Mixed/Other

A game for those who seek to find...wait...that's probably copyrighted material and not the best way to start off a blogging relationship with you. So instead, allow myself to introduce...mys...sigh.

If you haven't realized it by now, I love movies, films, cinema (whatever you like to call it) and basically I am in love with entertaining. There is no greater joy than bringing great joy to others through laughter or drama. But while these things - and others yet to be revealed - indicate a margin my delightfully twisted character, let's talk about se...um...why this blog is called Mixed/Other.

To answer this question I must tell you that I am Mixed/Other. I am he and he is me...or it is I? or...nevermind. M/O is my identity and my preferred race/ethnicity.

As a latch-key, mixed race youth brought up by interracial, mixed race parents and step parents, I found that I lacked the basic cultural proclivities that would allow me to blend seamlessly into one social construct or another. I speak no Spanish. I have light skin. I choose eloquence over Ebonics. I have dark curly hair. And not to put too fine a point to it, I am also a bit of a square - you know, a prudent, straight arrow who believes in goodness and accountability etc. etc. So I could never really hang with the bad boys. I never really fit in with the black people who felt I "talked too white." The white groups were always rather tentative to have me around, and the Latinos and I just couldn't relate. What's a lonely American high school student to do? Sing!

That's right - singing, performing, playing instruments, acting, debating. Taking part in activities where black and white related only to the colors of ink on the pages of music or script. It was through this prism of creativity that monochrome notes and words on the page scattered into colors of hope, love, peace, perseverance and joy, attracting each of his own color into and through the prism into a world of unity and fellowship. A world made just for all of us.

I digress.

As I grew and learned from my family, I began to understand that there was more to living in this country than being an easily categorized statistic. There was the art of being an American. There was the understanding that no matter what happened, no matter where I went, no matter what anyone else could ever try to persuade me to believe, I am an American, and I love my country and it's history for better or for worse. This is the land that my fathers, grandfathers, and great grandfathers fought and bled for, and none of them shared a common ancestry besides respect and pride for one another and his country.

This is the land that gave them a home. It was muddy hills in western South Carolina. The rivers of Richmond, Virginia. The hard winters of the Great Lakes. The tough streets of Brooklyn. The Cherokee lands of Georgia. The touch of this country on every root and branch of my family tree that is unlike that of ANY other country I know.

It's for that reason that I have always placed my allegiance and pride in the United States of America. Regardless of pitfalls and prejudices, we are unlike anything the world has ever seen.

So it has always been with a sense of pride - and comedy at the frustration my response will cause - that I mark everything from census and medical forms to employment applications and voter registration cards with a bold circle or check mark next to Mixed or Other. For to me, there is but one category that truly defines and encompasses me and various branches of my immediate family tree, and that is American.

Well, I am sure that by now I have splintered the soap box beneath the girth of my garrulity. So let me close by saying this: Welcome and God Bless!

You know something about me now, so let's hear from you. I can't wait to see what we learn from one another, and I'm especially eager to hear from more of you who mark off Mixed or Other.