When I was in 3rd grade, I was bullied by a kid named Jamal Alexander. I told my Nana and asked for advice. She asked me if Jamal was black. I said no. He was dark brown. She told me that next time I saw him and he was picking on me to say these four little words to him: “I am above you.” Needless to say I got into a lot of trouble.
I remember going to school and not seeing anyone else that looked like me. I later attended Wilson Middle School in Albuquerque New Mexico. I was beat up once for claiming that m mother was Mexican because the woman who enrolled me in school (my stepmother) was white. I remember going home and being told by my father that I was mocking an oppressed race by claiming to be a part of that race. YOU ARE HALF MEXICAN Amanda, it’s not the same thing. But I never remembered being around people that look like me on the Air Force Base in New Jersey. Or North Dakota. Or Mississippi.
I moved in with my mother. She lived in Willingboro. When I was 13, I was accused of being a slut because all white girls were deemed sluts. “I’m not white,” I claimed. “You’re not black, you’re white.” I was told.
I was raised by my stepsister and her grandmother who I later claimed as my own. Of course we all got off to a rough start. Grandma’s comments about my light skin and pretty hair didn’t make it easy to get to know me. Of course after having my hair burnt off and a few other comments about my flat ass and skinny frame, we all learned how to love one another. Eventually, it didn’t matter. I was part of the family. And anyone who disagreed could kiss my black ass. We went so far as defining ourselves biological family. People started to "see the resemblance" after enough insisting.
I wound up dating the only "multi racial misunderstood" guy in my high school. His mother was black, white, and Columbian. His father was Cornish. He grew up in Brooklyn and had no animosity of being a minority in our school. We later moved to Crown Heights Brooklyn, a predominantly West Indian neighborhood. We were not exactly welcome by the “banquet hall” below us on the first floor. They used to play music so loud that our dishes would fall off our tables from the vibrating bass through our floor. When telling our landlord, he addressed the problem with the banquet hall owner. “They don’t like us here cuz we’re black my brother. They have a problem with us because we’re black.” We shook our heads as we evesdropped and contemplated inviting both of our black grandmothers to the house.
I had a hard time finding a job in Oregon. I clenched my jaw through jokes about Mexicans, or Latinos or Spanish people. I always thought I would get the job. Until I realized that I kept checking the box next to “Hispanic/ Latino” was a guaranteed way to not get a call back. I eventually did get a job from a jewelry store who thought I was of Middle Eastern descent. People always hushed when they made a joke about a rag head or a terrorist. Eventually I took an ethnic studies class and realized that miscegenation laws were in full swing until 1951 in that state. Moreover, I should have realized the Confederate flags and gotten out of there sooner.
Three summers ago, I had the misfortune of dating a white supremacist and I was his exception. He loved guns and hated anything with a tan besides me. I tried reaching out to him by explaining statistics and economics to him. He wasn’t game to listen. This obviously ended messy. I was later called a kike, a nigger lover and eventually a nigger altogether. I couldn’t understand how I ever thought that I was going to live through that type of hate.
That summer was the same summer my father’s side had a family reunion. We stayed in Seaside Park, just like my Nana, my brother and I used to do. And for the first time in years I would be reunited with my aunts, cousin, my brother, and my father’s new family: Sonja and her two children Courtney and Allison. When I arrived I wasn’t greeted with hugs but rather very professional and distant handshakes. My father reintroduced me as his daughter and I was given a few hugs. My aunt was probably the most petrified. She wouldn’t even touch me until my Nana calmed her. “This is Mandi, my granddaughter.” She replied, “Well why didn’t you say so?” The love was later received but the final line had been drawn to isolate me.
Everyone seems to have something rooted to hold onto. It’s something that defines them. Just in case they lose their way, it is their anchor to bring them back. It reminds them who they are. Like tattoos, these roots are embedded in their skin. Even the ones who just want to shake it, can’t escape it. It’s a luxury most people don’t even know they have. It's also harder to find when the essential part of you is buried in two things. you never really know where most of you even comes from. I always remember my father telling me that I was half the person I could be when I went to Willingboro High School. I also remember my father trying to take credit for me deciding to go to college. To this day I can't really decide whether it was always in my bones to go to college or to strive to be someone better than what my father said I was. These things are usually well defined in homes. People often write about the moment they decided to go to college or at least the pressure to go. I simply remember filling out applications writing essays and paying for most of the fees myself. This can usually be said about most things in my life. I just remember doing them.I had no attachment to a specific identity therefore no attachment to any person conventionally identified. I just remember loving who I loved. I just remember being. Attaching. Existing in my own sort of way. With a black sister and a white father and brown mother an invisible brother and people of all colors who were my family.
“I was born a poor black boy.”
-Steve Martin
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