I grew up in Miami, Florida.

There, I was 
"Gringo" 

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This was what the neighbor boys called me as they heckled me on my way home from the school bus. They'd wag their tongues through filthy Vulcan fingers and whistle. Every freaking day.

 

For the longest time I wondered what that word -  Gringo - meant.

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I'm sure I asked my mother. If she was coherent, I probably got Mother's narcissistic-politician-style 'deflect and confuse' to avoid the question. Standard. 

 

I was 11 years old when I was raped by a white 17 year old surfer "kid".  He was part of the expanded daily group of hecklers, mostly Cuban or Puerto Rican.  My best friend at the time managed to avoid that little (rape) situation. As we walked home I said to my friend; "I wonder if that means I have a boyfriend now."

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Eleven years old.

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When I got home that evening, I was ten minutes past my curfew. Mother screamed and screamed about my getting home late. She was 'worried sick' and drunk. I never told her what happened. She took her life in 2012.

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I asked around at school about the word 'gringo' and finally a kid told me it was basically a "nickname". 

If someone had told me it was a racial slur I'd have looked at them as though they had three heads - so I somewhat understand why nobody would just tell me. But people called ME that.  I always have and always will see people as people.

 

This was Miami, Florida in 1983. The race, segregation bussing, desegregation and re-segregation were justifiably hot topics. Many cursed Jimmy Carter for opening the floodgate influx of folks from Cuba.  This wasn't only because of the fact that there was a pretty sudden influx of Cuban immigrants; but rather OUR ill-preparedness that led to massive angst. We lived in the Snapper Creek area.