quince project

I never had a quinceañera. My normal answer to the question of "Why?" is a puzzled look, and then an "I don't know!" with a silly grin and my arms stretched out wide. The real answer is, I was never Cuban enough.

At fifteen, I had a dog's understanding of Spanish; basic commands and cooing was most of my vocabulary. Everything that happened to me, happened to me right then. Tenses were unknown, and the dreaded subjunctive didn't even exist. I knew how to say things like, "Do you want some more ice cream?" and "You're so bad!" I didn't actually realize how bad my Spanish really was until I came here, and was placed out of the entire first year of Spanish. I learned four tenses in a week. Students from the middle of nowhere with thick southern accents knew ten times the amount of Spanish I did. It was, and still is, embarrassing. I'm taking that class pass/fail, and just trying to keep up.

It's "my" language. I should know it, but I don't. I missed out on the language, and the culture, and I've always found my last name to be a burden. People can't pronounce it properly, and when they can, they expect me to be someone I'm not. My culture extends just as far as a soft spot for flan and guava pastries.

So I never had a quinceañera. How could I? I was too queer, too klutzy, too anti-social, and too white. I didn't want to wear the tiara and think about how much I didn't belong. I didn't want to have to make small talk in my broken Spanish to relatives I'd never met before. I didn't want one of my cousins to be my escort. My blond, blue-eyed mother was the one who wanted me to have a quinceañera. My dad didn't care. My mom likes frilly things, and pink, and flowers. I just like dresses. One time when we were shopping, I came across the most gorgeous dress I had ever seen, on sale. I was fourteen, and my mother was still laboring under the delusion that my quince was going to happen. She let me get it. It sat in my closet for years.

The dress still fits. And if the shoe fits, wear it, isn't that what they always say? So I wore my dress, because I lied when I said I didn't want to have a quinceañera. I did, desperately. I wanted to own it, to own my blood and my culture and my language. Instead, three years too late on a random Sunday in November, I gave myself the kind of quinceañera I wish I had: just friends, cake, and laughter.