Who am I?

Dear Molly and World,

Some loaded terms: White. People of Color. Gender. Religion. Culture. Nationality. Ethnicity. Race. Familial Origin. 

A complicated puzzle. And is there really one solution? Not at all. Never.

Identity.

I live in arguably the most diverse place in the US, and for that I am grateful. My high school slices out into a pretty nice pie: Equal parts Black, Asian, and Hispanic, some Filipino, some White. I'd joke that Long Beach Poly has 31 Flavors of people. People would laugh, and agree. Where did I fit in?

When chatting with people, I often like to play the 'Guess my National Background' game as an exercise in cultural knowledge. And I get weird answers. A few people manage to hit the nail on the head, but more people come up blank. I am often asked in these situations if I am mixed. I am very not mixed.

With thick, curly, wild brown hair and green eyes, coupled with olive skin, I can pass as dozens of things. I have been pegged for various combinations of or singly: Spanish, Portuguese, Argentine, Brazilian, Israeli, Greek, Mexican, Norwegian, Swedish, Filipine, Native American, Czech, Polish, and German. The latest was a variety of Arab, from another student in my Medical Terminology class, who is Lebanese. Her first thought was that I wasn't American.

But I'm 100% Eastern European Jewish, or Ashkenazi. And very rarely can people guess that. If they do, they usually say "Jewish", and usually not right away.

3 of my great grandparents were born in Russia, 1 in Lithuania. (That's my sad claim to diversity: I'm one-eighth Lithuanian.) Going further back, everyone comes from Eastern Europe. My sister is eager to do the spit test/cheek swab for the likely anti-climactic results.

Sam and I will use the term "off-white" to describe ourselves. It's a common feeling for people of Ashkenazi descent. We are lumped in as White, but we definitely are not Anglo-Saxon in the slightest. And we ain't Protestants either. Sam indeed was blonde as a youngin' and has blue eyes, but Molly does not. Molly physically resembles the stereotype of a Jew, mostly with the hair, and maybe the nose.

Our surname, Rosenfeld, is about as Russian-Jewish as you can get.

I grew up constantly jealous of those minority, mixed-raced and multilingual folks (Not any more). I am a purebred, for lack of a better word. I grew up speaking solely English at home, and a tiny bit of Hebrew twice a week. And I thought my cultural background was as boring as heck. Monochromatically dull. Never mind that I'm a religious minority. I just checked the White box, and it didn't feel right. It never has. 

I've been struggling more and more with my identity as of late. I feel like a misfit wherever I go, and more often than not. 

I'm yet to find my 'safe space'. And I probably never will. I've almost never felt out of place at the ice rink, but there are very few skaters my age. I feel comfortable in orchestra settings nine times out of ten, but that took years and years and the shedding of tears. Switching to cello did help. Well, not as a junior, but that's beside the point here. But some discussions don't belong there. At NFTY, no one really cared. We never talked about our nationalities. We were all Jewish. And I never would bring it up either. I didn't want to discuss supposed privilege. College is no better. I have plenty of individual friendships, but zero friend groups. Come to think of it, I've never had a friend group. I start to feel like a sort of third wheel, or even just included out of pity. And my closest friends are never really friends with each other. I'm eagerly anticipating the day when I make two good friends at once, and all three of us become close. And my family has struggled a lot this past decade. Half of my life. Nearly two-thirds of Sam's. Economically and emotionally.

Far and away, the thing that makes my blood boil the most is that numerous people on assorted occasions have tried to tell me it's no big deal: White is White is White. But that's the point. White is just another made up catch-all term. The whole concept of trying to box people up in neat little groupings is, in my honest opinion, stupid and unnecessary, but we do it anyway. We are all part of one race: The Human Race. 

I've never thought of myself as having supposed "White Privilege". Instead, I live in fear of Anti-Semitism.

With Trump the Moldy Cheeto in the White (HA HA HA) House and general race relations as horrific as they were 60 years ago, this has been on my mind a little too much as of late. Especially since the release of Wonder Woman with Gal Gadot, the appropriate identification of us Ashkenazi folk is being discussed.  

Am I White? Caucasian? Am I a Person of Color? Am I something in between? Am I something else entirely?

The conclusion I've drawn: Ashkenazi is Ashkenazi. Our culture is our own culture. Judaism is our backbone. Our link to the past, and one another. 

Being proud of my heritage is a long time coming. I think I'm almost there. I guess the clearest closure will come in 20 or so years with my own future children. Raising them in Reform Judaism. Doing a heritage project with them, like the one I did in first grade. We had to make a poster of our family tree. I learned that while I'm undoubtedly American, I'm only 4th or 5th generation. When I went to New York in 2011 with Grandma Phyllis, I learned that I did indeed have relatives pass through Ellis Island on their way to Michigan.

I'll pose the question again: Who am I?

The Answer: I am Ashkenazi. I am a friend, a daughter, a student. I am a writer, a musician, a figure skater. I am just one person here in this great big world, doing what I can to leave a mark and make a difference. 

I am me, and that's all I ever want to be. 

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Song of the Day: L'dor Vador By Josh Nelson 

I first learned this song when I was in youth choir at Temple. Yikes, that was a long time ago. 10+ years.

Anyway, it stuck with me. Not only does it have a beautiful melody, but the lyrics resonate. 

We all have a cultural history to share with the world, and the history of the Jewish people is mine. 

We are gifts, and we are blessings, we are history in song.       We are hope and we are healing, we are learning to be strong 

We are words and we are stories, we are pictures of the past 

We are carriers of wisdom, not the first and not the last 

L'dor vador nagid godlecha 
L'dor vador... we protect this chain 
From generation to generation 
L'dor vador, these lips will praise Your name 

Looking back on the journey that we carry in our heart 
From the shadow of the mountain to the waters that would part 
We are blessed and we are holy, we are children of Your way 
And the words that bring us meaning, we will have the strength to say 

L'dor vador nagid godlecha 
L'dor vador... we protect this chain 
From generation to generation 
L'dor vador, these lips will praise Your name