It was late one night when, twenty years old and suddenly considering the depths of life, I had enough time to pinpoint one of my greatest anxieties: not belonging.
Nick came over, broad shoulder in the doorway of my apartment, a grin on his face. My teddy bear best friend, always there when it was time to talk. He took a seat on the bar stool. I sat next to him. His eyes glittered as I organized the words sloshing back and forth in my mind.
He raised his eyebrows. "What do you mean?"
"Well." I leaned over the counter. "Being a halfie. It's weird. I mean I've got a mom who emigrated from England, and a full-blown hispanic dad who's first language was Spanish. I was thinking about it, and I realized that--I don't really belong anywhere."
The realization hadn't happened suddenly. I was studying Indian literature in my World Literature class, and after writing up a paper about the "cracks between cultures" we face in a global society, I tried to pinpoint where I'd be on my metaphorical map. I started sweating when I couldn't find anywhere. Well, fine, I told myself. That was okay, I was in college; I could start a life after. Where would I live after college, on my own terms. Where would I belong then?
The map remained empty.
Sure, the map only existed in my mind. But that's about as powerful a place as any.
Nick nodded, smile still there, waiting for me to continue.
I always continued.
"See, cultures create places of belonging. They bond people together and give races, or religions, or countries something to share in. But there are also cracks between culture, where the cultures pull people apart, or push them away from one another. Because if someone's not a part of that culture, they become lost and solitary." The counter's granite flecks shined under the dim apartment lights. "I haven't inherited any one culture. I don't belong in England because I'm a loud and huggy, and I don't belong with Mexicans because for one, I don't speak Spanish, and that kind of feels like some betrayal, and two, I value my privacy too much. And then I don't even belong in the part of America I grew up in, the South, because I never adopted an accent. Plus I'm LDS, so everyone acts like I'm a cult member when I first talk to them. Which, I mean, that's their culture, so I understand the knee-jerk reaction, but still.'"
Nick's face remained even, but it had lost the smile.
I leaned into my hand. My chin went numb in my palm. "I don't belong in either of my own halves, and I don't belong to my birthplace. I've inherited the cracks between culture." I lifted my head. "I'm a halfie. I don't belong anywhere."
Nick didn't say anything right away. He shuffled the CD's he'd brought over for me to check out, then glanced up. A smile wrinkled his eyes, and his broad face lit up.
"Or," he said, "Maybe you've inherited all of them."
It wasn't the answer I was looking for. I changed the subject after that, and we played with CD's, with youtube links, with jokes. But that stayed in my mind.
Maybe I shouldn't say I don't belong "anywhere"; instead, maybe I should say I don't belong in "any one place."
For a long time, I was split between my two sides. Am I Mexican? Am I British? And these questions don't come head-on. They appear in smaller things; should I take Spanish this semester so Dad and I can talk in his native language, or would that make Mom feel shut out? Is it okay for me to hate Dad's salsa and love Mom's Cornish pasties instead? Should I decide to love my white skin because my mom gave it to me, or am I really just the ugly pasty one out of my beautiful, cocoa-colores sisters?
Most importantly: who am I?
I think that's the big question behind "where do I belong?" You can't find a place to settle until you know who you are. And once you know who you are, you can settle anywhere. Because where you are does not change inside you. Your skin color, your cultures, your family--it helps adds up to a unique experience crossing borders: you. But you don't have to pick and choose.
Because the truth is, I think we all end up creating our own individual culture, our own family culture, race culture, religious culture, and so on.
So maybe as halfies, we aren't so simple. We aren't a single race, or country, or culture. We're a bridge, the literal uniting of two different human experiences. Maybe instead of wondering where we belong, we can satisfy ourselves by saying "everywhere." Because we know what it's like to be odd, to be the outlier, to be unusual. We know what it's like to be part minority, part something. We know what it's like to be--different. Unique.
Everyone, in some way we don't always know how to see, is different.
I found piece with this idea: maybe because I don't belong anywhere, I belong everywhere, and that means I can help everyone belong with me.
My name is Mikayla Rivera. I'm a half-British, half-Mexican American, and I'm a neurotic-but-totally-in-a-cute-way writer.
I'm a Brexican.
And you know what? I think it's time I write about it.
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