"Both" I answered. It's simple, right? My mom is Black, my dad is White. The math is easy. What kind of question is this?
To my ignorance, it's a layered question, and it will become something I ask myself everyday, because everyday someone wants an answer.
I am a mixed kid who grew up with lots of other mixed kids on military bases across Germany. I saw lots of interracial parents who made different combinations of children. Like most young people, if you shared something delicious out of your lunchbox, I thought you were cool and we were friends.
Somehow, things just get weird and race becomes a big deal. I'm not sure if it's the inner workings of middle school or that my family returned to the states. I was friends with a couple of white girls. There was some drama, and then I was friends with the black girls. I was happier there.
Nothing major happens in middle school, but I'm making small observations that will become my foundation as I enter High School.
I'm shy and being social is painful. I'm inexperienced and naive. Kids talk about things I don't quite understand. I'm smart, have large grandma glasses, and my hair is always frizzed out-which would make me an easy target, but the black girls are my friends, and that's providing me some sort of... safety? I'm tall and large chested, uncertain about my body. I don't want to move around. I choose to wear clothes twice my size. I have not measured my level of attractiveness; it's not in my awareness. I have a gap between my teeth that I'm not particularly fond of, but I don't hate it... yet.
By the time I move out of eight grade, my answer has changed.
"I'm Black."
and I get my hair relaxed, because that's what black girls do.
photo credit: zen via photopin cc
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