Here I will talk about my mother and grandmother and women in puerto rico. How this had affected my art, my messages and my trauma without using word trauma. Para el de atrapada
As a Puerto Rican woman, born on an island that wears patriarchy on the forehead, I like to see us as “storms wrapped in silk”. Some might say I have an attitude, others find me exciting, toxic maybe and others well they plead me to go to therapy. My mom, she wasn’t about that, nor was the mom who came before her. They were into healing the mind through sound, unwavering optimism and a very neat denial of one’s own real flaws. Women here, they’re expected to be perfect, but not just any perfect, they’re expected to be complete: independent, working, beautiful, virgins, with a great self esteem, goes out and can maintain a social life yet not enough that it’s all she does, smart, socially aware, open minded, hardcore funny. And yeah great, ik easy, but when you live in a very big very small island, there’s little that goes unnoticed and less that goes unjudged.
Classism, funny topic. I was talking to this cheerful naive cute girl that liked anime and she told me in a tone that felt subconsciously mimicked “People in the streets are there because they wanted to, they made poor life decisions so why should I have to give them my money so they keep making wrong decisions”. This wasn’t a random white girl from Maria Reina, nor was she fifteen, this is our culture and those words came out of a girl that works every day to make her rent. Classism is just engrayned in us. We judge what’s below and have to be wary of our greed. Alcohol is also a HUGE part of our culture.