Ingrid Irigoyen,
Bethesda, MD
For the first decade of my life I lived with biological parents who were avowed racists. That experience was scarring because even as a young child my little gut instinct told me that they were wrong. Even though I didn’t fully understand it, the hate made me feel ill in the pit of my stomach and it made me afraid. The shame I still feel so deeply about that heritage has a silver lining though. It drives me to care about these issues. I want to be a counter-weight in the world, to let these genes I did not choose express in an open and loving way instead. My sister feels the same way. We are both working hard to do our part to listen, learn, be allies, be politically active, be voices for love. Maybe ours can be a story of hope.
