Adam Stanford sighed as he sat inside the office of Dr. Yasmin Hussein on the third floor of the Bank Street office building overlooking Parliament Hill. Located in downtown Ottawa, the good doctor's office was in a prime location. Tall, lean and athletic, with dark brown skin and curly Black hair, Adam Stanford was a fine specimen of man, but he was also troubled. The young Jamaican had been restless lately, and it had nothing to do with his demanding job at the call center or his studies in the MBA program at Carleton University. Nope, this was deeply personal.
Dr. Yasmin Hussein, a six-foot-tall, regal Somali-Canadian Muslim woman in her late thirties calmly shook her head as her patient, Adam Stanford, told her about his negative experiences with the opposite sex. Born in Bethel Town, Jamaica, and raised in London, Ontario, by an adoptive White family, Adam Stanford had been through a lot in his twenty seven years upon this earth. His adoptive parents, Liam and Nicole Stanford were nice people, but they were White, and couldn't understand how Canadian society treated people of color, especially young Black men.
After graduating from high school, Adam Stanford put off college for a while and did some traveling. The young man needed to do some soul searching and figure certain things out about his life. Adam returned to the island of Jamaica, the land of his ancestors, and lived there for a year. Even on an island full of Black folks, Adam Stanford stood apart because of his Canadian accent, and his breeding thanks to his upper-middle-class White parents.
In short, Adam was a fish out of water. He dated a young Jamaican woman named Samantha while in Kingston, but things didn't work out with her. Apparently, Adam was too "White-washed" for the feisty and deeply Afro-centric Samantha. Ouch! For the first time in his life, Adam Stanford was told by someone of African descent that in their eyes, he wasn't Black enough. Adam returned to Ontario, Canada, a frustrated young man. To lily-White Canada, Adam was too Black but to the Jamaicans, he wasn't Black enough. Quite a dilemma, eh?
Adam Stanford returned to his old life, made peace with his adoptive parents and later moved to the City of Ottawa, Ontario, for higher education. Adam enrolled at Carleton University, where he studied sociology. After graduating with a bachelor's degree in sociology, Adam looked for work in his field and couldn't find any. That's why he decided to go back to school and study business. Judging by how well Adam was doing in the Sprott MBA program at Carleton University, this change of major was the right decision.
While at Sprott, Adam met a tall, lovely young woman named Arianna Lahoud, a gorgeous gal originally from Zahle, Republic of Lebanon. The tall, bronze-skinned, dark-haired and green-eyed Lebanese Christian beauty took Adam's breath away, and he pursued Arianna single-mindedly. Fortunately for Adam, his persistence paid off and the lovely Arianna responded to his advances. The two of them began dating. For a while, Adam was happy as can be with his lovely, smart and decidedly exotic girlfriend.
Adam Stanford considered himself lucky to have someone like Arianna Lahoud in his life. At Carleton University, Adam saw lots of Arab guys with Black women but as far as he knew, he was the only Black man to land himself an Arab girlfriend. Adam introduced Arianna to his parents during Christmas Break, six months after they met. Adam's parents were thrilled to meet Arianna, the young woman whom their son couldn't stop raving about. Arianna was lovely, smart and charming. What man wouldn't be happy to have her on his arm?
