Assimilation

A journey into the impossible

I was 5 years old when I fully started to understand that I was different. Different how, you might ask? Well, in the vein of keeping it real, not white. I’m a brown girl, y’all. Plain and simple. I was quite a bit darker as a child. Currently I’m described as latte or not dark enough according to my Egyptian mother, pick your poison. Whatever shade of brown you want to describe me as, the fact is I will not be checking Caucasian on any forms and as I was entering Kindergarten, I got my first dose of the outright racism that was to be a running through line in my story.

Picture it. September 1987. A beautiful fall day. I’ve picked out the perfect first day of school outfit (a red/black plaid pinafore with a frilly white blouse underneath and black patten leather Mary janes). I requested my hair in a half up/down do and was ready to rock. My mother said I strolled in like I owned the joint and had no time or patience for her tears and histrionics. I said goodbye and moseyed on in. I was SO excited. Thrilled to be heading to school and starting this adventure and within five minutes I had my eager balloon deflated. His name was Michael P. Yes, I remember. One, I have a stupidly specific memory, but two, this was the 80’s. Everyone had the same name and had to use their last name initial to differentiate. I had 4 Michael’s, 3 Michelle’s, 2 Amanda’s and way too many Jaime/Jamie’s. I went and found my cubby with my name when Michael P comes up next to me and stares for a good long while. I sweetly said, “Hi. I’m Christine.” His response “Why do you have a Paki dot, are you a Paki?” Now please note I would never ever use this derogatory language towards the amazing people of Pakistan but these were his words, unfortunately. I laughed and said, “No, it’s just a mole. I’m Egyptian. He said “oh, same difference I guess.” End scene. I think I went home and asked my mom if she could cover it or get rid of it but she said it was a part of me and to just accept it. I didn’t really understand what had happened at the time. I was five for goodness sake. I went on about my business but it’s popped into my mind when I think about this subject so I believe this is where it started. My desperate need to blend and fit in. To not be different. To be just like everyone else.

When I was 9, we moved to sunny Florida. My mom was recovering from a horrific fight with cancer and wanted to be somewhere warm. We had vacationed there a lot so I was excited to be there. We moved to a town on the western/gulf side and set up homebase. I quickly made a few friends form the surrounding townhomes and set up shop at the complex’s pool. It was not lost on me that I was the ONLY nonwhite person. Oh, how I longed to be like my blond haired, fair skinned friends. I put Sun-In™ in my hair to help bleach it blonde. But try as I might my skin would not lighten. I had had pin straight hair my whole life but at age 8 we had cut it and somehow between that and pre-puberty it had turned unreal curly. Tight frizzy spirals circled my head. I was mortified. My mom was pre-occupied and didn’t help much with taming the beast so I looked downright wild. I begged her to straighten it and give me bangs and she refused so I took matters into my own hands with my “troublemaker” friend. We were of course alone; it was the 90’s after all and we decided to cut my bangs. What we hadn’t accounted for was, after cutting them wet, they dried in such a way that it looked as though I had teeny tiny curly antennae all over my forehead. I cried and cried. My friend of course left to go home for dinner and when my mom saw me, she lost her mind. Bless her though, because she started the painful process of straightening them and to try to salvage what she could. She would continue to straighten my bangs and style my curly hair for almost a year until they finally grew back in. I have many a grievance with my mother but I’ll never forget that way she went from crazy ass mad to let’s see how we can fix this. She stayed the course but unfortunately so did my need to be anything but me. To find a way to look and be like everyone else. To stop standing out and quietly blend into the background. I would continue to make these types of blunders in my journey for a long time, however the worst was yet to come.

I had moved a million times and been to so many schools I lost count by the time I got to high school. My parents had finally divorced and my mother swore we would be moving for the last time and that I would get to start and finish high school in one freaking place. Hallelujah. It was 1996 and we moved to a small, underdeveloped town north of Toronto. There were a few traffic lights, one coffee shop, one diner and one drive thru restaurant. The rest was farmland and the families who had been farming there for a few generations. We enrolled me in the high school that we happened to live adjacent to. My backyard was the track and soccer field. I was nervous but optimistic. I could feel the stares and curiosity as I walked the halls but this wasn’t anything I hadn’t experienced before. I went to my classes and felt I had survived the day. I got through the first week relatively unscathed. A few friendly people had shown me kindness as the ONLY NEW PERSON THEY HAD EVER EXPERINCED IN THEIR 14 YEARS OF LIVING. I’m sorry to yell but this was their truth and I was baffled. They were all born in the same hospital, went to the same elementary school. All the families knew one another. No one new had moved to the town, virtually ever. I felt like I was in an M. Night Shyamalan movie. Then I started week 2. I putzed along to my locker and found some graffiti on it. Someone had lovingly sprayed the word N****r on it. Great, here we go, I thought. Teachers saw it and quickly overreacted, making a scene I would rather avoid. I was taken to the principal’s office and they asked if I wanted them to call my mom. I said she was working and I was fine. No biggie, right? “I’m not even Black.” I uttered and waited until they let me get back to class. I kept my head down and barely muttered a word for a few weeks but what was I going to do? Sulk forever. In my, fuck those people armour I had honed over the years I started to crawl out of it but I was definitely faking it till I made it. Don’t let them see it hurts you and hopefully it won’t. I’ve been called every derogatory term for an African Canadian there is. You know what I did to combat it….I shopped at the Limited and Limited too. I only lusted for white boys on the cover of magazines and I never allowed myself to embrace anything about my culture. I even, from time to time made fun of “Us Arabs.” The ridiculous thing being that Egyptians aren’t even Arabs but semantics. Anything to assimilate and fit in.

I’m not proud of the person I was until I was north of 30. I’m not ashamed of her but I’m disappointed in her. I am sad that she didn’t have an ally saying “Fuck those assholes. Be yourself.” I hate that the culture was truly only for white people and everyone else had to prove they belonged. What a horror show. I wish I had done things better but we can’t change the past. All we can do Is learn from it and boy did I think I had, until….2018.

I was blessed with a little girl. A perfect tiny little bundle of absolute joy. Sorry to brag, but she was a Gold Ribbon newborn. Peaceful, well-tempered and to my absolute post-partum hormonal delight, she was fair skinned and blue eyed like her dad. The relief I felt that she did not resemble me at all was overwhelming. I thanked the universe for sparing her from any or all of the pain I suffered. She would be fine. Her creamy skin and colour changing eyes would set her on an amazing path. Then the little micro-racisms started popping up. “Oh, are you, her nanny?” “No, you can’t be her real mom!” “Got her good looks from her dad, I see.” There I was, reveling in her beauty and being plunged right back into my trauma. I now had some tools and honestly no real fucks left to give but the trauma was triggered and I had to work a bit to overcome the hurdle. She’s six now and looks like a bronze goddess in the summer with her perfect tan. She definitely gets this from me which makes me smile and marvel at her. It also helps with the healing to think that now when people look at her, they’ll know she’s just as much a part of me as she is of her European father.

Writing these stories was hard. I never want to hide that. I truly feel saying them out loud helps me heal and so that’s why I do it. I’m striving to make this world for my kid a bit more just but it’s so incredibly hard. My hope is that if enough of us share these kinds of stories we can band together and scream the words….ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

If this is you, or a version of you, much like last weeks essay….I hear you and I get it.

You’re not alone and I’m always here to listen.

Xx

The Conversation Maven