Here you are, too foreign for back home. Too foreign for here. Not enough for both. At the age of 10 my family moved to Miami, FL from Puerto Rico. Talk about a culture shock? My new dilemma at that age was figuring where do I fit in? Too much for a 10 year old to navigate. I did not speak English whatsoever. I was Sorta Latina, but my complexion was “too dark” for the Cuban Americans in my school. Even though we could communicate and speak Spanish, I did not belong. I was no good for their kind.
Kinda Black. My Dad is Black Puerto Rican, as is my family back in Puerto Rico. The term Afro Latino had not yet emerged. In my attempt to figure out this new dynamic, I started to make friends with the Black kids instead. The majority were truly welcoming- even though we could not communicate due to the language barrier. Until the day that a ring leader – bully started to make my life miserable by calling me a light skin-ded (just as she pronounced it) halfbreed. I did not even know what that meant.
Rewind for a moment. This new experience was not isolated to strangers. Prior to moving to Florida, my Mom, brothers and I spent the summer in Texas with my Mom’s Mexican family. Even then, we did not belong. My siblings and I were darker than our cousins, our hair was much thicker, we spoke Spanish, they did not. Therefore, we were not welcomed by our Mexican American cousins. Kids play- but we were ridiculed and treated like “The Help.”
Here I am, a 10 year old child in fifth grade tumbling in the weeds of identity. I did not realize it then. Nonetheless, I was constantly in a state of existing, but never belonging. Talk about eternal imposter syndrome?
Within six months of moving to Miami I learned English. I was fluent enough to get by. I learned English phonetically which awarded me the official “Akeelah” award of the spelling bee.
Maybe. Just maybe, this phase is behind me, so I thought! Truth is, it was not. It was the year I entered 6th grade, middle school, that I decided I am made to stand out and not fit in. My new mindset as a 6th grader did not mitigate the hurt nor exile from both the Latino or Black kids, but I assure you, I walked with my head held high.
It was then, I learned, I am enough!
You. Are. Too!
Xo,San
by far my favorite!!
I felt that pain too when my family moved to Queens, NY from Manhattan. We lived in the most diverse neighborhood in Manhattan at that time, Morningside Heights. My best friends throughout elementary were a rainbow of colors. My beasties Kledia was Ecuadorian, Martha, Puerto Rican, Tonya, Black American, Roger, Indian, Nina, white American with the freckles and red hair and then me, Dominican. I loved those guys. When we moved to Queens that’s when I realized I was so different. At 12, I learned quickly about discrimination and racism and not fitting in.
Incredibly relatable and so true for many of us.