Where do I begin? The older I get and the more I work in a community that represents me, the more I see the injustices I have to face. Advocating for others seems to have always been my calling in the midst of it all I forget to advocate for me. I stop to look at my surroundings those beautiful black and brown faces, that need to be heard. I listen, I hear those deep breaths taken because of how exhausted they are. I nod with agreement that this world we live in is sad, frustrating and left to leave us broken. I sit to wonder how many times; I wish I had the same.
This angers me because this thought and process always leaves me unanswered. Sometimes the exhaustion from explaining, battling and educating makes me angry. I stop to think of the privilege that I never had. I resent you, yes you! I am tired of living in a body, language, a job that I could never call home. In order to get by I’ve learned to accommodate to the Eurocentric, cis-gendered, patriarchal society I’ve been meant to die in. I survived and I keep on winning these battles. I do not know how I wake up to do it every day, but I do it. Maybe my therapist helps. Maybe it is my partner, maybe it is the thought that one day I’ll wake up and I am the one who helped fix it.
I am helping. I am finding ways to educate those around me. I am sharing my tools in my tool belt, while building a home. I’ve learned that dictating is no help to anyone;
“I’ve learned that providing people with their own tool belt and allowing them to find ways to get the tools is a way that my knowledge keeps spreading.”
I continue to learn, teach and make errors. I am not sorry for my errors. I am not sorry for the space I occupy. I am not sorry for my past. I am not sorry if I offended you and I am not sorry for this story.
I am a product of my past and environment. I am a product of my future and the seeds I plant. I am still learning and still failing. I will continue teaching and fighting. I will be tired; I will be me.
Storyteller G. Amaya did not provide a biography.
