Who I am

I enter the dim class room; I am ready to learn.

I choose to sit in the very front of the room.

My professor enters moments later.

The topic of the day is race and ethnicity. I try not to cringe at the sound of the word “race”

My heart begins to pace, I lower my head and fidget with my pen. I am the only person of color in the entire class.

In my head I can hear everyone’s prejudice voices, they do not know what I am. I rest my head on my fist, because it is getting so heavy, at the same time my curls bounce. I cannot contain them.

My skin is cinnamon, I am brown. My hair is soft and curly, when it is wet it soaks my back but when it is dry it becomes an afro, filled with tight curls. My professor, is talking about race. The topic I hate most. It puts me in an uncomfortable place.

I have never had to think about race until, I got to this school. I am not black, I know that I am not black, the people in this room and in this school are the only people who cannot tell that I am Dominican.

They do not know that my first language is Spanish, nor that my curly hair and tanned skin is natural. They do not know that I am so proud of where I come from that when they think I am otherwise; it tears me to pieces. Their lack of knowledge and exposure, hurts me. They think that I am black, because my skin is brown. But they do not know what I am. I am human. I have blood running through my veins, I have bones beneath my skin. But because I am brown, I am secluded I am different, I am black, there is no gray area. To them, you can only be either or, black or white. But I am in the middle. I am latina, I am Dominican and I want them to know and understand that, that is who I am.