There must be a place where kids like us belong - and no I am not talking about prisons, detention centers, or back to where we came from. Contrary to popular belief, we are no criminals. There has to be a place where a college education doesn't make us seem like we are scrubbing the brown off our skin in painful silence, where our fathers do not say to us, “You are not better than me," for wanting to be a first generation graduate.
There has to be a place where we can go where a glance at our last names do not equate to a decision, an unfortunate response, a call we wait on knowing we will never receive. Tell me there is a place where kids like us do not feel embarrassed of their father’s sombreros and their mothers accents at things like parent-teacher conferences, faking sickness to avoid the, “I'm sorry, can you repeat that one more time.”
Please tell me there are kids out there in other places who are not ashamed of where their family trees begin, who do not secretly wish that they could uproot their origins, strangle their ethnicities, pull the ropes on the noose around their names, and tomahawk missile away at their culture in the name of approval. I once made that mistake.
Tell me where this place is, where the word discrimination is just a word they can feel accomplished for spelling at school, gold starred tests. Tell me there is a place where they want to move forward and not stay behind, where schools begin to plant seeds of hope in them and not just turn them into another number, another statistic, another could have been but wasn’t.
Tell me that you have found a place for kids like us with tainted blood, who have to pull themselves apart to feel whole. kids like us who made it out, exceeded expectations, who as a result now live in cages for being dangerous, because the world does not know what to do with them because they weren't supposed to live this long. And tell me why I feel like I need to apologize??
As if we have not already paid with the bones of our ancestors who lie under every institution and somehow, that is not enough. Rest in peace tios, y tias, abuelos, y abuelas, not just yet our dear native tongues, although we do not know you in full, there is still a lot you have to teach us. Rest in peace, all the times that we should have stood up for you dear blood, please forgive us, we know better now. If only we could revive you all to show you we am no longer ashamed. See?
There has to be a place where we don't have to ask ourselves if our English brain is working or our Spanish one. "Does this sound better in Spanish or English?" "Which one am I better at?" To our mamas: "We are sorry, this doesn't translate out, the joke's not funny in Spanish" - To my Ma: "I am sorry that I am writing these things that I feel in mi corazon, and I want to show you the extent of my passion in these words, but all that comes out is broken Espanol and long pauses."
Please God, end this disconnect - where children are trying to communicate with their parents but their tongues do not match - but I suppose we are descendants of Noah after all, scattered languages.
My Spanish teacher was right, I have fire in my gut - an everlasting flame - it will not be extinguished without my consent. I am here because my brother is still searching for a sense of belonging, I am here because I cannot begin to tell you how many times I cried writing this, I am here because my father and mother do not feel comfortable in their own skin, because my sisters ask me, "Why are we made this way?" And I cannot look them in their little eyes with answers. So, I will not give up, I will find that place where we can stop thinking in twos, and realize that our one, our whole is acceptable, not just justifiable, and that that one is me, that one is us.
