Black and White
Like You & Me

Parallel Lines Sometimes Intersect

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The most segregated day of the week is Sunday followed by Saturday when people congregate at their individual, isolated places of worship.  I wonder what God thinks when he looks down on the Sabbath Day only to see his children sheltering themselves from their brothers and sisters as they cloister themselves in divisive settings.  It is no wonder that there is so much discrimination and hatred in the world.

Isn’t it crazy to think that on what should be the
holiest day of the week that we have
nothing to do with each other?

I am always surprised to see African-Americans in a Catholic Church let alone a Jewish Synagogue. I am sure that African-Americans would be equally surprised to see me at their Church. Perhaps Sunday mornings would be better served meeting and socializing with members of the other race?  We know as parents that we are only as happy as our most unhappy child. God the Father is asking, “Can’t we all just get along?”

The story revolves around two people who lived during the same time, roughly 1950 through the present.  The setting is the Detroit Metropolitan Area.

But, who are these guys anyway and are they both really named Tom?  Throughout the book you’ll get to know each one fully.  Hopefully you will laugh, appreciate, and relate to much of what Cookie and Whitey went through to arrive at the intersection of their parallel lives and lines.

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Tom and Cookie share an extraordinary friendship. They tell their fascinating tale in this dual autobiography. The volume unpacks their personal experiences during a seemingly innocent, then turbulent time in Detroit’s past and offers a model for getting beyond our racial differences, not by papering them over, but by engaging them and acknowledging that we have far more in common than we realize.

Roy E. Finkenbine

Professor of History and Director of the Black Abolitionist Archive, University of Detroit Mercy