Everybody feels like Anzaldua sometimes.

Everybody knows what it’s like to be constantly pinned with labels we have never claimed for ourselves.

Race. Gender. Class. Nationality. We consider ourselves identified everywhere we go.

We are pinned to the floor by people who don’t know us. They shine a lamp in our faces to blind us while they carefully examine and ridicule who they think we are.

We are pinned with medals by our own kin. Medals that bear the sins of our forefathers. They think they exhibit our strength, when they only exhibit their hate. I wish I could silence them so others would know I am not like them.

This reflection makes me wonder, if Gloria saw me, what would she say? Would she stand accusing?

It’s true: A white man knows nothing of the other.

He knows nothing of toil unheard. He knows nothing of being silenced, overlooked. He knows only plush seat of power. The singing of a crystal glass of champagne.  I’ve known that since birth.

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Growing up, I knew only a handful of people who were neither hispanic nor white. Two elders at my father’s church, Dr. Bill and Deborah Wright, were doctors at Valley Baptist Medical Center and held a more or less consistent presence in my life. Whenever they entered the sanctuary, the room seemed to stop and awe, even if only for a moment. It was uncommon to see African-Americans in Brownsville, and most people did not know “how to act.” The Wrights walked in holding their heads high and backs straight. Mrs. Wright sported a different hat each week, though no other women in the church wore one. Not just simple hats either; she didn’t shy from trying different colors, shapes, and sizes that were anything but conventional.

Their smiles always made me hopeful. Dr. Wright would approach me and pat me gently on my head and spread a genuine grin and with a heartfelt but raspy voice would ask me, “How you doin’ today, William?”

The Wrights’ lives were on call all the time, so there was no telling if I’d see them on any given Sunday. But their job was medical and death follows no schedule. Occasionally, when mom and dad would take me to Shoney’s Diner on Thursdays back when kids could eat for $5, we’d see them. But even if I didn’t see them at church, come Thanksgiving or July 4th, my parents would invite them over. It was mom’s custom to invite other non-natives to celebrate holidays with us.

The only African-American kid I was ever friends with growing up was the son of Saudi immigrants. His name was Hari Chari. Hari had a long moonlike face and a tall, lanky pencil-thin body. He was a pretty nerdy kid: a straight-A student who enjoyed playing chess, reading sci-fi novels in the library, and helping Mr. Vayas in the computer lab whenever he could. His mom dressed him in Ralph Lauren polos, dark wash “athletic fit” jeans, big red and white Reebok sneakers, and a Baby-G watch. When I met Hari in 2002, most people I knew were scared of anything south of Europe (which might as well have been Bosnia) and the term “Muslim” brought no positive associates. I’m not sure what Hari Chari was feeling at thirteen besides misunderstood by his white and Mexican friends, but I’m sure his parents were enduring some serious cultural suppression. If I was getting odd looks from patrons at la pulga, one could only imagine. Then, during the summer between freshman and sophomore year, Hari moved away.

In college, I became friends with Roy. Roy was quick to notice my small-town mind and unafraid to point out my ignorance.  The second time I hung out with him, we sat outside the university union eating burritos. Trivial conversation faded, and it got quiet. I asked,

“So you’re a music major, right?” He looked confused and furrowed his brow at me,  “Uh, no. I’m a bio major. I think I told you that last week.”

“Oh yeah. Sorry, for some reason I thought you said you played the trumpet.”

His eyes widened in shock. “Uhhh, because I’m black with big lips??”

He erupted in laughter causing eyes to shift over to our table. Boiling from embarrassment, I joined him in laughing as a way to release some of the internal pressure, desperately trying to tie down the truth and bury it. The truth about who I really was: some sheltered WASP flying away from his nest hoping to “see the world.” I assumed Roy laughed out of annoyance of being stereotyped by yet another white kid. I couldn’t stop apologizing after I caught my breath.

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There weren’t many Asians in Brownsville either. Their community was the third largest after latinx and whites, but that only accounted for a little less than 3% of the population. Several of the ropa usada stores and bazaar type markets in the heart of downtown were owned by a handful of Chinese and Korean families. You’d run into them smoking cigarettes outside their shops watching the traffic build up throughout the day. I tried not to stare but always watched them curiously in my peripherals and listened with burning ears as they exchanged words in Korean.

The Sorias, a Philipino family, ran the asian market off Central boulevard in the cleft of a deserted plaza. I’d saunter through the three or four ailes and stock up on Pocky sticks and Japanese ramen on a Saturday when my mom agreed to make the stop.

I enjoyed making friends of other minorities because we seemed to have an unspoken understanding of being the “other.” My exile came chock full of privilege. It came with institutional power and at times royal treatment by people I didn’t know (people thought rubbing red hair gave them good luck). I can never really know the struggles of minorities, and I’ll never be as nuanced and crafted as they are at telling their stories. But it seemed fate has permitted me to gain some empathy by grooming me in the furthest corner of the country.

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Among my oldest acquaintances is a Korean named Bobby Yim. I’ve known Bobby since grade school. His parents opened up a successful nick-nackery at the corner of Elizabeth and 12th street some twenty-five years ago. They sell random dollar-store items like notebooks, nail polish, napkins, and flimsy kitchen knives. The Yims must have made a success out of it though – they live in one of the nicer homes near the entrance to the Brownsville Country Club. It stands tall and wide like a barn and is painted in wedding cake white with blue window frames and a long driveway following the fence line and curving into the garage where they park their white Escalade and a white Camry. Through the window above the front door, the gold chandelier flickering like a constellation can be seen from the street.

The last time I saw that house was at Bobby’s end-of-the-year party a week after we finished middle school. My mother pulled up in her bronze Suburban and dropped me off near lunchtime. “Have a good time!” I jumped out and slammed the door and hurried both nervous and excited through a humid lawn buzzing with mosquitos. I approached the Yim residence and rang the doorbell.

When the door opened, a wave of air condition hit me and cooled my already sweating face. The home had a 20 foot tall foyer with white tile floors and forest green marble columns towering up to the second floor. The stairs led to a dark wooden banister and then a hallway with floral wallpaper. His mother held the door opened and through frantic gestures and lines of Korean, ordered I come inside and remove my shoes. She scooted me to the back patio through the living room neatly arrayed with polished oak furniture, leather sofas, and the fragrance of clean linen. When I stepped outside, I squinted at the sunlight reflecting off the pool. I could see shapes of the other 8th graders running, diving, swimming, and shoving each other into the water.

Bobby saw me first. He pushed himself out of the pool and approached me dripping water on the concrete, “Waaaasssuuupp!” he said with a big smile (it was the year of waaaassuuup).

“Waaaassuuup, ninja.” I said as we did our handshake. “Nice house.”

“Yeah,” he said, slapping me on the back, “I know!” and gave his loud cackle of a laugh.

This made the others look over and aim their super-soakers, “Heeey Beeeelliiieee!!” they all yelled launching streams of chlorine lasers at me. Raising my hands proved futile and my new Sonic the Hedgehog shirt was officially soaked. I would have felt sad that no one had seen it before drenching it if I wasn’t distracted by a pool party.

“Hey dude, go down the slide.” Bobby pointed behind him. Without a word, I ran around the pool trying to wiggle out of my shirt and not fall. I climbed to the top of the slide that was hot as a comal gripping my dry translucent thighs. I pushed myself down the chute and picked up speed before  five or six water balloons were chucked at my face. The shouts of all my peers went suddenly quiet when I smacked the water and sank below its surface.

The afternoon was total bliss. It was one of those times when every part of your brain and body was stimulated by joy. Hours felt like minutes as I dodged the splashes, dove into the water, pushed my friends over the edge, bobbed my head playing “marco-polo”, and trying to guess with the boys what the girls were whispering about through cupped hands. The table where they sat blared non-stop Linkin Park, Destiny’s Child, Creed, and Eminem. The parents were out having lunch, at the movies, or day-drinking, and we played the hits and sang all the lyrics we didn’t know as loud as we could.

Middle school was over. Summer was here.

But it wasn’t like other summers. Every summer previously had been little more than a “gasp” from the heavy burdens of a religious private school: the rigorous work, the competitiveness, the pressure to prove our dedication to the “spiritual,” and the constant critique first administered by the teachers and then echoing endlessly in our minds. Summer was a month of quieting those voices, a month of learning to play again, followed by a few weeks of video gaming to escape the heat, and a week of dreadful anticipation of our return to school.

Every August had ushered a return to normalcy. My elementary and middle school years passed with the same 30 kids divided into two classrooms. We knew each other. We knew our roles. We saw each other as reference points, as fixed objects that helped us find our social and academic bearings. But that was about to change. We were about to enter a world without those references. We were on our way to an inconsistent and transient society. Our only social skill would turn out to be a disservice: recognizing authority.

We ran around the pool like things were just beginning, but beneath our promises to “always be friends” was a solvent fear that we were at the end of something.

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I don’t know the exact time I arrived, but I remember the sun gradually descending behind the wooden fence behind the slide. Everyone had gotten out of the pool and stood around the table eating hot dogs and chips. I remained in the water directly under the shadow of the slide. I stayed there for a while, using my frog kicks keep me afloat. My back had been feeling uber sensitive for hours, and the water flowing off the slide felt as cold as ice upon my shoulders. I kept shifting back and forth, turning my neck from side to side letting the water cool my neck. The whole class was out of the pool talking amongst themselves while I bobbed in the shadows watching them. I must have looked like a bonafide creep.

Finally, my mom arrived and walked to the patio to call me inside. I exited the pool with my back feeling like a stretched balloon. I looked down at my fingers wrinkled like prunes. I said my final goodbye to my friends and every hug stung just a bit more than the last.

I couldn’t get comfortable in the car. I leaned forward with my bright red face directly on the AC vent. When I got home, I was in incredible pain. I didn’t want to sit, I couldn’t lie flat, and everything just burned with what felt like a raw open wound. I wanted to stand in front of an open freezer all night or change my skin into something that it wasn’t –  something resilient.

I rubbed Aloe Vera and all over my arms, chest, and back. It turned out the sunburn was a second-degree burn which needed special attention. My mom sat me down and explained to me why I needed to be extra careful when spending time in the sun. I was more vulnerable to burns than most of my friends, it seemed.