I am a person, a normal one, with ten fingers and toes respectively. My body works as it should, my mind is as scattered as the next college student and my morals are sound. I am a person but I am a woman so in the eyes of many I am automatically lesser but I’m smart enough to be in college so maybe I’m worth a little more than an average woman. I lose points again, however, when my skin color comes into play because I am then a black woman. I get the side-eye whether I am in sweats or Chanel. A second glance lets wandering eyes know I have the “nice” curls so maybe I’m mixed. Less black, more worth. There’s a lingering disappointment when I give non-black people my background but it’s something that I have gotten used to over time. At the risk of sounding like any other middle-class young adult I love my family but life has been unkind and they deserve more.

     My grandparents on both sides lived their lives like so many other black Americans, which is in poverty and working odd jobs or life-long but low-paying careers to give their children the best possible lives. They were happy to a point but stuck and my parents both rose up, however, and settled in the middle-class content enough with their lives. You could say where they are now is a key part in what functionalism is and how it works. They’re (my mother mostly) the stepping stone that floats in the uncomfortably in-between everything. Too high for the lower-class but far enough so that you don’t brush the upper-class. So while my family resides in the middle-class we can struggle as much as those who have less and splurge like those who have more, depending on the day that is.

     While financial status is very prominent in everyone's lives I would like to focus on race and gender inequality from here. I will speak about how private finances take part but one of the most important aspects of every single person is only at the surface level. As mentioned I identify as two things; black and a woman. Neither of these words are overly interesting on their own but when put into the identifying phrase “black woman” there is much more to unpack. My status value as a black woman stems from what someone sees when I walk into a room. I work ten times harder than the white woman next to me because I am put under a microscope. I code switch as easily as I breathe because I refuse to be a stereotyped because of the color of my skin.

     At nineteen I have already done several job interviews, all of which I am proud of but I look back at often and analyze myself. If a friend or family member saw me in that interview they’d know that wasn’t myself but they would also understand the need to assimilate in a world governed by people who prosecute you if you “act too black” or point it out when you “act too white” but there must be a common ground. I believe that it is very possible to have harmonious relationships between races and ethnicities but there is so much hate and anti-black culture rooted within so many that it is not an easy feat. However, I will say I do have an easier start than most people of color because I did grow up in more diverse areas, I can get my bearings quickly when faced with new groups or places and come off as likable and honest. Like every other black woman, however, I have a “know my place” mentality which is only useful in some instances because no matter how well I conduct myself discrimination by others is sometimes unavoidable.

     In the cases of both my mother and her mother, they are black women but my mother is about three to five shades lighter than me and on some days my grandmother could have passed as a white woman in certain lighting. This is where discrimination is seen in the black community under the label of colorism or shadeism; two words that my computer is attempting to autocorrect because most people avoid them so actively that they aren’t heard enough to be added to the dictionary. My mother’s lighter skin and straightened hair give her more face value because her skin and more European-leaning features make her more attractive in the eyes of the masses, people are more prone to listen to and take orders from her. This must have also been true for my grandmother's career seeing as she was a popular student counselor and English teacher during a time in which things like discrimination, prejudice, and segregation were prominent. So while colorism is dangerous it can be used to the advantage of black women if the opportunity is presented to them.

     To go more in-depth on the dangers of not just colorism but prejudice and segregation I will give the example given to me by my mother when I was young. In the late 70s, my mother was just approaching her teenage years, civil rights had shaken the states to their cores and my grandfather — who had always liked the finer things in life — took my mother and uncle to a restaurant in the south to give them a chance to branch out in their pallets and tastes while giving them a piece of his own home. Before they could even sit down, however, they were promptly told that the restaurant “didn’t serve blacks” and were told to leave. My grandfather was always well-mannered, well dressed, and well liked by anyone he met, and not to mention he was also secure in his space of lower middle class at the time. Though when it boils down to it none of this matters when history and culture is rooted in discrimination and hate, he could have been the richest black man in the world but it didn’t matter because they didn’t severe blacks.

     Now that I have touched on what it means to be black I will speak on what it means to be a woman. Yes, I am young but I am not naïve or sheltered, I am aware that the real world hates a woman in power no matter how many womanists stand up and say men and women are equal. For instance, I used the term womanist because feminism is rooted solely in the progression of white women and not all women while womanism encompasses women of all colors. However progressive either of these groups neither of them do much good in the grand scheme of things because society isn’t set up in a way that women can achieve their goals without working twice as hard as their male counterparts. Arguments to this statement can be directed at the fact that women and men are not paid the same amount for the exact same job and while this seems to be on its way out no efforts have been made by the government to make this a federally mandated change. As a woman looking to go into the film industry things like this scare me. I can win an Academy Award just like any other man but Hollywood paid me less for my script because of a sex that I cannot choose. Like being black, being a woman has an unfair advantage from birth. I am less than in the eyes of many even if black women are on the up and up.

     Though I am not white I do believe that I have more life chances than most that I have been grateful for. I went to a catholic high school and I am able to attend a private four-year institution and study subjects which I truly love and enjoy. My quality of life has improved because I had parents and grandparents that strived to be more than their skin color, their sex, and their situations. They have passes that drive onto me and one day I hope to pass that on to children of my own. I believe that life chances are given to you but they also have much to do with your mindset and how you want to live your life. To be given a life chance is to have a head start that many don't get and if you don't use them to their fullest potential then they are wasted so as I fight against the odds I will take each and every life chance I am given and give them my all. I will take these cards that I have been dealt and transform them into a winning hand.