On legitimacy and “brown-ness”: Hispanic Heritage Month and identity

Part 2: I’m not a cowgirl (a journal entry)

My favorite dress in high school was so, so ugly. Polyester, green, a-line and ill fitting, it had the exact thrift store vibe I was going for. It was perfect. I’d finish off that outfit with fishnet tights and combat boots that I’d bought at the local surplus store. My hair was short and perpetually, purposely uncombed. That phase of my life was the first time someone with skin like mine told me that I wasn’t “Mexican enough.” She asked me why I didn’t wear Wranglers and ropers, como era la moda.

“Because I’m not a cowgirl,” I said.

I’m not mad about this. Neither of us knew other kids quite like me, or what I was trying to be, yet. I was just starting to find my people and figure myself out. Our worlds can be so small during those early teenage years.

But it’s not just these early teenage years — my relationship with my body has always felt complicated and colored by external expectations and internal dialogue. I have feelings about my clothes, the size of my thighs, the constantly changing condition of my greying hair. I never learned to use a curling iron or apply a coating of liquid foundation well. I don’t know how to fill in my eyebrows or apply lip liner. All of these issues sound so irrelevant and small, but I walk into rooms with beautiful self-possessed, brilliant Latinas whose hair is perfectly straight or loosely curled, framing their faces and I feel underdressed or undone. I want to sit with someone and ask them to show me how to make my hair unfrizz or question them on how they chose the shoes and the joyería and the dress for that day.

Spanx or none? Flats or heels? Lipstick? Mascara? Why can’t my hands operate a round brush at the same time as a blow dryer?

I’m still exploring ways to push back against both internal and external expectations of who I should be. I’m doing this for myself and for my daughters. To get there, I find myself centering the best memories of the powerful women in my life.

It took a rebellion of my scalp and skin that forced me to stop coloring my hair to remind me of how as a little girl, I loved brushing my Tía’s wavy, silver hair.

Thinking about my mom and how she always asked if I was wearing lipstick on my way out the door, knowing that I probably wasn’t. She said that because her mother used to say that to her, and because memories of my grandmother are treasures.

Thinking about the profesoras and librarians and writers and actors and activists who show up however they damn well please but with a massive presence that shines. They show up with big voices and long histories, all different and powerful and they’re all enough in their identity. I am enough and I will make sure that my children know they’re enough, too.

Part 3, the final part in this little series, a love letter to my brownest child… coming soon