Guest Bloggers | Mixed Roots Stories

Growing up Biracial in the South

By Rose Espiritu

So I’ve been working on my documentary, Mixed Up, a little bit over a year. The film is centered on parenting someone of a different race. We’ve conducted over 70 interviews with interracial couples and their bi/multiracial children, as well as interracial families brought together by adoption, to ask about their understanding of their racial identity. The majority of my interviews have been in urban locations such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York etc. I was extremely excited to have the opportunity to interview folks in my home state of Louisiana. Here is a sneak peak of one of the interviews.

Q: How do you identify and why?

A: I identify as black. I think it’s because I grew up in the south, so we’ve always had the one drop rule. Growing up at a very young age my dad explained to be that although my mom was white the world would always see me as a black girl first. The best example I can give you is

“I’ve never been in a room of black people where I felt like I’m the only white person here, but I have been in rooms full of white people were I know I am the only black person there.”

Q: What factors influence how people choose to identify?

A: We live in a society where race is learned. So it really depends on the community you come from. I think if you grow up around black people a lot of times you identify with certain cultural things that are happening within that community. But beyond that even when you are in a diverse or white community, if people see you as black than that is what you begin to identify as.

Q: Why would you be reluctant to marrying a white man?

A: My grandmother wants me to be able to identify with and always remember that I’m black because she went through a real struggle and she wants to relate to me. She’s like you’re so beautiful, you’re so smart. She wants to think of me as an extension of her legacy. She was born a sharecropper, she didn’t have a lot of education but she did the best she could. But because I’m getting an education and I’m traveling it’s like everything she did wasn’t in vain, and she wants my kids to relate to her. If at some point I marry white. My kids might feel like they can’t identify with my grandmother. I think that’s my biggest fear.

Q: Do you think mixed children are reducing racism?

A: I don’t necessarily think that mixed children are reducing racism. What I think is that the more mixed kids that we have the more people will relate to two different races or three different races. And I read somewhere recently that the reason why the LGBT issue has really taken off and grown exponentially is because everybody knows someone gay. But not every white person has a black person in their family. Well my white family does have a black person in their family, they have three, me and my sisters.

Rose Espiritu is a Nigerian and Filipino filmmaker from Louisiana. She has always had an interest in identity development in relation to race. In 2013, she began filming Mixed Up: The Documentary. The film is an interactive investigation into the parental influence of racial identity development in children of interracial families. Rose has conducted over 70 interviews with interracial couples and their bi/multiracial children, as well as interracial families brought together by adoption, to ask about their understanding of their racial identity. Rose also founded the company Culture Chest, which is a subscription service that carefully curates divers books for children ages 3-8. Find us at @CultureChest! You can follow her on Twitter or Instagram @roseespiritu_

Mixed Up: The Documentary is an interactive investigation into the parental influence of racial identity development in children of interracial families. Follow us to keep up with our progress FB: Mixed Up Documentary @mixedupdocu

Growing up Half Mexican and Half Chinese

By Rose Espiritu Photo by Kierston Clark

When talking about multiethnicity, most of the existing literature focuses on the experience of folks who are half black and half white. We had the opportunity to speak with Joseph Acez on his experience growing up half Mexican and half Chinese. In this interview he speaks on what it is like growing up as a second generation immigrant, assimilation, and other observations related to race relations. Double minority is the term for someone who is mixed with two minority races in the United States.

Q: Do you feel like you have more diluted sense of culture because you are biracial?

Joseph: I feel like my sense of being Mexican or Chinese are both diluted because I live in America. My parents also didn’t want me to stick out like a sore thumb so they really wanted me to embrace the American culture and fit in. Any interest I had in my culture mostly came from me being interested in the things about being Mexican and Chinese, rather than my parents instilling it in me.

Q: What challenges have you come across in relation to your multiethnicity?

Joseph: I was with my black friend the other day and we went somewhere and we were with a lot of black people and he said ‘this is great. We’re with a lot of black people; I’m comfortable.’ In that moment I realized I’m never going to run into a bunch of people who are half Mexican and half Chinese and feel “comfortable”.

Q: Do your parents have any opinions about your dating life?

Joseph: Growing up, my parents made sure that I knew I could date anyone outside of my race. They also let me know that they had troubles being together and that people didn’t want them to be together. Not just each other’s family, but people in general would think it was strange. They told me that I should be able to date whoever I wanted to date so it was never a thing for me.

Q: Is it possible to assimilate and hold onto your culture?

Joseph: My parents came from Mexico and China. They were poor so they came here to try to make a better life for themselves and they did which was great but while they were doing it they didn’t have fun because they were both immigrants and they didn’t fit in. You go to America and it’s your new home but it doesn’t feel like home. It’s interesting my dad has a Spanish accent when he speaks English but he has an English accent when he speaks Spanish because he’s lived here for so long. Same thing with my mom. What they wanted was for me to be very comfortable wherever I grew up, that’s why they didn’t teach me Spanish or Chinese, which I wish they did. Their hope was that I wouldn’t have to deal with any of the feelings of being an outsider.

Rose Espiritu is a Nigerian and Filipino filmmaker from Louisiana. She has always had an interest in identity development in relation to race. In 2013, she began filming Mixed Up: The Documentary. The film is an interactive investigation into the parental influence of racial identity development in children of interracial families. Rose has conducted over 70 interviews with interracial couples and their bi/multiracial children, as well as interracial families brought together by adoption, to ask about their understanding of their racial identity. Rose also founded the company Culture Chest, which is a subscription service that carefully curates diverse books for children ages 3-8. Find us at @CultureChest! You can follow her on Twitter or Instagram @roseespiritu_

What Does my Body Mean?

As a student of jazz at my university, I often occupy white male dominated spaces. I am the only woman of color (a black/white biracial woman) in a jazz history class, “Jazz Musicians as Composers,” a course that explores the gray areas of jazz as a concert music. Sometimes, I wonder if I can give myself permission to be a woman of color in this space. In a discussion surrounding the “Freedom Now Suite,” Max Roach’s response to the Greensboro sit ins, I have 75 minutes to say something—anything— so that my professor doesn’t think that I’m “just a shy student.” Rather, I negotiate with myself for 75 minutes what I am allowed to say, how what I say is a reflection of the body I occupy. Pressure mounts as someone questions the rigidity of jazz as a “black” art form. Pressure mounts as students discuss the auto-exoticism of African-American jazz musicians. Pressure mounts as the professor asks if anyone has ever felt that they had to represent a group of people, to act as a monolith. I scream silently: “Yes, every time I enter your class. Every time, for 75 minutes, I measure the amount of voice and the amount of blackness that I allow myself to have.”

What does my body mean here?

. . . . .

Liminality.

For those of us who live at the shoreline

standing upon the constant edges of decision

crucial and alone

for those of us who cannot indulge

the passing dreams of choice

who love in doorways coming and going

in the hours between dawns

looking inward and outward

at once before and after

audre lorde, a litany for survival

Liminality is vast, infinite. There are no impossibilities. In liminality, there is enough room to breathe.

Liminality is the top of the breath. It is filling your lungs, oxygen massaging their pink lining, brushing into corners that you didn’t know existed, air pressing into ribs. You could fill your lungs forever, but you don’t—for convention’s sake.

Liminality is the asymptote. It’s the space between two curves closing in on an axis. No matter how far it travels, it can never touch zero: a value that is both a number and the absence of a number. Zero, the asymptote, is both/and.

Despite its confines, there is room to breathe in liminality. But in this infinite space, never-ending combinations and intersections can also feel like limitations—boundaries defining what you are not. These intersections, azure lines on graph paper, can box us in until this liminal space feels suffocating. Sometimes in intersections, there is no room to breathe between these walls.

After the end of World War II, Germany—a battered and broken nation—was left to the political players still standing. In this time of post-war wreckage, Great Britain, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union divided the land into East and West Germany. The capital, Berlin, too, was subject to division despite its physical location in East Germany under Soviet occupation and thus became two halves: East Berlin, under the eyes of Soviet soldiers, and West Berlin, within the hands of American, British, and French troops. In 1961, the Berlin wall began to take shape.

West Berlin became a dim light in darkness as the Soviet’s occupation on the other side of the wall resulted in poor treatment of its citizens. As East Berliners sought freedom by “illegally” crossing into West Berlin, the wall became a sight of loss and memorial for those killed in their attempts. Eventually, to increase security, the Berlin wall transformed into a multi-layered structure: between two walls fortified with barbed wire existed a no man’s land in which guards would shoot wall hoppers. Between these walls lived a space with no definition: a space that was neither West Berlin nor East Berlin. No one lived between these walls: the lucky ones moved between, across, in transition while guards did death’s work… until their shifts ended. How could any identity exist without life in the space between these walls? Who are you “in doorways coming and going / in the hours between dawns?” Are you a transition?

. . . . .

Bridge.

1,950 mile-long open would

dividing a pueblo, a culture,

running down the length of my body,

stalking fence rods in my flesh,

splits me splits me

me raja me raja

…Yo soy un puente tendido…

“I am a bridge,” writes Gloria Anzaldúa, voice of intersections. In Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza, she describes how her body—its mass, its fullness, its veins pumping blood—connects cultures, languages, people. I imagine her soft, naked skin sprawled across 2,000 miles of desert borderlands. Her body, nearly 2,000 miles long, lays down as her calves, back, shoulders rise hundreds of feet in altitude. I imagine small people sinking their fingers into her soft skin, gliding across her back. Into Anzaldúa, the border disappears. Whatever wall existed melts beneath her breasts and under her breath. Her skin, a skin made for this desert, connects space.

The mestiza, mulatta, her body becomes a bridge. In her body, she adapts, translates, code switches. She becomes the bridge upon which others—the less adaptable, the more comfortable—walk, small steps on plush skin.

Robert Park’s Marginal Man Theory positions a biracial person “outside of the two races to which he belongs, a stranger in both worlds. His personality to the development is based on how he adjusts to the crisis, which is a permanent crisis because he is socially located between two irreconcilable races” (Rockquemore 36).

A stranger in both worlds. Not a bridge but an outsider “socially located between two irreconcilable races.” Anzaldúa and Park offer contrasting positions: she connects and he excludes. She reconciles and he dissociates. She constructs a bridge across two walls and he lives between them. Both are unnatural.

“A Borderlands is a vague and undetermined place,” writes Anzaldua, “created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary. It is in a constant state of transition” (Anzaldua 25). Where do connection and isolation meet? Are you a bridge?

. . . . .

Fullness.

Like a glass of water, you fill it till its whole. Full. Completely adequate.

“What are you?” Nine times out of ten, I respond with: “I’m half black and half white.” It’s easy, it’s true (more or less), and it’s habit. But speaking in fractions is a dangerous territory, risking a sense of incompletion, insufficiency, fragmentation that I might impart upon the person who asked. Two halves and twice as incomplete. Now how is that possible?

Most days I wake up full. My body contains no gaps—I fill my lungs until infinity. I have a full body.

I step out of bed and walk to the bathroom. I turn on the light and greet myself in the mirror. On some days, the gaps appear. My hair seems to resemble that of my straight-haired friends, with a just few more coils and frizz. When did that happen? I look for my mother in my face… then I give up. What am I missing? Fluorescent lights make my skin look pale. I wonder: Maybe I do need more sun.

On these days, the gaps eventually fill in. I hope not to feel them tomorrow.

Biracial: two races. Biracial: a binary. Biracial: one body between walls, across borders, in vast liminality.

. . . . .

I sit at my desk. My breath is still. I inhale slowly, feeling my ribs expand, my back pressing into the chair. I fill my lungs until somewhere, the top of my breath—the minuscule space of stillness between inhale and exhale—turns into a release. I raise my hand and speak.

Works Cited

Anzaldua, Gloria. Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. San Francisco, CA: Aunt Lute Books, 1999.

Lorde, Audre. The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde. 1st ed. New York: W. W. Norton, 1997. Print.

Rockquemore, Kerry, and David L. Brunsma. Beyond Black: Biracial Identity in America. 2nd ed. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littelfield, 2008. Print.

Carly Bates is an artist emerging from Phoenix, Arizona. With a background as a pianist and vocalist, she is active in the Arizona arts community as a creative collaborator with musicians, dancers, poets: storytellers. Carly is pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in Music and a minor in English Literature from Arizona State University. Towards earning her degree, she is one of three women using the body, voice, and narrative who wrestle with questions of heritage, disbelonging, and specifically her identity as a mixed race woman in a performance titled Negotiations.

[Photo by: Bethany Brown]

Mixed Race Love

When I think about love, it’s for the mixed race. Many years ago, people hid who they really were just to please society. People who loved one another romantically had to endure hatred from those who were against one’s human right to love whomever their heart desired. Society has always placed persons who are mixed race in a box, never allowing a human to identify and embrace who they truly are.

At a young age my mother taught me who I was. In addition she taught me how to love, acknowledge and be proud of who I was. The history of my mixed race was taught to me by mother. She explained the history and culture of our, Native American, Black and European heritage. In addition, our ancectors and her parents were of a mixed race people. I was given an ancestry book which contains information and stories about my ancestors who were considered mixed race. She warned me on how ignorant the world is with their opinions. Keep loving, embracing despite what society says.

During my school years I only had one friend from each school; one school was predominantly white and the other multiethnic. One of my schools was located in a small town and the other in the inner city. My experience at each school taught me to sustain my love for myself as a mixed race person. Both of my friends were, mixed race just like me. Their parents taught them just how the world viewed us. They learned the same about being mixed race and the love for one self was already instilled. We had a strong back bone to sustain the love for one self. To this day I’m so thankful my mother taught me early on how to embrace my mixed race heritage, and not to change who I am for anyone, or to be placed in a racial box that was created by this world.

My advice for fellow, mixed race people is to never change who you are. Accept who God created and it is you. Learn the history of your ancestors; show them respect and pride. Love who your ancestors were, as it will sustain the inner love in you. Continue to show the media positive examples of people that are mixed race. Most importantly connect, work and change the mixed race community. We want our legacy to continue from generation to generation. 14f1811b-34e0-4171-a120-7e5c76f5b600

Love always,

Lakia Shavon Lightner- founder Mixed Chicks Sorority

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Lakia Shavon Lightner is my full name. I was born in Connecticut. My mother was a single parent and a professional teacher. I’m the eldest of eight. And I have a new role as aunt.

Professional in: Public Relations/Women’s Studies.
Founder of, Mixed Chicks Sorority .

Academia and the Identity of Mixed-Race Women

I am a 35-year old mixed race woman (Black Jamaican, Nigerian and White British), born and living in Leeds, Yorkshire the UK and I recently completed a counselling diploma. As part of the work I had to do to achieve my diploma I had to do a great deal of work around examining my racial and cultural identity. It was also part of the course requirements that I had to do 20 hours of personal counselling.

I didn’t know it when I started the diploma but I had a massive amount of work that I needed to do around exploring my identity as a mixed race woman. This emerged when I started my personal counselling. I began to realise I had a lot of unresolved feelings around past experiences of racism and the lack of understanding and acknowledgement I had met as a mixed race female. I also needed to look at issues to do with race within my family as well as ancestral baggage. It was extremely difficult, however, for me to find an appropriate counsellor to work with. Prior to starting the counselling it hadn’t really occurred to me that it may be difficult for me to have my counselling needs met if I needed to discuss being mixed race in any detail. My experience (and this includes working with both a white and black counsellor) was that my counsellors really struggled to work with me. My first counsellor defended against hearing my experiences of racism and the second had his own ideas about how I should see myself as a mixed race person which were incompatible with my own views. So after two abortive attempts at counselling I decided to help myself and went away and did a significant amount of reading on mixed race identity. Most of this was academic research from the U.S as research in the U.K on the mixed race population is incredibly thin on the ground. Worryingly there has only actually been one UK academic paper published on mixed race identity and counselling and this was published in 2014!

The reading I did on mixed race research from the U.S was enormously helpful to me. I found quite a lot of it fairly easily online but I did have to buy some books which were often very expensive and in some cases hard to get copies of. The research was somewhat limited in that being mixed race in the UK is obviously different to being mixed race in the US due to different political landscapes and histories. Slavery is much more tangible in the US and this significantly influences perceptions of race there. The UK’s history of slavery and colonialization still massively impacts thoughts around race here but has some different implications for UK Britons of colour. I still found the US research helpful, however, and I did manage to find enough literature on race and cultural issues in general in the UK to receive positive benefits.

Armed with more understanding of myself from the reading I had done I went back into counselling and managed to find a counsellor who did have some specific understanding of mixed race identity. I was able to do some good work on my identity with her.

It feels important to point out though that for counsellors in the UK there is no specific requirement for them to demonstrate any meaningful level of competency or knowledge about working with the mixed race population or working with racial issues in general. My own negative experiences in counselling are certainly not unique and it is widely acknowledged that counsellor training is falling short in preparing counsellors to work competently in this area. I would recommend anyone reading this who is considering counselling around racial issues does their homework regarding their counsellor’s level of skill and comfortability when it comes to the topics of race and culture.

Without the help of reading academic texts on mixed race identity I think my understanding of myself would realistically not have advanced as far as it did. It was crucial for me in developing a fuller understanding of myself as a woman of colour as was my increasing interest in intersectional feminism. Particularly I would say academic research helped me to see my experiences were completely normal and were experienced by many women. The research also gave me ideas about how I could improve my self-esteem and my life.

The problem I would highlight is that reading academic texts can be challenging at times, even for people who have the privilege of a university education. I feel very aware that the mixed race population in the UK will more than likely be deprived of the benefits of academic texts, which would serve them because they are not readily available, not always easy to read and also specifically UK research on mixed race identity is minimal anyway. It takes dedication to commit to searching for appropriate texts.

The answer seems to be that mixed race people urgently need to be more represented in UK social policy and mental health experts need to do the groundwork of converting academic texts on mixed race identity into their practice. We are in a quandary though as for this to happen more academic research on mixed race identity is needed in the UK in the first place. The future for the mixed race population is currently not looking very bright in my opinion where academia is concerned.

The mixed race population is a rapidly growing in Britain and is the third largest ethnic minority group.Both black and mixed race people are over-represented in prisons and the mental health care system. Mixed race people have been reported as more likely to be victims of crime. Mixed race children are the most likely to be put in care and also over-represented in youth justice and child protection systems. I think it’s fair to say right now that academia is definitely failing us.

This piece originally published at the Ain’t I A Woman Collective.

The Mixed Roots Stories team is, like Nicole, eager to see more mixed race representation in global academic discourse. Stay tuned with Mixed Roots Stories this year as we release the Mixed Roots Commons, our forthcoming online forum for invited scholars to gather around central themes and debates taking place in Critical Mixed Race Studies today.

Nicola Codner is 34 years old and currently training to be a person-centred counsellor in Leeds, UK. She is biracial and her heritage is White British and Black Caribbean. She has a strong interest in difference and diversity which led her into re-training as a counsellor. Prior to training as a counsellor she worked as a publisher in academic publishing. She’s keen to continue to develop my writing experience hence part of her interest in blogging. She has a degree in English Literature and Psychology.

In her spare time, she loves reading, music, art, theatre, traveling and cinema

White Dads

Being brown and having a white dad means something, whether people want to acknowledge it or not. Right now, I’m working on an anthology project—“WHITE DADS: Stories and experiences told by people of color, fathered by white men.” I’ve been loving the ways people are taking this idea, supporting it, and helping it grow. Thing is, though, absolutely none of us have the same story to tell about what it’s like being brown, raised by a white guy in a society that ranks validity based on melanin and race. This is a part of my story and the story behind WHITE DADS.

Answers are never just black and white–but in the case of biracial identity, sometimes, that’s exactly what they are.

When I was about five years old, I learned the phrase, “Pedestrians have the right of way.” To me, this translated to, “I am going to walk into the road, and you have to stop.” So with all the wonder and arrogance of a new kindergartener, I unfortunately made habit of walking out into traffic with the confidence of a queen. My mother calls this my “Bad Seed” phase. My older sister had to literally grab me by the shirt and yank me from harm’s way as cars backed out of the driveways I didn’t care to notice.

One evening in 1996, I was on out on a stroll with my dad downtown. While I don’t recall it being a particularly bustling evening, I know there must have been enough cars buzzing by to practice caution when near the road. What I do recall, though, is that I was being a brat, most likely because I didn’t want to hold my dad’s hand. I was probably insulted by the sheer fact that he thought I needed help crossing the street at all. Didn’t he know I had the right of way?

I broke away from his grasp and took off tearing down the darkening street. My dad, 6 foot tall, took off running right behind me, no doubt yelling for me to “get back here!” You’ll have to catch me first.

And then, right as the chase was getting underway, I almost ran right smack into a young couple out on a date. The woman was almost frantic.

My dad has told me about the brief interaction he had with that man and woman, all those years ago. Now, he laughs at this story.

“Those people thought I was trying to kidnap you!” he bellows.

It’s funny, you see, because I was little brown girl, being chased by a big white man on a darkish, half deserted downtown street.

I laugh at this story, too. My dad may be a lot of things—someone who, for example, doesn’t fully understand racial fetishization or the panicked terror of police brutality against people who share my skintone—but a stranger or my kidnapper is not one of them. How could those people not see that?

I’m African American on my mother’s side, and I’m a Russian, Polish Jew from my father. In a world where we’re so often told black and white issues don’t exist, I have been coerced into telling the world that’s exactly what I am: A black and white issue.

I don’t have my father’s hazel eyes or his ruddy, pink cheeks. I’m a brown girl, not as nearly as light as my father or quite as dark as my mother. I’ve got my mother’s melanin and big, brown eyes. My sister has the high forehead of the Native Americans we’re mixed with from our mom’s side of the family, and I’ve got the babushka face from my ancestors in Eastern Europe from our dad’s. You probably wouldn’t guess that’s why my cheeks are so round, though. And why would you? I’ve got my mother’s melanin and big, brown eyes, and that’s what people see. When I’m asked that degrading, yet common and impolite question, “What are you?” I know what they’re really asking is not “Who are you?” but, “What made you that color?”

The idea of having my father mistaken for a stranger wasn’t something that really registered with me until I was older. My mom and I were both brown, but my dad and I were both Jewish. Two of a kind on either side. It wasn’t until I was older that the fact that I didn’t get to be in control of how other people saw me, and by extension what they saw when they looked at my dad and I, honestly came as a shock of hurt. Because we didn’t immediately register as looking like the family unit norm, society told me that he and I weren’t two of a kind after all; not really.

I came to realize that rather than being seen as unique individuals, people of color are seen as a blur of the narratives and stereotypes centered around our ethnicities. This is the kind of faulty thought process that has led so many people to ask me, “How can you be Jewish if you’re black?” Or worse, the definitive, “Black people aren’t Jewish.” There’s always this opposition of my identity. I’m either too black to be Jewish, or too Jewish to be black.

In our society, black people don’t get to be dynamic. Black people don’t get to be seen as diverse within the general population. We’re seen as one big lump mass of the same experience, “The Black Experience,” it’s often called. And if you don’t fit neatly into that preconceived fold, the immediate conclusion is that there’s something wrong with you, not something wrong with the narratives that have been concocted around race identity. There’s this false idea that we all have the same, one story to tell from start to finish. We don’t even get to claim an ancestral nation most of the time. People simply say, “Africa,” like it’s all the same. And because we’ve been stripped of the privilege of knowing those nations, that’s almost just what it’s become. We don’t get very many opportunities to be seen in the mainstream as individuals. We’re used as diversity, but not seen as diverse.

In parallel strides to the systematic and institutionalized racism that’s rampant in our country, this is a colorist society. “White” is typically and continually seen as the default race—even down to little things, like the color “nude” being a light skin tone—and it’s seen as the opposite of brown. Again and again in our male-run world, white men are the gatekeepers who make the decisions for us all. It’s obvious and undeniable that they’re the demographic with the most privilege in our country, and more often than not, the antagonists in stories about seeking social and racial justice.

These are things I know to be true about the climate of our world. My dad and I both know that they’re true. But what it also means, on a personal, individual level, is that I, a young, black woman, am seen as the the opposite of the older white man who is my father.

Enter WHITE DADS. This is the push back, the retort, the response, the healing process. This is a chance to share, laugh, process, and expose the immense diversity that exists in our communities, even within this one sliver of racial identity. This is a chance to tell our stories and say that we, the people of color with white dads, are valid, strong, and that we are not fractions of mismatched cultures inside a single being. We are whole, and who we are is enough.

Don’t let the specificity of the title fool you. In fact, it’s meant to be provocative. In some ways, it’s at odds with itself. Having to preface “dad” with a label, an explanation, can be an othering experience all it’s own. The theme may be specific, but it is by no means narrow.

On top of that, these days, so many brown folks are united under the “people of color” umbrella. This kind of budding unification is an astounding display of support. By choosing an often overlooked focus, potential is created to expand that unification in new ways and to publish those who are bursting at the seams with untold stories.

WHITE DADS is accepting all forms of creative expression from black, brown, mixed race, adopted and/or POC who have the unique experience of having a white father. This is meant to be an intentional, creative opportunity to speak on truths, tell stories and share art that fall within the thematic focus.

I’m tired of defending who I am. Fighting white supremacy and patriarchy, two things I care greatly about, are political issues I invest a lot of myself into. At the end of the day, though, theory, “-isms,” and social constructs are not going to make my dad less of the father who raised and loves me. These are political issues. My relationships with my family are not.

It’s isolating be unsure of where your identity lies.There is not a universal truth or a simple answer. This project, like identity itself, is far too nuanced and complicated to ever be restricted to binary modes of thought; to ever be about just one thing or another.

These are matters I recognize to be authentic about my own story and experience, but there’s so much more to say. WHITE DADS can be a place for those stories to be told. It’s a space to explore the crossroads of where social and political constructs intersect with personal experiences and family, loving or otherwise; an opportunity to look into the nature of identity and family ties that are anything but black and white.

Submissions are open from Dec 1st, 2015 – Jan 15, 2016. Check out the WDZ Tumblr page for more information. Email whitedadszine@gmail.com with questions. Find more writing from Sarah here.

Sarah Gladstone is a writer based out of Oakland, California. In addition to being a contributor for online sites such as Ravishly and The Huffington Post Blog, she also works on personal writing endeavors. WHITE DADS, a new zine anthology of stories, art, and experiences told by people of color fathered by white men, is her most current project. Most of her writing is creative nonfiction, poetry, and prose on topics relating to identity, race, and orientation. She appreciates all great forms of storytelling, magical realism, and the interconnectedness of art with social justice and humanity. When she’s not entangled with the written word, you can find Sarah debating the merits of pop culture, indulging in discount cinema, and generally trying to live a story worthy life.

Visit white-dads-zine.tumblr.com for more information on Sarah’s latest project, or email whitedadszine@gmail.com

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Fringers Part III

Part III- Journey Back Home

From the time I was very young I can recall wanting to meet my dad. I would eagerly wait for postcards and letters from him filled with photos and talk of meeting each other. Sometime in elementary school all contact fell off and by the time I was in college I still had yet to meet him. I had this fantasy that once I met my dad and went to Turkiye to meet the rest of my family it would suddenly change my life and I would find the place where I’d finally fit in.

After years of waiting to contact my father I decided to try finding him via the internet through a search engine. Surprisingly, I found his contact information on a website about his art. I emailed him at first simply asking for my grandparents’ current address as I hadn’t communicated with my grandmother in many years. This eventually led to my visiting him a couple times in Florida. During one of these visits I met my aunt and uncle who were visiting. My aunt is not an emotional person by any account, but we both found ourselves crying when we had to part ways after just a few days of laughter, exchanges in broken English and Turkish and exchanging gifts. It would be a few more years before I would see her again.

One of the things that stands out the most to me about my visits to get to know my dad was how aware I became of my racial/ethnic identity when I was with him. Growing up in a white family as someone who can pass, race never really came up. However, when I would go out with my dad I was acutely aware that his phenotype and strong accent highlighted my difference to others. I can recall actually being frightened after 9-11 that people would attack us as many people make no differentiation between any of the countries or people in the Middle East, seeing them all as American enemies. In an odd way, despite my constant claiming and assertion of mixed identity- these were some of the first times when it was done for me. What was often an invisible identity to others became extremely visible in a way I did not have control over. To make things more complex being in my dad’s presence not only brought my race/ethnicity into question, but his accent brought our nationality and citizenship to the forefront. Despite all of my concerns, I cannot recall a circumstance in which I experienced anything negative due to race/nationality while with my dad, but this too is likely due to his racial ambiguity and being in multicultural areas.

As time quickly passed and my grandparents heard of my interactions with my dad, they had my cousins contact me and eventually get a trip setup to visit. After over 20 years of my grandmother ending letters with, “God willing (İnşallah) we will meet one day,” it was finally happening. For my mother and future husband this was not exactly the ideal time as the U.S. Embassy in Turkiye had recently been bombed, however I had this overwhelming sense of peace and confidence that this was where I was suppose to be at that exact time and there was no harm that would come my way.
I also knew that another chance may never present itself and was determined to go.

Funnily enough my biggest fear was getting lost in the airport and not being able to get help due to a language barrier and not recognizing my cousins who were coming to pick me up. My mom had also helped me practice what to say to customs agents about coming to visit family so as not to raise any suspicions given the recent political terrain. After all of my worrying not only did the customs agent not ask a single question, but everything in the aiport had an English translation and my cousins and I immediately recognized each other despite never having met and only one or two phone calls and a handful of photos. On the ride back to the Asian side of Turkiye I was surprised not only at how beautiful and surreal the country was, but that I was hearing American music on their airwaves.

I spent the next few weeks between Istanbul and Antalya. The country was as beautiful as I’d been told and my family collectively worked to make sure I met everyone and was treated wonderfully. One of my cousins used much of his vacation leave to spend time taking me around and we instantly bonded; it was as if we’d known each other forever. However, when I was not with my cousins, who could provide translation or when discussions would slip into Turkish or there appeared to be a disagreement of sorts I was reminded that I would never truly understand the family dynamics or feel that I one hundred percent fit-in no matter how hard they tried to make me feel included.

The most difficult part of the trip was spending a week with my grandparents and uncle where we were unable to communicate with each other. By this point I had finished the only book I’d brought, which ironically was Malcolm X’s biography detailing his trip to the MECCA, read every book in English that my family owned and written and recorded countless diary entries. My grandmother spoke to me in Turkish at a rapid speed with a smile on her face, while my grandfather took a silent approach by grabbing my hand and taking me along while pointing at things.

One of the memories I cherish the most was when my grandparents took me into town. We went into jewelry store after jewelry store where trays of gold were pulled out and they would look at me and point to the gold bracelets being displayed, while I would get extremely uncomfortable because I had no idea how much the jewelry cost. Finally we entered a store where one of the employees was able to translate and let me know that they wanted me to pick out a bracelet. I chose the smallest one. It had delicate circles that reminded me of the waves at the beach in Antalya. I watched as my grandfather pulled out what appeared to be an extremely large amount of money after they weighed the bracelet. My uncle and grandmother motioned for me to kiss my grandfather on the cheek as we walked out and as I did a very large grin spread across his face. Shortly after buying the bracelet my grandfather took a trolley back to the apartment and it was clear that his only purpose in coming along was to get me a special bracelet. When it was time for me to leave their home and return to stay with my aunt they each pulled a “typical” grandparent move, pulling me aside and “sneaking” me money.

The trip taught me two things. The first was that my family in Turkiye loves me simply because we are related; they don’t care if we speak the same language, live in the same country or have hardly spent any time together. They love me because I exist and nothing can stand in the way of that. I had heard about family being of extreme importance within Turkish culture, but experiencing it was quite another thing. The second lesson I learned was that at my core I am truly American and always will be. Even if I learn the Turkish language, spend every summer abroad and immerse myself in Turkish culture every second of the day I will still be the fringer within my family.

CONCLUSION

At the beginning of my journey I focused on finding an experience or place that would instantaneously make me feel one hundred percent understood and accepted at all times. I lived based on the premise that I was lacking something that I needed to find and only then would I be complete. What I found along the way was a series of confirmations that I am a life-long fringer and that my experiences and occupation of strange spaces—somewhere between Europe, Asia and America, between Christianity, Islam and spirituality, being a white passing Middle Eastern woman, yet identifying as mixed because I understand this experience more than my own culture— are what make me who I am.

One of the most powerful revelations I came to was at the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity a couple of years ago. After watching the documentary “A Lot Like You” I became very emotional and asked the biracial filmmaker Eli Kimaro if after traveling to Tanzania and shooting a documentary about her journey she has ever truly felt like she fit in with her Tanzanian family. Her response was profound. She told me that maybe our purpose isn’t to fit in. She gave an example of how she kept asking her aunts about their lives and cultural practices that she would have known never to ask about had she grown up in Tanzania, but through her outsider status she didn’t and persisted. Eventually her aunts opened up about being raped and brutalized. She told me that it was by her being an outsider that she unknowingly asked inappropriate questions, which ultimately resulted in her aunts finding some healing from what they had experienced. She then proceeded to tell me that her daughter has seemingly from birth had an innate and profound connection to Tanzania, so maybe that connection is not part of our purpose, yet our purpose of being fringers is just as important.

Now, instead of focusing on lacking knowledge and experiences I think about what I do know and who I can touch and connect with as a fringer. I understand a mother’s desperate love to protect a child from a culture she did not understand how to navigate, so somewhere in a synergy of love and fear she did her best, which meant distancing the child from the rest of her family and identity. I know what it’s like to “reclaim” your name and heritage and find a parent using Google. I know what it’s like to be raised by a biological parent, yet take the journey of a transnational/transracial adoptee to find their biological family members only to realize how much you are like them, yet how you are so completely shaped by the family that raised you. I know what it’s like to take a life-changing journey that is simply a beautiful exotic extended vacation to those around you, meant to be discussed for a week or so upon return before being shut away in photo books to be discussed on a rare occasion. I know what it’s like to be an adult in academia and still get that feeling of discomfort when asked how I identify or worse yet, have my identity policed by others. Most of all I know that the validation and acceptance I flew thousands of miles to find was never something anyone else could provide. That’s the ironic thing about journeys, we frequently come to the realization that what we believed to be lacking and searched for externally, has in fact always resided within the core of who we are patiently waiting to be realized.

Naliyah Kaya is the Coordinator for Multiracial & Multicultural Student Involvement & Community Advocacy at the University of Maryland College Park where she works closely with Multiracial/Multiethnic and Native American Indian/Indigenous student groups, serving as an advocate for the needs of these communities. She currently teaches TOTUS Spoken Word Experience and Leadership & Intersecting Identities: Stories of the MULTI racial/ethnic/cultural Experience.

As a poetic public sociologist, Naliyah utilizes poetry as a medium for teaching and social change. She encourages students to engage in artistic expression as they examine their own identities, beliefs and values and as a form of activism in promoting social justice. It is her hope that through this process of self-exploration students will embrace cultural pluralism, find commonalities across differences and engage in research and dialogues that seek to benefit the greater good of society through positive social action.

A native of Washington State, Naliyah grew up just outside of Seattle. She earned an A.A.S. from Shoreline Community College, a B.A. in Sociology from Hampton University, and received her M.A. & Ph.D. in Sociology at George Mason University. Her poetry has been published in Hampton University’s literary magazine The Saracen, George Mason University’s Volition, Voices of the Future Presented by Etan Thomas and Spindrift Art & Literary Journal.

Learn more about Naliyah and her work on her website.

Fringers Part II

Despite feeling comfortable verbally sharing my story with friends and students it has taken me 15+ years to publically write about it despite numerous kind nudges from others. Somehow “putting it out there” in written form has always been somewhat of a foreboding experience that has kept me paralyzed in fear—that others may respond critically and perhaps like so many times before that those I identify with will reject me. So it is my hope that these words will encourage others to share their own truths, shake off fear and move forward embracing the freedom that comes from breaking free of silence…

Part II.

“From Turkish to Mixed”

As a child, I knew that my dad was from Turkiye and that this meant I was “Turkish.” At such a young age all I could equate “being Turkish” with was being forced to wear “weird” clothes in cultural festivals once a year, receiving gifts and letters from my babaanne (father’s mother) that went unread until they could be translated and playing with my one Turkish friend (whose mother my mom became close with while taking language lessons from her).

I carried around this identity without much thought for most of my childhood. Once my mother married my stepfather and had my brother, we interacted less and less with the Turkish community. With my mother working full-time and commuting 3-4 hours a day my Turkish identity only surfaced occasionally- most frequently at cultural events for school or when I brought store-bought baklava to potlucks.

Around middle school, this identity started to take on more meaning for me. Having been raised in predominately white, middle class, heterosexual, Christian spaces where most knew little or nothing about my father’s background no one ever queried much into the racial/ethnic identity I carried due to my fair complexion. There was often confusion around my last name differing from the rest of my family and my relationship to my younger brother whose blond hair and blue eyes stood in stark contrast to my own, but not to the extent of questioning my “whiteness.”

While I knew my mom, brother and stepdad were white, I personally had never given much thought to my own identity nor identified as “white.” I began to get frustrated that I did not know an entire half of my family—that I could not communicate with them without assistance, that I knew nothing of their culture, religion or location and I began to reject my “whiteness” and to solely identify as Turkish. As I entered high school I became increasingly angry at the lack of understanding I had of my family and self. In an effort to help, my mother contacted the family of my childhood Turkish friend and informed them that I wanted to learn more about my dad’s culture. They immediately invited me to participate in a Turkish fashion show. Excited I went to their home only to come back in tears as her mother had spent half of the rehearsal telling others to speak in English for me. Rather than feeling a sense of belonging and solidarity, the experience only further solidified that I truly was an outsider in both worlds.

When I returned to school after the weekend, the assistant principle, who happened to be at the fashion show, decided to pull me into his office to question my racial/ethnic identity and tell me about his Turkish immigrant wife before asking me to be a buddy to an incoming Turkish international student. Surprised and agitated I tried to explain that I was American and had little connection to my Turkish heritage and that any student on campus would be about as much help to the new student as I would be. The student either never came or something I said convinced him that it was not something he should further press me about, as I never did meet the student.

While I’m sure he had the best of intentions and likely thought he was being “progressive” by learning about his wife’s culture and trying to connect people from the same racial/ethnic background this interaction simply illustrated to me that he considered all of “us” to be the same and was yet another situation in which my lack of connection to my heritage was exposed.

Throughout high school, I continued to wrestle with my identity. The first two years I began to make new friends, most of whom identified as Mexican, Black or biracial. Within this group, I felt more comfortable exploring and expressing my emerging racial/ethnic identity. However, this was not without it’s own bumps in the road such as when discussions about “white people” arose. I sometimes shared certain sentiments, but felt conflicted. I would remind my friends that my mom and stepdad and brother were white and I was half white as well. This was usually met with a comment such as, “Well you’re different because you’re mixed.” I’d sit there thinking, “You’re still talking about my family…” Eventually I started to realize that my stance of rejecting whiteness via distancing myself from white people was incompatible with loving my family and myself.

My junior year of high school I began an early college program and started attending community
college full time. I remember one of my first courses was post civil rights history. The professor had us do an assignment that required us to interview family members about our cultures and history. Unfortunately, I was only able to complete half of the assignment. Once he found out that I knew little of my dad’s heritage and my own culture he went on a mission to “help me find it” and avoid assimilation! That day, we went around the entire campus until he found another Turkish student and left me with her. We had a polite but awkward conversation, which did little in helping me “find my culture,” but did serve to further highlight my status as an outsider.

After the awkward encounter I quickly found my way to the multicultural center, which soon became my home away from home (I literally slept there in the morning before classes to avoid traffic). I began to gain an eclectic group of mostly African and Middle Eastern international friends, two of whom were other bi/multi racial women. One was of a Turkish Pakistani background, but was raised in America and another, Amnah, shared almost the exact same story as myself except her father was from Dubai and she phenotypically did not pass for white. I was elated to finally have a friend who understood what it was like to be raised in a white American household, while wondering about the other half of your family and identity. Amnah and I quickly became close friends and sought out a cultural organization to join.

At the time, there were few cultural student organizations on our campus. The closest one to being multiracial was the Muslim student union, which was comprised mainly of international students from numerous countries. However, being raised in Christian households, Amnah and I didn’t see this as a group in which we would fit in. Despite neither of us identifying as black, many of our friends were in the Black Student Union, so we decided to ask if we could join. While we may not have identified the same racially we connected with many of our friends in the BSU as most of our parents/families were recent U.S. immigrants.

Once a year the multicultural center nominated a set number of students to attend the annual community college students of color conference. It was through these conferences that I found my way to the multiracial community. The MAVIN Foundation was just taking off in Seattle and they held a session at the conference. It was the first time I had seen a session description that I could really relate to and was elated. However, the students of color conferences were not all filled with fun, camaraderie, understanding and laughter. They were also places that brought out pain, frustration and reaffirmed boundaries.

I can still recall one particular incident in which I was reading a book in the hallway when another attendee approached me and began to engage in conversation. Unbeknownst to me he was conducting an authenticity test under the assumption that I was a white girl wearing a “black” hairstyle. Once he found out my racial/ethnic identities he began to go on and on about how he was wrong and how “my people” were actually one of the most targeted and oppressed groups due to the anti-Middle Eastern sentiments shared by many Americans post September 11^th. That evening he expressed his interest in dating me. I found it interesting and perplexing that despite being the same exact person, within a matter of minutes, in his eyes I suddenly went from being a white girl engaging in cultural appropriation to a mixed girl who was beautiful and acceptable for a man who believed in Pan-Africanism to date. Reminded of the old familiarity of high school lunch conversations, this was not the first or last time I’d be told that one part of me redeemed the other. Those giving the “compliment” never seemed to understand how it could be interpreted otherwise and I could not understand why it still sometimes felt affirming.

When reflecting on these experiences I often recall a conversation I had with a friend during which she said, “Your race is part of who you are, but it is not all of who you are.” I think that was the beginning of my realization that being a fringer was okay. Not fully understanding my culture was okay. Letting go of societal labels and expectations of who I was and should be was okay. There would be many more uncomfortable and life changing experiences to come, but I was the only one who could define myself and regardless of who or what others perceived me to be, all that mattered was that I knew who I was—a mixed, frequently white passing, second generation American sociologist, who knows more Spanish than Turkish, loves spoken word poetry, 90s R&B and Rap, boxing, is still a fan of The Seattle Super Sonics and Allen Iverson, watches obscure documentaries, wears giant earrings and is obsessed with dog advocacy. I am a kaleidoscope of the sum of my social identities, experiences, interests, and talents, yet none of them alone adequately define me. I am happily indefinable.

Learn more about Naliyah and her work on her website.

Fringers

Fringers

We are

cross-cultural babies

border straddling youth

intercontinental adults

We are infants formed out of true

sometimes forbidden

love, tours of duty and pleasure travels-

brought back like souvenirs

We are the children that have hidden our cultures and stories

inside diaries and memory boxes

filled with words

that have flown over seas

and traipsed across our minds

We are daughters of fearful mothers

who change our names

to prevent separation

via our fathers and their citizenship in other lands

So we wait patiently until our 18^th birthdays

to reclaim our names

before jumping on planes

headed towards our heritage

landing in unfamiliar spaces

met by faces we’ve only seen in pictures and dreams…
I have always been what my best friend’s mother refers to as a fringer. In fact, the majority of my inner circle is comprised of fringers- those of us who occupy peripheral spaces moving in and out of groups, yet never fully fitting into any one. Growing up this term resonated with me as I sought to unpack and frame my untraditional mixed experience- that of an American born daughter, raised by her biological mother, who often identifies more with transnational adoptees than other American born biracial/multiethnic individuals. Throughout the following entries I highlight some of the things that have marked and shaped my transnational mixed experience.

…

Part I.

“Reclaiming my Name”

I would assume—unless given a name that caused you to be bullied throughout school— that most people don’t give much thought to their name outside of asking the meaning and how it was chosen and/or considering changing it when getting married. I dwelled on it. As far back as elementary school, I can recall it being a point of contention between my mother and me.

My mother’s family−a blend of German, Irish, Scottish and Welsh –came to the U.S. a few generations ago. To the best of my knowledge they all identified and presented as white. My father is Turkish and was the only one in his family who decided to live in the United States. I am not sure how far back our family ties to Turkiye or that region of Asia go and with family members displaying a variety of phenotypes (my dad is often mistaken in the U.S. for Mexican, Native American, Asian Pacific Islander) our racial and ethnic ancestry is anyone’s guess.

My mother met my father through an international pen-pal group. He was often in and out of the U.S. as a young adult so much so that he eventually became a dual citizen. My mother would come to find out many things about my father that informed her decision to raise me on her own and to give me an alias last name. Like many American women who had children with recent immigrants, my mother lived with the nagging fear that once their relationship was no longer amicable there was the very real possibility that her only child could disappear into a country and culture she hardly knew and in which she had no rights.

Throughout my childhood I was enamored with the idea of having the power to choose the way in which others identified me. In elementary school I dreamt of altering my name—likely more a result of trivial reasons such as the first letter of my last name (*Adams) being at the beginning of the alphabet, which always meant going first for presentations. However, at some point I came to understand that I did not share my father’s last name, and though I knew of him more than I knew him, I wanted what I perceived to be my “real” last name−The name that tied me to my father’s side of the family and my heritage−even if that connection was more symbolic than lived.

The first chance to change my name presented itself when my mother married my stepfather. She asked if I wanted to take his last name as she would and I refused. I was about six or seven and didn’t particularly like the idea of sharing my mommy with someone else. Always a stubborn and independent child I decided that keeping my name was the only power I had to assert my individuality so I was going to preserve it at all costs. My mother respected my wishes and I came to love and respect my stepfather very much, yet I never wavered on my decision not to change my name.

On my sixteenth birthday my mom took me to get my driver’s license. When we got to the window at the DMV I went from excited to livid. My mother had always told me that she’d purposely not given me a middle name so that I could choose it when I turned eighteen (as well as change my last name to my father’s if I chose to do so). It was her way of attempting to pay homage to my father’s culture after she’d heard that middle names were uncommon in Turkiye. Whether or not middle names are used within my father’s family I still have no idea. Upon reviewing my identifying documents and starting the process for my driver’s license the woman at the DMV informed us of some news-I did have a middle name…*Shane. In that moment my mom learned that her idea of putting down multiple last names on my birth certificate had resulted in somewhat of a fiasco. Legally my middle name was a variation of the German name her family had used upon immigrating to America. So now I not only had an alias last name (*Adams), but an Americanized variation of my mother’s German maiden name as my middle name. I was *Leah Shane Adams or as my license stated *Leah S. Adams. Walking out with my driver’s license I simultaneously felt elated and angry. For the next two years I would now have to carry around an ID, which declared to its viewers a name I felt not only less connected to, but was actually agitated by.

In the months leading up to my eighteenth birthday, I was consumed not with planning an extravagant party, but rather with my trip to the courthouse. I spent months researching necessary name change documents and poring over name books and websites to help me choose my middle name. I finally decided on one that I not only liked the sound of, but had a meaning that felt right–felt like me. Being a poet I even decided to change the spelling of my first name and add a prefix to make it “flow” off the tongue with my new middle and last name. When the day finally came, I went by myself to the courthouse and stood before the judge, who asked a couple of questions, before signing off on the paperwork. It was much less ceremonious than I had anticipated (though I’m not sure what I expected). I received multiple copies of the embossed paperwork affirming my new name to the world. That day I went from *Leah (weary, tired) Shane (Americanized version of Schoen) Adams (alias) to Naliyah (to ascend, uplift) Kamaria (moonlight, bright like the moon) Kaya (rock). In that moment, I knew that I had reclaimed a part of my identity that could have easily slipped away and I was proud.

nazar boncuğu talisman; painting by my dad

Over the years I came to realize that the alias name was part of a mother’s love. For my mother that name was my protection—something meant to invoke questions about our relationship should my father have succeeded in his desire to take me to live with my grandparents. It was her antidote to the nightmare and anguish Sally Field’s character experienced in Not without my Daughter, an amulet (nazar boncuğu ) she placed around my entire being. For me it was a daily reminder to fight to preserve my heritage—to refuse to assimilate—to reject the melting pot ideology. As someone who can pass for white, some did not understand why I chose to change my name− “exposing” my West Asian/Middle Eastern heritage after 9/11—why I would willingly make myself a target when I could cloak myself within whiteness or at least phenotypic ambiguity. I think somehow I’ve always innately known that seeking to preserve self is often the same way we compromise and lose it—we lose our capacity to exist wholly, authentically and unapologetically. For me that was never an option.

*Indicates pseudonyms were used

Learn more about Naliyah and her work on her website.

A Higher Revelation

Mother’s Eulogy_2015

On our Mother’s birthday a couple of years ago, I wrote this essay about Minnie. To be honest, on this solemn occasion, no reverence, can truly capture her life’s journey.

Our mother just turned eighty-six. She’s not your normal octogenarian; she still slings baseballs overhand to Zeus, my sister Monica’s Rottweiler, to fetch. By any measure, that’s extraordinary. But, then again, nothing about Minnie is ordinary.

She’s a force of nature; the person in charge. No Leave it to Beaver June Cleaver type; she doesn’t abide the Norman Rockwell paradigm. Minnie is infinitely more independent, immensely more passionate, and unapologetically less servile.

In short, she’s a woman ahead of her time; a spitfire. A woman who doesn’t lament the past; a woman who bridged the generation gaps, who served as the head of the family long before feminism was defined, took hold, and became a social norm.

Our mother grew up on Riverside Drive, a predominately Latino neighborhood in west Tucson, Arizona. It didn’t take Minnie long to learn, that at the time, the Westside part of town offered her few opportunities.

She learned early to cope with adversity and became skilled at adapting to the circumstances at hand. She discovered that life most favored those who relished the challenges it had to offer.

She inhaled her formative years, intuitively aware that her youth was fleeting, perceptive to the fact that her surroundings and circumstances would determine her fate.

Not prone to indecision, she forged ahead, planted her roots on Valencia Road at the southernmost edge of town and, shortly thereafter, started her family.

At the time, Valencia was a bumpy, caliche-rutted two-lane dirt road leading to the Santa Cruz river and the Papago Indian reservation – and as our mother knew, to places far beyond.

Valencia, as Minnie saw it, served as a buffer, a dry, creosote, shrub-laden moat that protected her family from other-worldly in- trusions, delineation from which to launch her children to future endeavors.

As I’ve grown older I find myself reminiscing more about Mother. I remember how she wore her favorite straw sunbonnet while tending to a variety of red, white and pink roses which lined the perimeter of our front yard. Scores of cars would travel down our guardian highway. Invariably, as if pulled by some magnetic force, they would slow to a crawl, and make a U-turn to Minnie’s house of flowers.

Women of all ages, would exit from fancy cars and cross the cultural divide that was Valencia, to talk to Minnie about her roses. Somehow, they all seemed out of place in the desert, their fair hair shimmering in the sun; all pleasantly plump, their pale skins flush red, similarly attired in drab and muted cotton skirts.

I mention Mother’s roses and Valencia to make this point: Minnie knew where and how to grow things. She took hard earth and made things bloom.

She planted and nurtured; she tended to things that created life. She is our family’s Tree of Life. And true to the proverb that one should not judge a tree by the flower it displays. But rather by the fruit it bears, Minnie gave birth to and served as a surrogate mother to family members and friends, too many to mention.

I lovingly remember how she’d break the stillness of hot and dry summer evenings by cranking up the stereo to dance with my sisters, Gloria, Cecelia, Linda and baby Barbara. Each, alternately leading and following, swinging and twirling to a musical montage of Pérez Prado, Glenn Miller, and Motown. A Mother and her daughters, awash in music, wonder, and discovery reveling in the moment and each other. More than a decade later, she was still swinging – frequenting clubs to watch and listen to my Brother Dan’s rock & Roll band.

Another indelible memory was when we’d visit our Abuela and Minnie, and my sisters would tenderly braid our Yaqui grandmother’s regal, floor-length silver tresses. They would hover over her like attentive Indian princesses would a mythological, matriarchal God.

To see Nana imperially seated on her throne, a simple spindly- legged chair in the middle of a humble adobe home, surrounded by Mother and her daughters’ embraces is a recollection I cherish and often revisit.

Then, there was the time I had my high-school buddies over for an all-night poker party. Naturally Minnie sat in, and in her inimitable way through humor, contrived conversation, and an occasional ace-high bluff, figured how best to bet against each player at the table.

When it came to competition, regardless of age or gender, Minnie took no prisoners. She unrepentantly took their money and on one occasion even made a buddy of mine, cry.

As she laid down yet another winning hand and reached to scoop up the pot, one of the youngest players lamenting his luck, subconsciously let out an audible sigh, a visible tear in one of his eyes.

Aware that Minnie had noticed, he squirmed deep into his chair and contritely mumbled, “No…no…Mrs. Wilson, I’m alright, (cough, cough) there’s too much smoke in here, I just got something in my eye.” Nice try, bud. The boy never lived it down.

We played throughout the night until we lost all our chips. I remember the morning sun streaming through the kitchen window shedding light on the dining room table strewn with coins, greenbacks and cigarettes.

I recall Minnie leaning over the table to gather the last of her winnings. She turned to each of us, smiled, and whispered “Boys – never underestimate a woman.”

Trust me. I haven’t since.

But my most cherished memory of Minnie was when I was eight years old. Every day after school, I had to walk down a neighborhood alley in order to get home, and every day the local neighborhood bully would be waiting for me in that alley to taunt and terrorize me.

One day, my childhood tormentor sprang from the bushes, tackled me to the ground and proceeded to kick my skinny little butt. Battered and bruised, I limped home and told Mom.

Now Minnie, being Minnie, ordered me in no uncertain terms to go back into the alley and confront the bully once again. She wiped the tears off my face with a flour-encrusted dishcloth (she was making tortillas at the time) and gently shoved me out the back door.

I shuffled my way back into the alley to confront the bully once more. To this day, I wish I could say that I hammered on that boy, but the truth is, he kicked my ass, again.

But inexplicably, this time the beating didn’t hurt. I discovered that getting the crap kicked out of you – was no big deal.

I got up, my nose bloodied, but unafraid, refusing to admit defeat. On that single occasion, Minnie taught me to face my fears, to take a stand, to pick myself up. And, most importantly, she taught me never – but I mean never – ever – walk down an alley alone.

I haven’t since.

My younger brother Ric and sister Barbara, will attest to the time when without warning Minnie caught them sharing a toke and, just as surprisingly – decided to join them. According to my siblings, she was last seen that day sitting cross-legged on the living room carpet, sheepishly smiling, marginally coherent, listening to Springsteen, munching away on chips and bean dip.

You see, Minnie isn’t beyond exploring her boundaries. She experiments on many levels; her life, after all, has been a series of chances taken and odds overcome.

So when I saw my baby sister Monica’s video of Mom pitching the baseball to Zeus the Rottweiler, I thought, “Eighty-six? What is this woman made of? And all the while I’m witnessing this, Don Henley’s song “I Will Not Go Quietly” kept replaying in my head.

“Too many tire tracks in the sands of time

Yeah, I’m gonna tear it up

Gonna trash it up

Gonna round it up

Gonna rip it up

I will not lie down

I ain’t no tiger

I ain’t no little lamb

Suppose you tell me

Who do you think I think I am?

I will not go quietly

I will not lie down

I’m brave enough to be crazy

I’m strong enough to be weak

I see all these heroes with feet of clay

Whose mighty ships have sprung a leak

And I want you to tell me darlin’ Just what do you believe in now?”

Well, Mom. We, your children believe in a higher revelation. That would be you.

We too, will not go quietly. We will not lie down.

Happy eighty-sixth, and many more – and please, Mom – give Zeus a break.

Frederico Wilson is currently the owner and President of an International Fluid Power Procurement and Sourcing Company; founder of a non-profit organization (under development); blogger at mestizoblog.com, focusing on multicultural perspectives and issues. He is a USAF veteran (environmental/missile inspection specialist); and former domestic and international professional in the Airline, Telecommunications, Sales, and Financial Securities industries. Originally from Arizona, he is a lifetime student of cultural anthropology and applied behavioral science. He attended Arizona Western and the University of Arizona and holds numerous military technical, and corporate management certifications and licenses.

He is of mixed Mexican, Indian (Yaqui Tribe), Euro-Iberian, and Cornish Celtic ancestry. He lives, works, and writes in metropolitan Seattle, Washington.

He is best described by a quote attributed to Anthony Bourdain when recounting the preparation of a Burgundy wine-base rooster entrée.

“So, they take this big, tough, nasty-ass rooster, too old to grill, too tough to roast. Marinate and simmer the shit out of it, before it’s tasty.”

Frederico is the author of a new book, Escaping Culture: Finding your place in the world. Find out more on his website: mestizoblog.com

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