~ Beauty for Ashes ~

Four weeks ago I finalized a process that was a year in the making: I legally changed my first name.

It started as a fluke. I worked as a waitress for about 8 months and had a knack for knowing all my customers’ names. They complained that they couldn’t remember mine, so I tried to think of nicknames they could use…

…but my name didn’t lend itself to any easy-to-remember nicknames. Oh, what to do? I found myself wondering what name I would want if I had a different name?

Surprisingly, the thought of a new name lingered after I left that job. I spent much time seeking within my heart what might this be all about?

Time spent in quiet reflection, introspection and heaven-gazing revealed my need to go a bit further in my quest for significance and identity.

In my young years I heard daily just about every racial slur one can imagine for African-Americans, the Japanese, Chinese, Jews, Italians, Mexicans…you name it, I heard it. My father had lived in the deep south from the age of 13 and fully embraced hatred for people of all colors.

…FYI: Don’t believe the “I’m not racist! Some of my best friends are black” rhetoric; It’s actually denial….

Having spent my first 13 years in a small town in Colorado — where I remember only one or two “black” students — I knew no more about “them” than what I heard around the house.

Then we moved to Las Vegas with our dad, where we found ourselves in classrooms with students of many different races. I was confused that what my dad taught me about other races didn’t seem to hold true. “Non-whites” were no less intelligent than I; they were neither monsters nor deserving of a superior attitude from the likes of me!

It was a humbling reality check to the Nth degree; I accepted what I saw as a personal challenge to become a better person.

At 13 years old I decided to reject those values of hatred and ignorance, yet it took years to reformat my brain to where I no longer first identified people by skin color or race.

I guess it worked. I married a man of Mexican descent, after all. And I know more Spanish than he does. ; )

Now a mother of five Hispanic earthlings and one Hispanic heaven-dweller, I found that I owed it to myself to take one more step toward distancing myself from the childhood filled with hateful language.

In changing my name, I have blended the unique, in honor of my mom, with my deceased daughter’s name, in honor of her and her siblings’ Hispanic heritage.

In changing my name to include her middle name, I have detached myself from the ignorant, hate-filled language that flooded my youthful ears and connected myself to my Hispanic husband and children.

The newness I feel is inexplicable. I have finally…symbolically…left behind the cruelty that defined my early perceptions of people who were not like me.

I guess I have my customers to thank for the first steps of a year-long journey that led me here.

© Alexa Lopez 2008