The Colby Echo

Issue date: 2/23/07 Section: Opinions

If there's one thing I learned from moving to Kansas at the age of 13, it was that difference mattered. Such a word had little meaning for me in the place from which I was coming; Miami-where you could find myriad tongues rolling words to their own rhythms-was indiscriminant.

I was definitely not in Miami anymore; while before I was only a small part of a huge mix, I suddenly became one of the few "others" and my difference became as defining as my name. How was I to reconcile the fact that many of my new peers didn't find it acceptable for me to be a proud Hispanic AND a proud American? Not only was it not acceptable, many found it nearly impossible. It was almost incomprehensible that I could speak a different language at home and have very distinct cultural habits, yet listen to the music they liked and wear the same clothes that they did; it couldn't be done, they said, so for the next three years, I was always in one box or another.

My contentions with the word "assimilation" have been many because of just that: it means putting people in boxes. To some it means not speaking to my mom in Spanish when we're at the mall; to others it means taking down the little Colombian flag that hangs on my rear-view mirror.

However, categorizing becomes more complicated when not only in a matter of seconds could I speak to a cashier in clear, crisp English, but I could also show you the American flag stuck proudly on my back window. If we as humans are so complex and our minds so intricately wired that we cannot merely categorize ourselves in terms of a few qualities, why must I be simplified as either an immigrant or an American?

I agree with having those who come into this country learn English as quickly as possible, but I also understand that many of those who do come here work at least two or three jobs, so that the time and money for English classes are not readily available. While many who commit crimes on our streets are immigrants, there are still just as many who are honest, law-abiding people and who should be treated as such. Though those crossing our borders are doing so illegally and under breach of our country's law, so are our fellow American business owners who hire them cheaply and exploit them ruthlessly.

I think that most people can agree on a moderate approach with immigration; not many would completely close our borders to everyone just as not many would leave them wide open for everyone. These are just a few of the issues within the immigration debate, and as it is clear that they cannot be looked at from only one perspective, immigrants themselves cannot be either.

My chief concern presently is not how we're dealing with those coming in, but with those who are already here, who have been here-people like me and my family. The fact that who I am has a lot to do with being Colombian and a lot to do with being American is unchangeable and uncompromising; I cannot choose one or the other as an absolute means of self-definition. What becomes lost amidst the unyielding cries to assimilate-something that many Americans have forgotten-is that on this lovely land that we all adore, I don't have to choose.

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