Find Our Way
The odd thing about living under a dictatorship and in fear of my life as a Latina, because at this point, none of us are safe even if we were born here & this land was Mexico before it ever was the U.S. I’m finding my way back to myself as an artist which is through my words. Words have been and always were my life. They’ve been my constant companion since dad died. I’ll never forget being young, and always asking my mom for journals, stationary, or pens, sometimes all three, so I could write. Eventually, I saved my allowance I earned from my grades and started buying my own supplies. She’d say to me, “Ayy Sarita, if you buy anymore, between you and Aunt Esmer y’all could open up your own office supply store”. I’d say to her, “Yeah Mom, I hear there’s a huge market for used office supplies, and broken crayons are in high demand.” She’d inevitably called me “cabrona”, and I’d answer back quippy with, “I can’t imagine where I got it from”, and now looking back I realize that its really beautiful being Mexican-American, they’re obsessed with us.
Older me, now thinks, well in this economy, I wouldn’t rule that out now. I mean, broken crayons do still color and if the spiral is good why not just toss out the old pages and begin again? Speaking of new beginnings, maybe in spite of all the bullsh*t this is the start of something new? Or am I just that radical optimist that has hope that maybe humans will finally learn that war never solves anything; or that sacrificing the innocent for your own selfish gain is morally reprehensible. That’s when it occurred to me…we’ve always been at war with each other since we killed off the dinosaurs and the lives that came before us. Except now, we’re living in the digital age where wars start online through hate speech and deliberate manipulation of the mind through algorithms that claim to be tailored to meet your needs, yet harvest your data, turn around and sell it to a 3rd party websites who will use it for their own malicious intent, or manipulate historically democratic elections.
I called home crying the other night, yes I’m that girl that sometimes still calls her mom when she’s in utter distress and only the soothing sound of her voice can calm me down because I got terrified that I may never see her again. The thought alone kills me since I’ve already lost one parent and that was hard enough. I thought to myself, are we next? I have fair skin, but that doesn’t mean anything, it never has to me, except that I hate the sunburns I have to go through before I can retain any sort of color. I’m still Mexican-American. I said to her, “Mom why haven’t we figured it out yet?” “When will we ever learn that the only thing that matters in this world is love?” While I am a woman of faith, as I’ve gotten older I’ve come to think that “God”/”the Unvierse”/”the divine”/”source” is so massive, and huge that organized religion has its limitations. If we all come from “God”, then we’re all in theory ONE human race, we’d never cause harm to one another since that is an extension of ourselves. Maybe that’s just me, but I find it all and this life very fascinating (most of the time).
On the contrary, I have lived long enough to know in my years in this life and perhaps in my past lives that we somehow always tend to f*ck it up. I don’t know what the answer is, but I do think it starts with truly loving ourselves first then others, healing our traumas, talking out our fears not running from them, finding the courage from within to be who we truly are and most of all having empathy, kindness and love even when it’s hard. You tell the truth and you don’t let go of real ones.
Grief taught me to laugh through it, show up and most of all never, ever give up. I wish I knew how to hold grudges or perhaps do others as they’ve done me, but eh, that’s too much work and not my job to keep score or settle the score that’s God’s/the Universe’s job. All I have to do is keep being my best Sarita self (even though my best varies daily) and help when and where I can. I pray that if in doing what is right leads me to be arrested then I’ve decided it was worth the fight, because change doesn’t come easy but if it leaves the world better off for my future unborn child (lets’s hope my future husband gets it together already, pobre mjio, he’s lost, but he’ll find his way) and for others then it was totally worth it.
Mama said there would be some days like these, but I don’t think she meant days quite like these. I pray for strength, resilience, and gusto for us all fighting the good fight in our own special unique way. I’m convinced it’s all the beautiful souls left on this planet that keep it spinning in space and prevent it from exploding. I’m learning to give myself even more room to self care whatever that looks like (meditation, running, yelling into my pillow, mental health check-ins with my therapist), and extending grace to myself when I need it. I’m reminding myself if I get too caught up in this bs then I’ll forget how to live and I MUST live my life since I only get one (sigh) these challenging days too. Mama did NOT raise a fool, she raised a Chingona.
I wish I could give the world a giant hug right now, and especially the families affected by the deportations, mi gente te quiero mucho y estoy orando por ti. To everyone, everywhere just trying to survive, feel seen and heard (self included), I am sending you so much love. We will find our way & get through this together & NOT apologize for being who we are.
