We could all learn a lot from crayons: Some are sharp, some are pretty, some are dull, some have weird names and all are different colors... but they all have to learn to live in the same box.
- Andy Rooney
It happened more than forty years ago, but I clearly remember each moment of the entire frightening episode. I was a small, physically underdeveloped, freckled, blonde seventh-grade girl in an ethnically mixed, inner-city junior high school. A verbally prolific little kid, I had the unfortunate habit of getting into trouble for saying things without thinking. Yolanda, a Latina classmate, was exotically beautiful and well-developed. She had jet-black hair and olive skin, and wore dark-red lipstick, crucifix earrings and lots of makeup. Everywhere she went, she was accompanied by four girls of similar appearance with whom she engaged in a clever mix of Spanish and English. Their partially understandable conversation was punctuated with occasional bursts of sarcastic laughter. Tantalized, I yearned to be Yolanda’s friend, but her attitude toward my overtures was disdainful. She scowled at me and my friends, if she looked at us at all.
One day toward the end of the second semester, I confided to a friend that I didn’t like Yolanda, unaware of being overheard by one of Yolanda’s allies. To my horror, Yolanda approached me shortly afterward and scathingly announced that she and I would “have it out” after school. “Meet me by the tunnel,” she sneered. “Be alone, and don’t even think about not showing up!” Her friends were beside her, snickering and adding insults.
I was practically paralyzed with terror for the next two hours. Word spread among the students about the upcoming event, and I heard bits and pieces of conversations about bets of how bad I would “get it.” My friends felt sorry for me, but were visibly relieved that Yolanda demanded I show up at the tunnel alone.
When the dismissal bell rang, I walked out of the building into a throng of kids jeering in English and Spanish. They followed me as I walked toward the tunnel like a prisoner to her execution. Suddenly, Yolanda appeared with her friends and stopped me on the sidewalk when I was about halfway there. Apparently, she wanted to begin the confrontation where the widest possible audience could look on. There wouldn’t be much room for a crowd in the tunnel.
Yolanda began by calling me a stupid little sh-- with a big mouth. Looking at the ground and humiliated to the core, I nodded, and everyone laughed. Next, she grabbed my collar and made me look at her. “You don’t like me because I’m Mexican,” she announced loudly. An ominous rumbling growl issued from the crowd.
Instantly, I protested in a stronger voice than I expected myself to generate, “No! No, that’s not true.” And then I shocked everyone, especially myself, by blurting, “That is not why I don’t like you!”
Seconds of silence that seemed to last forever followed, then Yolanda shrieked, “What? You admit it? You don’t like me?” Then she shoved me toward the tunnel and hissed, “Okay, you asked for it. Get going.”
Suddenly, hooting and laughter erupted. I heard a boy’s voice say, “Hey, Yolanda! You hear that? Who can blame her?”
Another said, “Oh, man, she tells the truth!”
Another taunted, “jAy, Yolanda, posible tiene razón!” (Maybe she has a reason.)
Others were out for blood: “Give it to her, Yoli!” and “Que pega la pendeja.“ (Just hit the idiot.)
Yolanda gripped my arm as she forced me down the stairs into the narrow pit, reeking of urine, that ran from one side of the boulevard to the other. Every kid who could find a toehold around us crowded in. Yolanda screamed at them to back off to give her some room, and she began to circle me like a hungry wolf. To my surprise, she repeated, “You don’t like me because I’m Mexican. That’s why you don’t like any of us.”
Once again, the crowd reacted with a hateful growl.
A deep sadness overcame me. I was quivering inside, but looking her straight in the eye, I said, “I was stupid to say what I said so loudly that your friend heard me. I never wanted you to hear it. But your being Mexican isn’t why I said it.”
Yolanda objected again. “Tell the truth. You don’t like Mexicans!”
Again, I denied it by shaking my head firmly.
“Okay, then, tell her why you don’t like her,” someone shouted to me.
“Yeah, gringuita, tell her the truth,” came another voice.
“Shut up!” Yolanda screamed, and her friends gave the crowd menacing looks. But they persisted: “Yeah. Tell her. Do it! Do it!”
I was not relieved by any of this. All I wanted to do was either die on the spot or be magically transported out of there. What to do? Being outnumbered, I would be a fool to fight back. I looked at Yolanda and realized that in a far more serious way she, too, was miserable. I took a deep breath, held her gaze and quietly said, “I don’t like you because you aren’t friendly. At the beginning of the year, I tried to make friends with you, but you never said hi when I said hi, and when I smiled at you, you never smiled back. I liked you a lot at first, but then I gave up.”
Yolanda was frozen in space, staring at me.
After a few moments, I continued, “You think I don’t like Mexicans, but you’re wrong. You want the truth? I would love to have your hair and your skin. And I wish I could speak two languages like you, and I’m sorry that I hurt your feelings.”
Yolanda listened, and her eyes grew larger. She seemed to be amazed, then suddenly swallowed, shook herself and sneered, ‘Well, look who’s kissing my a-!”
At this point my humiliation was overwhelming, and I looked at the floor of the tunnel waiting for whatever would happen next.
“Get away from me!” she screamed. “Just get out of here!” Without looking at anyone, Yolanda gestured at the crowd to part and let me climb the steps. Surprised, but eager to get away as fast as I could, I rushed up the stairs and ran across the boulevard. Thank God, a bus going my way was taking on passengers on the other side. I hurriedly climbed aboard, showed the driver my pass and found a seat. Instantly, I was overcome with racking sobs. Without looking at anyone, I used my dress to sop up torrents of tears.
The end of the term came soon thereafter, and, terrified of Yolanda, I carefully avoided her. There were no confrontations, not even eye contact. Summer came and went. When school started again in September, something happened that still mystifies me: I was seated in a classroom as Yolanda entered. We spied each other, but before I could avert my gaze, she smiled and cheerily said, “Hi, girl, how’ve you been?” I literally looked behind me and, seeing no one, looked back, supposing that she was baiting me for another confrontation. But Yolanda, keeping her distance, kept smiling an apparently sincere smile. “Did you have a good summer?” she asked. But I was too shocked to respond. During the rest of our eighth-grade year, Yolanda, who no longer hung out with her former friends, went out of her way to greet me with a warm smile. I was still so freaked out that I rarely responded with a fraction of her friendly energy, but it didn’t seem to matter to her. We never became close friends, but I lost my fear and actually grew to like her.
Through the years, as I’ve pondered what happened that day in the tunnel, I’ve come to an important understanding: Finding the courage to tell the truth opens the heart to the possibilities of peace and reconciliation.
- Gerry Dunne, Ph.D.