Why Are You Obsessed with My Race?

Introduction

P

eople size me up and down with their eyes, but eyes do not intimidate me. I am told that my hair is too curly to be white and too straight to be black. People ask me questions as if I owe them an answer. The most common questions they ask are: "Who are you? Where are you from? Don't you know your features are exotic? Are your parents from here?" Funny, they look at me sideways when I ask them the same damn question they asked me. I am more than sure that my body language answers their question. In the front of my mind, I am asking, what does my race have anything to do with you—and why do you care? I am part of many. I am confident in whom I am, and I accept myself the way I am.

The other day, I was asked by a black girl, "What makes you think that you are black?" She continued, smirked, and said, "You want to be one of us, but you are not." The tone in her voice was as if she hated me because of the color of my skin. The week before, a white girl asked me, "What makes you think that you are white?" Her sarcastic remark wasn't any better. She had the nerve to say, "You are too dark to think you are worthy of white privilege." Needless to say, this is the shit that I go through. Racial profiling is at its fineness at my school and, to be honest, in my community as well. It is not only the words that cut deep, but the stares are worse.

I am Stella. I was named after my great-grandmother, who was a black woman. She died when she gave birth to my grandfather. With that being said, my grandfather was raised by his white father and his family. After my great-grandmother passed, my grandfather did not know his roots from his mother's side of the family. From what I was told, my great-grandfather married a white lady months later. However, my grandfather said he never felt out of place because his father and his family owned most of the town. With that being the case, they knew not to disrespect my grandfather.

Before my grandfather passed away, he shared with me many stories that were so amazing to hear. However, some of his stories were dreadful. My grandfather told me about when he walked into one of his dad's stores; the cashier was new, and in the 1920s in Alabama, Jim Crow racism was the law. Racial segregation was rigidly enforced, and death meet many black people at their front door all because they were disliked because of the color of their skin. Well, when my grandfather walked into the store that day, having a conversation with his white brother and laughing, he didn't know that that day his skin color was a target. The white cashier pulled out a gun, looked my grandfather dead in the eye, and asked, "Nigger, where do you think you are going?" My grandfather's brother yelled and jumped over the counter. "Put the gun down! He is my brother!" My great-grandfather ran to the front to see what was going on. He didn't have a clue that his son's color intimidated the cashier. His father told the cashier, who he had hired that day, that my grandfather was his son. The cashier quit on the spot and called my great-grandfather a nigger-lover. When I think about that story my grandfather told me—sadly, I see that nothing has changed.

It is hard being biracial. I feel like people will not let me live, love, or, better yet, breathe. I am so sick and tired of people asking me where I am from. What am I mixed with? I am like, "Worry about your damn self, get the fuck off my back, and let me breathe." What never surprises me is that they stare me down as if I am their enemy, and they don't even know me.

When I was little, my dad used to pick me up from school. He used to always take off his hat when he opened the door for me. Every time he opened the door, he reminded me that a real man will always open the door for a lady. He always kissed me on the cheek and said, "And that means for little ladies as well." I remember when I was in first grade, one of my classmates asked me if my dad was my servant. I slapped her in the face and told her no, he is my daddy. Needless to say, I got in trouble. My mother and dad always told me to control my anger. It is hard to do, especially when I am always around idiots.