Racialization is assimilation, which is not to be confused with self- actualization. Being beige, that is mixed race, black, brown, red, yellow or white is not something to aspire to. It’s not something that we are hardwired to do. We are not born with it.

We are told that we will be seen as colors and will be treated in coordinated ways. And we choose our response to race and its progeny, oftentimes adapting, making do with what people call you and I.

Race serves as a category, a means of sorting, of ensuring that some are helped up while others are kept down. I wouldn’t take that hand-me-down identity even if I was still waiting on the words that covered me, that addressed me fully.