When I was a little Black girl with barrettes in my hair, I loved running, skipping, and jumping. I loved waking up and being able to move. I wasn’t very fast, a shame for a girl in a Jamaican family for sure, but I loved running around all the same. There was so much joy in moving my body. Skipping down the block to my own private song, I felt like a dancer. Swinging on the swings in my neighborhood park, I’d pump my legs to go higher and higher so that I could kiss the sky. Riding to the corner store and back on my bike with the training wheels, pedaling faster and faster, I’d let go so I could zoom down the hills, the wind whipping my braids behind me. When the weather was too hot or too cold, I was content with running around our small apartment, getting on my mother’s one last good nerve, until I fell into a giggling, gasping heap. All those things were so much fun. And all those things made me feel so free.
In so many ways, we were the same little girl. Yes, I’m a 40-something-year-old Latina trying to get back some of the freedom that that little brown girl had.
In so many ways, we were the same little girl. Yes, I’m a 40-something-year-old Latina trying to get back some of the freedom that that little brown girl had.