| Love is Blind |
| by ‘Anonymous’ |
Last night I had dinner with my cousins Nitza, Jenny and Lillian. Although we grew up together I always felt like an outsider… atleast that is how my uncle Manuel, Jenny’s father, always made me feel. I grew up thinking that I was his least favorite and I was probably right. I mean I am the daughter of a woman who became pregnant out of wedlock at the young age of nineteen. And as if that wasn’t enough, one who had committed the unforgivable sin of being in love with a black man. My mother doesn’t like to speak about this subject and I would probably meet my doom if she ever found these pages in which I have chosen to include her story.
According to the stories my grandmother has told me, my mother had many admirers when she was young. Many “fine men” dreamed of my mother. “But despite this” my grandmother would say, “your mother chose that black man.” I never really understood my grandmother’s way of thinking nor my uncle’s. I just can’t see how ones skin color affects one’s ability to love and be loved.
The name of the man that my mother loved but her family disliked is Faust. From the little bit of information that I have been able to gather from my mother’s close friends, Faust is an honest, hardworking man who was madly in love with my mother and wanted more than anything to be by her side when my sister Mary was born. But his job as a truck-driver required him to travel constantly. He didn’t feel comfortable leaving my mother alone in what was their home at the time and as a result asked my mother to stay with my grandmother while he was away. I sometimes wonder if he and my mother ever regretted this decision.
While Faust was away on one of his trips my mother had to endure the torture of living with her mother who reminded her everyday of the big mess she had made out of her life. She filled my mother’s mind with fears that Faust was not coming back. She told my mother that by his side she and her baby would not have a bright future because she was sure that he would never amount to anything good in life because he was black. In other words, his blackness predestined him to be a failure.
So as the months progressed my mother met the man who would become my father, Pedro. You see, Faust wrote many letters to my mother while he was away and called tirelessly but my grandmother always managed to intercept the calls making up excuses for my mother and it is needless to say that my mother never saw one letter. Soon enough my mother began to believe my grandmother and fear and uncertainty began to govern her. My grandmother always had her eye on this successful young man who wanted to marry my mother and “make an honest woman out of her.” This man who turned out to be my father was handsome, powerful, rich. Of course, for my grandmother and uncles to like him he also had to be white.
As soon as my sister Maritza was born my mother married my father, Pedro. Painfully, though, Faust returned a day later and was enraged and heartbroken when he learned all that had happened while he was away. After that I don’t really know what happened with regards to him because my mother never saw him again.
Ironically, my mother’s “bright future” by my father’s side did not materialize. My father, the man who was supposed to make my mother happy and give her everything she needed, instead beat her, cheated on her, and didn’t support my mother nor his children. Of course after a few years of this physical and mental abuse my mother divorced my father and has remained alone since then. What angers me the most is not the fact that my grandmother and uncles still think my father was an excellent husband and father. What bothers me the most is the fact that they still think that an individual’s skin color determines their ability to love and succeed in life.
As you might recall last night I had dinner with my cousins. Out of the four of us, I am the only unmarried one. Within the past two years there have been several weddings. Jenny, Nitza, and Lillian have all married wonderful men. Hardworking, loving, honest, and to their parent’s dismay, black men.
Jenny had it the worst out of the three. Her father is my uncle Manuel. One minor detail that makes my heart devilishly rejoice: that her husband’s name is Faust. Before Jenny introduced her Faust to Manuel, my uncle loved him! You see my uncle loved the fact that he was Christian, a doctor, and that he seemed to make Jenny extremely happy. Jenny had purposefully left out one minor detail: that he was black.
Jenny told me she hoped that my uncle had changed his way of thinking and that he would accept Faust. This of course was not the case; my uncle disowned Jenny and told her that she could forget that she had a father while she was with “that good for nothing…” Well you can imagine what other foolish things he said.
What I find strange and bothers me deeply is that my uncle loved him before he learned that Faust was black. I guess that since Jenny’s description of Faust was so wonderful my uncle assumed that he was white. Despite her father’s foolishness, Jenny married Faust and now awaits their first child. My cousin Jenny told me last night that we had to break the chain of hate and racism by standing up for what was right, as she did. We raised our glass to that. Nitza married Danan and Lillian married Ricco, who are both wonderful men who make them extremely happy.
Please don’t misunderstand me. I am by no means trying to say that white men are bad and that black men are the best. I have learned throughout my short life that love has nothing to do with a person’s skin color and if you let people’s preconceptions get in your way you risk your chance at happiness. Like the saying goes “Love is blind” or atleast it should be.
Color does not affect a person’s ability to do anything, especially to love. Everyone should be judged on an individual basis. By generalizing one risks the chance at meeting some of the most wonderful individuals in this world as my grandmother and uncle did.