It is difficult to hear the rhetoric surrounding race and ethnicity in today's political climate. I was born in Milwaukee, and my family later moved to Franklin, Wis.
Franklin was filled with many middle-class people from all over the world. There was no difficulty being a minority in Franklin. Everyone was the same, no matter the color.
When my family moved to Worthington, Minn., when I was in third grade, everything changed. Worthington has a major slaughterhouse and meat-packing plant where many undocumented immigrants from Mexico come to get jobs and provide for their families. Other minorities come to Worthington as well, but 40.6 percent of the residents in Worthington today are Hispanic. That community includes my brother, my papa and me.
When I was in elementary school, there wasn't as much of a divide between minority students and Caucasian students. In middle school, I got my first taste of racial profiling and discrimination.
When the eighth-grade "formal" was approaching in a few weeks, I had convinced my mother to let me get a beautiful flowered dress. I excitedly texted all my friends about the dress and they told me that a boy from our class wanted to go with me as my date. I couldn't believe it and was so excited to go with him. The boy and I started chatting at school and I couldn't wait for the formal.
The week of the formal I got a text from the boy and he said: "I'm sorry, I don't want to go to the formal with a Mexican."
At the time I didn't cry or get upset. I didn't say anything. But at that time I made a subconscious agreement with my mind — being Mexican was something to be ashamed of.
After that I made sure that no one knew my last name, as that would be a dead giveaway of my minority status. On my social media I changed everything to " 'Ari Elizabeth" so no one would know I was Mexican.
