I like polo shirts instead of Apple Bottom jeans;. I like Green Day instead of 50 Cent. I don't listen to hyphy music all the time. I don't listen to a lot of gospel music, and I have absolutely no talent when it comes to singing. I like to shop at a variety of places such as American Eagle, Hot Topic and J. Crew.
My aunt, cousins and close friends have called me an "Oreo."
An Oreo is made up of a sweet white cream sandwiched between two chocolate cookies. Get it? They're referring to my black exterior, which is my skin color and my so-called white interior, my character.
I transferred to Leigh High School, a public school in San Jose, for my sophomore year. My first day at Leigh, I met a girl in my P.E. class. She started asking me questions about my hobbies, sports, my class schedule -- you know, the usual conversation starters. I told her I played basketball.
"You must be really good. You look really good," she said.
This girl had never seen me play, and already she was making assumptions about my athletic ability.
I was at a journalism workshop, and one day, I was being completely goofy singing old Britney Spears songs. We were talking about singing ability, when one boy said, "All black people are good singers." I was astonished that he actually believed that. Hasn't he ever seen "American Idol"?
Before they got to know me, some of my new white friends made a lot of assumptions. They assumed that I knew the meaning of phrases such as "ghost ride the whip," "going dumb" and "hyphy." I didn't. I'd been in affluent, suburban private schools most of my life, and I didn't know the definitions for those words because they were rarely used among my friends, most of whom were white.
Instead, I could tell you about the latest lingo on MTV's "Laguna Beach."
Eventually, my new white friends realized that I wasn't the person they were expecting me to be. I didn't live up to their preconceived notions of black people.
All of this confusion has caused me to question who I really am. I want to belong, but I don't want to have to change who I am to do it. But that's what I did.
When I'm with my black friends, I begin acting more like them, and the same goes for when I'm with my white friends. I'm letting their expectations change who I am. But oddly enough, it is helping me figure out some things I didn't know before.
I'm learning that people are going to judge other people no matter what. It happens unconsciously. I've also realized that I shouldn't change who I am to fit a certain stereotype that I'm really not. I am free to be who I really am. I can be goofy, nerdy, sassy or reserved around everybody. I don't have to act a certain way just to fit in.
At this point, I'm trying to figure out where I stand among my friends. Am I the black girl, or am I the girl who acts white?
I'm hoping that I'm neither. I'm hoping that to my friends, I'm just me.