MULATTO BILDUNGSROMAN: AN ESSAY OF RACE, IDENTITY AND CULTURE PART ll

(Continued...)

At the end of the viewing he told me that he liked me and that he would rent the apartment to me. I do not want the apartment because I do not want to give my money or have anything to do with a person who views me as a mongrel. A mongrel is a dog. I had to go home and look the word up because I couldn't believe that I had been referred to as a dog and I had hopes that perhaps there was another definition, less insulting, that he had intended. Alas, as pretty as you please, he had used a word that can not be construed as anything but an insult. I also think he 'liked' me because I was silent and smiled ever so vaguely  when he called me a mongrel. I was a good Negro which means a Negro who is acceptable to whites. A good Negro is one who doesn't get bent out of shape when insulted. This line of questioning is par for the course with those of us of mixed heritage. Lawrence Hill devotes and entire chapter to this line of questioning. The chapter is called: The Question. In the often humorous book, Talking About Difference: Encounters in Culture,language and Identity, writers from Canada of mixed heritage write about this theme too.  Lawrence Hill has an essay in this book titled: Zebra: Growing Up Black and White in Canada. In this essay Mr. Hill is more likable to me. He mentions that when he is asked The Question he refuses to answer not because he is ashamed but rather because it is always demanded of him to answer. It seems our not-so-easy-to-define makeup and appearance drives some people to distraction. having read so many stories on the subject, some riotously funny, I have learned two things. One, I am not paranoid: it really is happening, and two, I have learned some snappy comebacks for the next time I am asked The Question.

I have never asked anyone what race or ethnicity they are. This is not because i am better than those who do; it is because I can not think of one way to use the information to further the relationship and gain a friend. Thus I render the question rude on top of useless. I also never ask someone what they do for a living because I assume no one, except Tina Turner, is working at a job that they would stay with if given the chance to be independently wealthy. I am however aware that this question can produce useful information  but for the most part, how and when it is asked is a good indication of how you are perceived. I do however ask about culture, if, and only when, I am invited to do so - which is to say, when it is made abundantly clear by the speaker that they wish to talk about their ethnicity and culture. Even then, I never assume that this disclosure is my opportunity to become an investigative reporter. I am careful to formulate my questions so as not to psychologically rape the individual or make them feel like I have felt when grilled which is to say like I am subjecting them to the inquisition.

There is a story I tell about coming back to America and living in The Fillmore District in San Francisco which at that time was like saying Harlem. People immediately associated Fillmore with Blacks. But unlike Harlem, which is historically Black, The Fillmore is now all white, and before it was black, it was Asian. The story is about my 'getting rid' of a Macy's shopping bag filled with marijuana lids for a guy who asked me if I thought I could get rid of them. I had no experience with slang or African American vernacular and I took his words literally. I do not smoke pot then or now but I was always, at that time, asked if I had any pot. I saw this as an opportunity to make friends and to finally have the item I was always asked for. Unlike cigarettes, I observed that pot smokers passed joints around. It was a shared thing and users tended to be friendly by my estimation. So there was nothing in my experience with pot to make me understand or believe that it was something that was purchased. It was grown, like potatoes or rhubarb, and therefore I assumed that like too many tomatoes on the vine, it was given away instead of seen going to waste. 

I love myself for this experience.

I gave the pot away and never collected a dime. When people offered me money I declined in the same way I would decline taking payment for goodies my garden might yield. I think this is a funny story but every time I tell it to strangers I am always asked the same thing:

Where are you from? 

This question would be normal if it weren't for the next question which is always:

What are you?

It should simply be a funny story but it seems to upset quite a few people. One person went so far as to grill me about the details of my family members and friends - his questions - he was a student and a policeman, where aimed at uncovering the drug-addicted or incarcerated people he was sure I was related to. When he found none, he simply shook his head in disbelief. He never spoke to me when passing but rather shook his head each time he saw me. For him it was irrational to his sensibilities to encounter a person of colour who did not have a keen understanding of drug use. He was sure I was lying. I had told him a story that failed to confirm and conform to his idea of who I was based solely on race. These two questions which are persistently asked of me, with the telling of the story, suggest a few things to me.

First, to be asked where I am from is to imply that my story is foreign in nature. It makes the assumption that my story has never happened to anyone who looks like me or talks like me in New York City, San Francisco, and Hartsdale, New York; all places that I have told this story. Or I might assume that all of the people I have told are pot smokers and have never met a non pot smoker and are astonished that such a person exists. Perhaps it is true that I am indeed the only non smoker in these cities. maybe my story is not funny at all and in reality  and in reality all my listeners are non smokers and are horrified that in their midst is a drug dealer. I have told this story in Crompond, New York too, to riotous effect even, but the listeners were smoking pot and because I have often heard that smokers get something called 'the giggles' as a side-effect to smoking marijuana I can not trust the authenticity of their laughter.

When 'where are you from?' is followed by 'what are you?', I realize that there is something about my story that jars the listeners' perceptions of who I am and where they think I am from. There is something about my telling of the story that makes the listener ask two questions that do not seem like questions of natural progression. I might ask how the story teller got out of the situation - a deeply religious adult I was living with stepped in, told the young man to get lost or she would call the police. She, in turn, saw my naivete as proof positive that God works in mysterious ways and through idiots and children. Her laughter was hard and long. Or, I might ask if the teller was forced to retrace their steps and collect the money for the marijuana. I also might ask if I ever saw the young man again. No. These two questions asked together with the telling of that story suggest to me that when people hear my story they assume it is not the story or experience of a person who looks like me. I have gained a considerable amount of weight with each telling of that story but no one ever asks me what weight I was when this event happened. You may see this example on the page and you might say to yourself what would her weight have to do with the story but I ask, what does my racial makeup have to do with the story? These two questions tell me that something about my story and me has upset and caused confusion within the order of things of the listener. The questions are asked to reformulate and make certain what was assumed about me just by looking. And the only thing we can tell about another person just by looking is on the surface: obvious physical handicap, deformity, size and skin colour. We can not tell race from looking but we sure can assume it. 

When I wear a Star of David in New York City every Hassidic within sight assumes I am Sephardic. I am often assumed to be a Moor. I am Spanish when conversations are begun in Spanish and ended when I am discovered as having inadvertently passed. When I lived on the outskirts of Little Italy in The Bronx I was often asked if I was Sicilian.

I do not mind being asked if I am these various identities. I enjoy it in fact because it makes me feel that I truly am connected to mankind as i should be. But when I answer 'no' to all of the above and I'm immediately asked to reveal what I am by a complete stranger I realize that the person with questions now needs to reassess what they assumed so as to not make the same mistake again. The reactions I get are similar to those individuals who suddenly discover that they have been unwittingly involved romantically with a trans-sexual. They feel tricked and want to know how they could have been so fooled, for to fall in love with the wrong gender is to be avoided and so it is with race.

Much more recently I am at a party with D. She is the daughter of a well known person and I would guess that inadvertently makes her famous and sought after too. We are sitting together on a day bed in the late evening chatting. We know one another because I am employed by her mother. I like her, and I assume that d=so far she likes me. In all ways she is polite and well intentioned. Suddenly a hand extends to her, interrupting our conversation. My hand is shaken only when D kindly turns towards me and introduces  me to the body attached to the handshake. A firm one I might add. So firm that it feels aggressive. I hold myself back from rubbing it in feigned soreness. The hand shaker acknowledges me and immediately returns wholeheartedly to D. I am left to listen or disappear. I am sure I can sense that D is slightly amused and embarrassed by the hand shaker's aggression. She, the hand shaker, is clutching a glass of wine with a mitt that is as huge as my grandmother Germaine's I wonder if she is from New Brunswick. I am struck by this woman's focus. She is on a mission and its sole point is to make herself known to D. I am no one to her. But I am weary of going away when not wanted. I wait until something is said that will afford me the opportunity to join in. 

The woman, who surely comes from somewhere near New Brunswick, finally reveals that her job has recently exposed her to an upsurge of clients that are into drugs and far more desperate than she has seen in all her years as a social helper. She also reveals that she is from Northern Maine which gives me fleeting smugness -- a stones throw from New Brunswick -- we're probably related with mitts like that. But right now she is as busy as a fart in a mitt trying to seduce D. 

It is then that she includes me in the conversation with eye contact. I interpret the inclusion at this point to mean that she believes me to be knowledgeable on the subject of desperation and drugs. I can't hide my face; I imagine it pinched; about to fold in on itself. She reveals quite sincerely that in all her years she had not known such problems exist to this extent. She wonders aloud if she is naive. I tell her that I believe most of the world is desperate and immediately I think of the term 'economic segregation'. I make a mental note to think more about that term at a later time. D nods her head in agreement with me which prompts the interloper to begin wondering who I am. She wants immediately to know what I do for a living. I smile like Pirate Jenny and tell her I work for D's mother. This is what she says:

Her: I didn't know that.

Me: I can't imagine you would. We have only just met.

Her: But this is a small town. That's the sort of thing I would know about.

Me; I can't imagine why. I don't know anything about you.

Her: How did you get to Vermont?

I glance at D and she kindly steps in to answer:

D: New York, Canada, Massachusetts, Vermont.

Her: What part of Canada?

Me: Prince Edward Island.

Her husband arrives: He is introduced all around. He has caught the part about Prince Edward Island. 

Her Husband: Why did you come to Vermont? What are you doing here?

D's husband arrives.

D's Husband: You don't have to answer that question.

Me: Are you two the Vermont police? I don't know what to say...

She and husband looked confused. The room empties and I feel as though we single-handedly pooped on the party. I have to remind myself constantly that anyone who approaches me with a "What are you doing here?" question is trying to ruin my enjoyment at the same damned party. "What are you doing here?" is not the sort of question that one asks to be friendly or inclusive. It is asked when one is startled and cannot understand the relationship placed before them. It is asked of me often as a desperate attempt to understand how I, a person of colour, snuck past their noses and became lodged in their community without their knowledge or approval. How else can you explain her surprise that she did not know about my employment? I cringe at the thoughts I am led to involving the importance others place on having known or not known of my engagement with D's mother. You see, D's mother is 92: Do people now have less respect for her for having hired me? Do they see my engagement as a reflection of her mental state? Will they now keep a wary eye out for her well being lest I bring desperation and drugs to her? It is me that suffers the outward scrutiny and I am weary and feel often less and less inclined towards politeness. I walk a precarious line here for this is also my job and responsibility. i am thankful that my care and her family are worldly and aware. 

Beyond my own observation or experiences there is a family member in their midst who, like me, is mixed. She is loved and not hidden. But she detests coming to this small town. I suspect that when she goes out with her family she is stared at. I would bet my eye teeth on it. For this well known family is readily spotted around town, and her being the only one of colour in the group, would be stared at. When one is well known everyone believes they know you to a certain extent. We all like to think that we know our celebrities. We also like to believe that they are just like us. But what if we discover that they are not just like us when we learn of the colour in their midst's that is not explained or excused, but merely allowed to be? If you are unable to contain your curiosity, and you were on a familiar basis with this family, you might go over and say hello in the hopes of an introduction. The person of colour will be lingered over a moment longer than all the rest. That moment will be so brief it will be indiscernible to all but the brown ones. In the flash one will be told by the outsider that they don't belong. The look is always accusatory in some fashion and the person of colour knows that look all too well. It's a look that can cause coloured folk to feel beat to snot.

In the few short years since I've read, Native Son, I have had the opportunity, because of my various experiences, to rethink Richard Wright, and to, at times, high-five his literary creation of Bigger Thomas in all his rage-full glory. I understand both Wright and Bigger more than I want to. Sadly, I think Bigger was not hard for Wright to conjure up. I've heard that Wright was a sad, angry man. Anecdotally, my friend Gray, while in Paris, described Wright as, "An angry black man looking for a fight with any poor white schmo that stumbled past his table". Wright wanted some guts for garters and Gray was one of those white schmoes who were eaten alive. 

Ces't domage. Ces't la vie.

In the literary canon I can find the silence of black male characters that often translates tot he silence that living black men feel in this society. But I, as woman, feel it too. Bigger Thomas is white society's nightmare. The huge murderous black man out to rape white women. But I can't help but feel that the interrogation that is presented to me without any sort of foreplay or introduction is not dissimilar from enslaved women not having control over their reproductive rights. I shall answer the questions posed to me because I am feminine. I am weak. Both feel intrusive, like rape: the female made controllable, made submissive, the male controllable only through emasculation and silence.

It is maddening to be violated. It causes me to feel full of rage and indignation. And at these times I wish I had the literary freedom of Bigger- the freedom to just be an imaginary character upon a page, with no real consequences to be had, for I too, for just a moment, might enjoy letting loose if for only one page.

I heard the author Djanet Spears, while visiting Toronto, answer a question posed to her by stating: "Being black is not a monolith". I thought this profound and O so true. Yes, my skin is brown and I think that most people who are not brown believe this means I can speak for all other brown people. I think it no less corrosive for blacks to think we are all alike  than for whites to think this. I think once we begin the mind expansion of who we are, and all that we entail, everyone else will follow. We must be our own navigators.