You would think in grammar school that I would fully understand that I was an American since we always had to sing the National Anthem and recite the pledge. But, It didn't register. Honestly, I don't even know the exact moment that I fully understood that I was an American. If I had to go back to my 1st grade self, I would probably say it was when I took my first ISAT test. I think that's 1st grade...Anyway! So, you know how you have to mark your ethnicity? Well I couldn't find 'black' on the list. The only thing that related to me was African-AMERICAN. I bubbled it in.
Learning about slavery from that point on and how slaves got to America made everything so much easier and understandable. I already knew I lived in America but I thought my race was just black. Thats how I referred to it and thats how everyone else referred to it. I then knew why I recited the pledge and sung the national anthem.
I fully understood why every November on a tuesday I ended up at the park field house down the street from my house and why all the adults looked into those little box thingys, a.k.a., Voting. After finding out I wasn't just black but actually African-American, I started to recognize the fact that I was an American. For example, I started to notice how America is a mixture of all cultures, a melting pot. I started to relate the school systems from other countries to the ones I was used to. Most importantly though, I took my history and related it to what my culture consisted of now and saw the ideas from Africa mended into the rituals. A big one, Church. At my church, you can see the African influence.
The signs were around me the whole time but I realized I was an American from bubbling in a circle.
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