Not Just a Box

Not Just a Box

For years, the hardest question on a form wasn’t about income or address. It was the little box: “Check one.”

Black.

White.

I am not just Black. But I am also not just White. So what box do I check?

I’m mixed. And for a long time that felt like an apology. Like I had to explain myself before anyone else explained me. “No, I’m not just Black.” “Yes, my dad’s Black.” “No, I don’t know why my skin is this shade.” I became a translator for my own existence.

And honestly, often I want to check Hispanic too, just to add some flava. Not because I am, but because “mixed” isn’t a box and “other” feels like a storage closet. I want the form to see all of me, not the part that fits neatly.

My hair tells the same story. It’s natural curly. The kind of curls that shrink up to my ears when wet and take up the whole bathroom when dry. If I want it straight, it’s a production. Two hours to blow it out, section by section. Then the flat iron. The heat, the smell, the arm workout. All that just to make it look like something it isn’t.

Most days I let my hair stay curly. Because that’s the truth. It’s Black and it’s White and it’s neither. It’s mine. It’s a spiral that doesn’t follow one line, and I’m done apologizing for it.

Being mixed means living in the “and.” Not the “or.” I’m not half of anything. I’m whole. I carry my Black side's greens recipe and my White mother's stubbornness in the same body. I get the nods in one space and the questions in another. “What are you?” I’m both. I’m me.

For years I thought I had to pick a side to belong. But picking erases people I love. Erases parts of myself. So I stopped. On the census, I check both. If there’s no “two or more races” box, I make one in the margins. If someone asks, I say, “I’m mixed. Black and White.” Period. No “just.”

I’m learning that I don’t owe anyone a simpler version of my story. My hair doesn’t straighten itself to make other people comfortable. I won’t either.

I am not just Black. But I am also White. I am the space between the boxes, and that space is wide enough to live in. Wide enough to be proud of.

And on wash day, when my curls are wild and free, I remember: I don’t have to choose. I already am.

*Cathryn m harris