15/9/2013 & 17/9/2013
I have permanent tan lines. Confined within my bikini lines this skin that stays hidden seems alien to me. Sometimes I look down and think is that my real color? The neutral, natural surface unaffected by the sun is that my true hue? Though faded in winter they never go away and by the time summer ends three months of nothing but sun I’m permanently clothed in my white bathing suit. At times the lines are a sense of pride when golden brown looks that much richer against fluorescent white, giving me bragging rights of how well I tan. “It’s because I’m hispanic” “I don’t even have to wear sunscreen” “I spent allll summer outside.” Among my predominantly white friends, I always won.
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| Nude by Camila Pacheco-Fores |
But recently I’ve felt betrayed by the sinful skin that never sees light of sun because some days I look down and see my “true” color.
I am not Latina.
I am not hispanic.
I am not a woman of color.
I grew up in a white suburban town and became a white suburban girl.Though my parents may have come from countries where spanish floats in the air they breathe and every inhale is thick with español; I am not a woman of color. though the best three years of my childhood were spent blabbering and dancing las palabras y acento de mexico
White suburban Texas beat the brown out of me
not just color but syllables and every time they said my name with an “eh” instead of “ee”
I believed it
Camilla Camilla CamillaThey saw my name and thought “eh” too complicated
They saw my skin and thought “eh” too complicated to try and understand that she’s anything other than Mexican which to them meant
illegal
poor
builds houses then cleans them but still eternally dirty and with their grime steal jobs money homes lives of us pure innocent hard working white peopleso seven year old looks at her skin and thinks sin
and so begins the endless battle against tan lines within
Over the years my public world turned white-- perfect english no spanish clothes that masked wide hips and big butt eyebrows plucked upper lip waxed legs shaved hair straightened that one hollister mini skirt worn at every opportunity.
I didn’t even know what I was doing all I knew is that I wanted to be what I thought was normal; to be just like my friends, for my hair to be “perfect” which in middle school meant straight long blonde and beautiful, for my name to be ashley so everyone would stop stumbling over my syllables, and for no one to call me a beaner then say “RUN” whenever the police drove by.
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| Juana Cecilia, the Mexican calaca guarding the entrance to our home |
I kept my spanish inside invited very few home so as not to scare them away with the Mexican calacas by our front door, one of the many "weird" decorations so unlike the Martha Stewart homes of my friends. I didn’t want them to hear my father speak his accented english or my mother push food with too many spices.
On my 18th birthday I got the tattoo on my left shoulder, engraving family, Mexico, and heritage on the back of my heart so with every beat the color seeps back through me. But some areas will always be bleached. The white on my skin physically shows where the sun has never lingered, but with my eyes this skin outlines the boundaries of battle played out across my body still.
I have permanent tan lines.
