Not So Twins Day: Perspectives

Tyler Shepherd

APAM

9/14/14

Not So Twins Day Perspectives

TYLER

I cannot wait for Twin Day! Sure Crazy Hair Day and Pajama Day were fun but now my best friend Diane and I get to wear cool matching outfits. The minute the teacher told us about Twin Day I knew we’d be twins, and we’ve been planning our look everyday. At recess we meet in the orange tunnel on the playground to discuss our final plans. When we sit in the tunnel Diane seems very quiet, so I ask her “Are you alright?” She says quite simple in nearly a whisper “We can’t be twins anymore.” I laugh because Diane has always been one to joke around but she doesn’t laugh along with me. What does she mean? After a minute of silence she informs the reason we can’t be twins is because I don’t look like her. She points out how her skin is silky and straight and mine is curly, and her skin is light and mine is dark and her eyes are green, and mine are brown, so there is no way we can be twins. I don’t even know what to say, she’s right, we are super different how did I not notice. She leaves the tunnel to go coordinate outfits with someone who actually looks like her. I leave the tunnel hating that my skin is tan and that my eyes are brown, and oh how I wish to have silky straight hair like all the other girls in the class. My mom picks me up and with tears in my eyes I tell her the news. I ask her why I have to look like this when all the other girls get to look the same. My mom seems at a loss for words, but I need answers. I think of my own solution, I can’t change my eye colors or skin, but I would if I could. However, I’ve seen my mom straighten her hair so I will plead with her to straighten my hair, so that even if I’m not exactly like all the others I don’t have to be drastically different. A flat iron will be the key to my problems.

MOM

I knew this moment was going to come but I didn't expect it to be so soon. And no one quite prepares you for when your little girl comes home crying that she is too dark. I know I shouldn't be mad at a five year old but I feel so angry with the girl who made my daughter feel this way. And I'm not too happy with her parents either, because perhaps she got this close-minded idea about race from them. Now my daughter has to go through what too many little black girls have to go through feeling different, inferior, and unattractive because of her race. I try to comfort her and tell her that her ethnicity is very special and very beautiful but to feel left out or to not fit in is the most traumatizing thing to a child, so she doesn't want to hear that. What she wants is for me to straighten her hair so that on Twin Day she looks a little like the other girls. It breaks my heart that she can't see how special her ringlet curls are and her glowing tan skin. I tell her I'm going to talk to these little girls’ parents so we can work it out. But Tyler has always been set on what she wants and she feels like she can't show her face at school unless her face is topped with straight hair.

I agree to it, figuring we will compromise just for today. However when she sees her hair straight it is as though a magic fairy has granted her one wish, and she intends for it to last way past midnight. She loves the easiness the flow, the "whiteness" and it immediately lifts her mood, as she dances around telling me "I'm going to wear my hair like this forever". I feel conflicted; happy that she's happy but sad that it wasn't until she gained a whiter feature did she feel pretty. I think about my experience, and how I started to straighten my hair, and how my mom started to straighten her hair and how it's all so symbolic to where black women stand in this culture, not finding value until we are a little whiter. This mentality and the practice of straightening hair dates all the way back to slave times and that mentality has found its way in to my living room and my little girl. And I know as she flutters about the room with her hair fried straight, amongst the aroma of a flat iron, that she, like so many black girls really means it. She probably will want to wear her hair like this forever, but as long as I am her mother she will not want to be another race forever. I have every intention of teaching her the beauty that comes with being black and starting a new tradition of loving who you are rather than changing who you are.

DIANE

I mean it just makes sense. It is Twin Day after all and all the other girls are going to have matching outfits and matching skin colors. If I stay Twins with Tyler, then we won’t really look like Twins and then it won’t be like we got to have Twin Day at all. All the other little girls laughed at me when I told them who my twin was. They said with my hair and skin I should be a twin partner with one of them. We did just learn colors and shapes in class, so I know for sure that Tyler and I don’t match. One girl in particularly keeps pushing me to be her twin because we both have blonde hair and green eyes. But really I could be a twin with any other girl, because we all have straight hair, light eyes, and peach skin, except for Tyler. She’s the odd one out and if I’m a twin with her then I’m the odd one out.  If I were a twin with any other girl everyone would really believe it. Tyler is my friend, and on the inside we are a lot alike, but people won’t know that just by looking at us so the only proper thing to do is to not be twins. She loves Parent Trap so she knows that twins are supposed to look exactly the same, and unless I spend a day in the sun or she puts white out on her face this simply won’t work. I don’t want to be the odd one out; I don’t want to be laughed at for my too tan twin. So I guess I just have to explain to Tyler that it’s only right that we don’t be twins. I’m sure the other black girl in Room 203 will be a partner with her and that way everything will make sense. I feel bad breaking the news to her, but we can be partners on Best Friend Day.

DIANE’S DAD

Where did she learn this? I can assure you when one of the mom’s of a little girl in Diane’s class called to arrange a meeting I did not think she was going to tell me what she did/ Where did our little Diane learn that it is good to be divided by race. I sit on the benches next to the playground as Diane and all her friends’ play; they aren’t a very diverse bunch so I’m almost positive the cute little black girl is Tyler. As they play Tyler’s mom comes and sits beside me and I immediately assure her that this is not a way of thinking we passed down to her and that she mean it innocently. I see Tyler’s mom is very polite about the situation but in her eyes I see that she is going through something. As we talk about the incident she reveals to me that Tyler now feels different from all the kids in a bad way and now always wants her hair straightened. “Just the other day she asked what to do to get her skin lighter” she tells me. I just feel awful about the whole situation, even though Tyler’s mom reminds me that I’m not too blame. Why couldn’t Twin Day be more specific like “Same Clothes Day?” I think to myself. I pull Diane and Tyler over so we can clear the air. Tyler explains that she looks too different and Diane adds that’s why we aren’t twins. I ask them to put that aside and be twins because of how alike they are within. But they have already found new groups so that doesn’t quite workout, as Tyler’s mom and I encourage them to hug and make-up I’ve learned a lesson just like my daughter has. I’m grateful this happened because it reminds me to constantly be teaching my kids life lessons like tolerance and caring about what’s on the inside. Who would think all that would come from my kindergarteners Twin Day?