Alicia Velez Stewart
Providence, RI
I also could have gone with “Wow, you don’t look Puerto Rican,” or “You are too “white” for us.” My father is 100% Puerto Rican, my mother was an all American mutt (as she would say – Lithuanian, Irish and English). Even so, my last name was still Velez and I have black hair, black eyes, olive skin and look distinctly Spanish. My mother was never extremely close to her family and as a result my brother and I were raised to favor our Latin roots and I identified as such. Growing up in a rural area where – at the time – we were the only Latino family in town was never an issue, though. No one thought twice about it except me – I always wanted to be more like (read: blonde and freckled) my friends in school. I was so excited to get to college and find out there was a Latino/Hispanic student association. Finally I would get a chance to meet and mingle with folks outside of my immediate family who looked like me, had families like mine, ate the same foods I liked! Instead I found out that I wasn’t “Latina” enough to be a part of the group because I was born in Massachusetts not PR, because my Spanish had a more “American” accent that the others, because I “didn’t look Puerto Rican” enough. I was told I was too white, that I didn’t know what it was like to “really be Puerto Rican” and, therefore, could not be a part of their social circle. Ridiculed and shunned by folks of my own ethnicity and then chastised for having too many white friends. Still coming across this kind of nonsense in my 30’s – especially after marrying a Scottish-American. Guess what, people? You didn’t want me. So, what’s my Race Card? Racially, I consider myself to be caucasian. Ethnically, I consider myself to be Puerto Rican. Ethically, I consider myself human. Realistically, I consider myself an outsider among my own people, on both sides of the ethnic fence.
