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- <text id=89TT2050>
- <title>
- Aug. 07, 1989: Smiles Vs. Stares
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1989
- Aug. 07, 1989 Diane Sawyer:Is She Worth It?
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- NATION, Page 14
- Smiles vs. Stares
- </hdr><body>
- <p>By Robert Benson, Priscilla Johnney Benson
- </p>
- <p> Three years ago Robert Benson, 42, a white meatpacker in
- Kansas City, married Priscilla Johnney, 46, a black nurse. She
- has six children from a previous marriage and cares for three
- handicapped foster children, two white and one black.
- </p>
- <p> "In some churches, you're ignored. They won't sit beside
- you, especially at a church that is more white. At black
- churches, they raise eyebrows, but they don't do anything," says
- Priscilla. "We go to the malls, and people look at us, and some
- give us a look of approval or disapproval, but it doesn't stop
- us from holding hands. Sometimes people see us, and they think,
- `Oh, nice. He can afford a housekeeper.' When Robert puts his
- arm around my waist, they're in shock. `He's having an affair
- with his housekeeper.'"
- </p>
- <p> "When we go down a road and stop at a light, white people
- and black people look at us all mad like," says Robert. "I wave
- at them. When the light changes, I wave them on and say, `God
- bless you.'"
- </p>
-
- </body></article>
- </text>
-
-