister and I were not mudd babies. She told them that they'd better just leave her chocolate friends alone. Everybody loves chocolate, right!