Consuelo I was often like, maybe I’m not Latina. Maybe I’m not Latina enough. It was like this like race that I was in that I could never complete.
Violet Canales
Living your most authentic self might seem easy when born into a family with a Salvadoran father and Mexican-American mother. Yet Violet Canales, born fair-skinned in East LA, often called a ‘weta’, was exposed to exclusion, even within her own Latino community, creating a sense of confusion and disconnect from her Latina identity.
Violet found herself living in two different worlds, one Latina and the other White, and feeling “not good enough” for either of them.
Questioning her Latinidad, Violet aimed at successfully fitting into American culture. She has two degrees, a Masters and works in corporate America. And yet, she met the same barrier of non-acceptance.
Listening to Violet’s story will bring you to tears, empathizing with her story and rallying to create the comunidad that gets disrupted when questioning cultural identity. By the end of the episode, you will be laughing at the commonality that we all share and realize there are more of us here than we realize.
Violet Canales on Instagram, LinkedIn and her favorite cafecito place, La Manarca in Boyle Heights.
Transcript:
[Intro]
Consuelo:
Welcome to another episode of the Life Lnxx podcast. Happy to have you here on this special Wednesday, when we have a fabulous guest with us, Violet Canales. She has come from East LA, where she grew up, and had her journey with figuring out cultural identity and how that really resonates from what you’re raised in and what you’re taught to coming to a point of self-awareness. So welcome, Violet.
Violet:
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me on. I appreciate this time and space that you’ve made for me. I did want to say that I was born in east LA, but I grew up in the IE. And if you know people out there hearing this, you know, you know, just wanted to make sure.
Consuelo:
That was big. Awesome. Awesome. Okay. And for those who aren’t in California, the IE?
Violet:
Inland Empire. Mostly Chicanos, huge Latino community.
Consuelo:
Awesome.
Violet:
My family out there. Yep.
Consuelo:
And yet here you are in New York.
Violet:
mm-hmm… How did I get here? And what will be next? Writing my story, for sure.
Consuelo:
So, that’s what we’re gonna talk about today. Glad you’re all here listening to Violet’s story, and get ready for the journey.
Violet:
Yes. Hope you’re ready for this.
Consuelo:
You’re here specifically to speak to your journey of cultural identity, the challenges you’ve endured and the soul searching through cultural identity. Many women will resonate with your experience. So I am very grateful that you’re joining us.
Violet:
Thank you. Thank you for bringing me on to this podcast, to share my story, because it definitely gave me the opportunity to look inward and, reflect on what’s really important to me, and hopefully inspire other women that are listening to this, to be your most authentic self.
Consuelo:
So start us on this journey. How did you feel when you were younger and growing up in it? Were you supported your, your community?
Violet:
I would say, as far as, questions about my identity, there are moments here and there when little kids talk about where their parents are from. And, I would always hear, “oh, my parents are from Mexico”, because that’s where everyone was from where I was growing up.
Consuelo:
Oh, okay.
violet:
And that made me think about where my parents are from. My mom is not from Mexico. She was born in east LA.
Consuelo.
Proudly born in east LA.
Violet:
Yeah. And my dad is from El Salvador and that’s all I, at that time, knew about it. Like, oh, he’s just from El Salvador. Like he came here when he was 30 no one ever bothered to follow up on that story; why he came, anything like that. Until I got older, you know, I became more curious because you have that sense of awareness with, maybe music you will hear.
I don’t know if you remember that song…? (Begins singing)
Consuelo:
yeah, yeah,
Violet:
She’s naming all these countries and that made me like, “okay, well, am I in that? Like, is that me?” You know, all that Latino pride. And then it got me thinking, “oh, Salvador is in it. Like, I’m Salvadorian.
But as far as like what being Salvadorian means I didn’t really know. I knew that they had pupusas, but like… There was even this whole prototype of what a Latino woman looks like. I remember people telling me I was too light skinned to be Salvadorian.
Consuelo:
Oh gosh.
Violet:
Yeah. Or, “oh, you’re a white girl”. They’ll just dismiss me as a white girl.
Me being half Chicana and then half Salvadorian, not really knowing Spanish well and living in a community with mostly Mexican Americans and people confusing me as being white because it’s such a homogenous community of Mexicans. There’s not much diversity. People were so quick to write me off as a Weta, a white girl.
Oh. You know, “Tu no sabes”, like she’s a white girl.
Thinking about like my time as a teenager and then going into my early twenties, it’s like, was I always pushed away to the point where I’m just like, “fuck it. Like, I’m not”… Excuse me. I don’t mean to cuss, but…
Consuelo:
It’s okay.
Violet:
I’m not gonna even try to be a part of this community. And I’m just gonna try to fit into this white community because there was a time where I was just like that, too. Like, okay, well you guys are going to dismiss me when I need you because y’all say that I’m like this. Then I’m going to fit into this larger American community looks like, American society looks like; what I see in the mainstream on television and music. And you know, I did all of that.
Consuelo:
At a time, when you’re really needing to fit in. You do not want to be ostracized. And here you are, trying to find a place where you could fit in. And yet. not having it willingly open to you. Oh, Girl World is so ridiculous. I mean, it’s ridiculous to begin with and you add this extra complexity, this depth to it, and you’re like, oh,
Violet:
Even in my own family, when I try to speak Spanish to my dad, like my mom’s side of the family would always make fun of how I would speak to my dad.
And that’s just family. Right. Always like picking fun of each other and that’s probably their own insecurity of their identity too projecting onto me. So, you know, I now understand that, but at that time I didn’t. And so, I didn’t feel comfortable speaking Spanish all the time because I knew that’s what I would be met with, with my family, with people in my community.
Consuelo:
how did that make you feel?
Violet:
It was almost like a lot of the times, I wasn’t Latina enough.
I was often like, maybe I’m not Latina. Maybe I’m not Latina enough. Okay, so am I Latina? Like, I don’t know.
I always kept coming back to my heritage. Always curious about who I am, that knowledge that my dad had, my mom had, my grandma, from my mom’s side, had. Wanting to know more about me. I always felt empty. I always felt like there was something lacking. I always felt like I wasn’t enough still. It was like this like race that I was in that I could never complete.
Consuelo:
You felt the barrier alone in the immediate community, not being directly from Mexico, even though you are first generation Latina. you feel like, okay, in my community, I’m not accepted as a Latina per se, because they think I’m too white and I don’t speak this Spanish the way the community’s speaking this Spanish.
And they have a really tight knit group and here I am on the fringe. And so you’re growing up through most of your life, feeling all this unknown of how you fit in because, as a multicultural woman, you’re living in two worlds and you don’t really fit in any one.
We’re a global citizen. We don’t assign to just one location. And so, tell us more of wanting to know more of where you come from.
So your father came from El Salvador your mother is Mexican American.
Violet:
Yeah.
He was born in Polorós, which is like a very, very small town outside of San Salvador, which is like a big city out there. Came here in 1976, the first time, through a visa through like, he calls comerciante, which is like a work visa, essentially.
So, his first time it was just for like a visa to work. And then, I didn’t know this until I asked him this last week, tell me more about like, how you came and why you came and when you came, all that stuff. And, I never knew that he actually went back to El Salvador. And the second time he came back, it was with my Tio Gino, through tierra, through the border.
So I never knew that about my dad that he came through illegally. And that’s crazy to me! Like, how do I not know that? Because I thought it was always through avion, like through airplane,
because that’s what I heard. “Oh yeah. I came through the airplane the first time”.
Yeah.
But yeah, and it just right there shows me like how much I was not, I didn’t feel motivated to ask these questions, uh, to my father, when I was in my teens, because I was just so caught up at that time on how to fit in with the larger white community, the larger American community, uh, society. But also, still trying to be accepted by like that small community I grew up in.
Consuelo:
So which way did you go, trying to be more Latina or blending into being white?
Violet:
You know, in the early two thousands, I remember wanting to be more like a white girl wanting to talk like a white girl, whatever that means.
And growing up in a predominantly Mexican American community, light skin, having a mother that speaks English because of her own assimilation when she was growing up in east LA, because of the discrimination my grandparents faced, for me, it felt like, okay, well I’m halfway there.
I’m like almost a white girl, you know. But I’m not! So it’s very confusing. I’m now a 30 year old woman and I feel a little lost and disconnected from what I’m really from.
And, I look at myself and it’s like, I have indigenous features. I have features of my grandma of my aunts, of people, you know, would be considered indigenous.
Yes. You know, I’m Latina! So, it’s been very eye opening for me to ask my dad, like about how he came to this country, just looking inward and reflecting on how much he had to sacrificed, uh, the history of his people and the history of my mom and her community, and realizing that I need to own that history.
That is me! That is my identity. I need to celebrate it. Look inward, stop seeking that outside validation, especially, especially from white folks. Because that’s not yours. That’s not your history. That’s not your story. You’re never gonna get fulfilled.
It’s not gonna feed your soul. It’s not gonna feed your spirit. You have to find that with the people in your community and the people that share your blood.
Consuelo:
Was finding community part of your reason to move to New York?
Violet:
Being first generation, I could have easily became another statistic. Having a mother, who is Mexican American, growing up in east LA, not going beyond a high school diploma, having children really early.
I wanted to make something, create something new in my own immediate family, and write a new story for the women in my mom’s side of the family. While I knew that what I grew up in is something that I didn’t wanna repeat, it was also a very confusing time.
Because like most people, most women, most Latinas who are now, you know, reaching their thirties, growing up in the two thousands, especially in Southern California, there wasn’t much representation of us. We didn’t see ourselves in any kind of, leadership roles.
We weren’t even existent. I don’t think I knew any kind of role model I could look up to. There are very few, maybe Selena.
Consuelo:
Yeah.
Violet:
She’s in music. So for me, I feel like I need to share this story. There was like this itch I had to connect with other women, other Latinas, other, other girls that grew up in the same circumstances, as far as financially. Having parents that were blue collar and being first generation and having no one to look up to, guide you out of that kind of cycle of poverty that you grew up in.
Consuelo:
What was that process? What helped you get to that awareness of, I am who I am. I come from a millennia of Mexican and El Salvadoran and indigenous people.
Violet:
Yeah.
Consuelo:
…That’s, what’s pulsing in me right now. And, that thought of, “Hey, I want to go discover what that is all about”. So what, helped you get to that point? Because I think that would help a lot of women, even it’s their own personal journeys, but you know, it might work for someone else.
Violet:
I could think of the defining moment that kind of woke me up. It was awful. I hit rock bottom.
So around my late twenties, I had moved to New York City, after I received my master’s just to check out what New York City’s like. It was my first time living outside of California. Very exciting. The plan was I’ll be there for be here for three months and go back to California.
Once I came here, my whole worldview was open, like it…
Consuelo:
Exploded.
Violet:
Exactly. It’s like, okay. It was just like, whoa, like it’s not just Mexicanos, aqui, hay Colombianos Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Venezuelan, like you name it. And so, that’s just Latinos, too! You got everyone here.
My worldview exploded and I realized that I was with my boyfriend to be comfortable. I was scared to get outside of that, that bubble. I wanted to stick into that safety zone. I didn’t want to leave out of it because if I did, I didn’t know what was else out there.
So yeah, being out here really opened my eyes and there was this guy I met. He was a white man. He had blonde hair, blue eyes. I wanted this validation from this white man. I wanted him to accept me. I wanted him to take me seriously, I guess, as someone that he would call a girlfriend.
But every time we would talk, my history would come up, you know, how I grew up.
I grew up, you know, very hard area. I grew up with not a lot. I grew up poor! I didn’t grow up with a lot. And, he would make me feel, uh, embarrassed for it. Not directly, but in like little remarks, like, “oh, how did you not do that?” Oh, that’s like… They couldn’t fathom the kind of conditions that I grew up in.
And it made me feel like, like this immense amount of sadness and embarrassment and scared fear that I would never be able to meet someone who can accept who I came from, where I come from.
And I was just totally alone, alone. The first time I had ever been alone and single like that about to, you know, exit my twenties.
And just feeling like, who am I? I don’t know myself. I don’t feel like I’m doing things for me. My spirit is not expressing itself. And, I think, it was during that point where I started like, just connecting with women, mostly women of color, mostly Latina women, and just trying to connect with them and hear their story because I feel like they were the only ones that could relate and also I could find community in.
And it made me.. yeah, acceptance. And also, another thing I realized was I need to be helping my community. I need to be a part of my community. I need to not make people understand. Because they need to understand for themselves. They need to learn that on their own. But like, I can’t keep trying to make them want to accept me, be accepted by their world.
That energy could be poured into bringing up my people, bringing up my women, being there for my other Latinos who are facing that kind of like sense of loss of identity, loss of… confusion of who you are and feeling incomplete and not enough. And being in two worlds and not enough for each world.
It’s so important for people in the Latino community to be there for one another, because the kind of experiences that comes with being Latino in America. Right? Not just for the immigrants themselves, of course. That’s list is endless the racism, the discrimination. Right?
And I’ve seen that with my own father, like having to face really racist people. And like me seeing that, it took a toll on me and I still operate sometimes of like, out of anger. My own experience as a first generation girl and not having anyone, know anyone, have any role models, trying to get myself out of poverty, that’s when you need community the most to come through.
Because the Latino experience in the U.S. that in itself makes you Latino. The kind of problems we have to figure out on our own and alone, a lot of the times, is it’s unique to Latinos. And that’s why we need to be there for each other.
So yeah, at that point, I was like, I’m not going to play down where I come from.
If people ask me like, “oh, how come you can’t Spanish well?” It’s like, learn your history. Learn the history of Mexican Americans in this country, the discrimination, they had to felt. The reason why my mom was never taught Spanish. during that time, when my grandmother was in her thirties, how she was ostracized, you know, made to feel like an outcast, like that internal racism she felt that she couldn’t teach her children Spanish.
Consuelo:
Yeah, no, I can really empathize with your mother because my mother, she was so afraid of our physical safety and so wanting us to blend in, but only on the outside of the house.
I can go out and join into what’s happening in the community and yeah, I’ll be fine. But to have people really understand and join into your community, like you were saying, it doesn’t happen.
Violet:
It’s hard. It’s exhausting. It’s draining. I feel that way every day with the work I do. I have to speak with a lot of different C-level folks, and big companies and big enterprises.
Consuelo:
Wow!
Violet:
Yeah! So if you could imagine, I don’t sound like this. This voice does not come out.
Consuelo:
Yeah.
Violet:
It’s major code switching and that’s my whole life. My whole life I’ve never… like this, how loud I am? This is my, I feel like this is my Salvadoran voice. This is my grandma coming out. This is my, I don’t know who’s coming out. This is who I am.
Like if I could be like this at work. If I could go into work every day, talk to my colleagues like this.. Dude, I do not talk to my colleagues like this. And it’s.. I’m one of two Latinas.
Consuelo:
Oh!
Violet:
It’s just really, yeah, it’s exhausting.
So, ultimately I guess, the point I’m trying to make is that code switching that all of us has have to do, whether it, being having to like not laugh too loud, having to be mindful of the words you use, the colloquisms (sp) or the sayings. Like that’s a whole other thing for me, too, that I notice, in my job, is like, I feel like I’m always mixing those sayings up. And, when I’m mix them up, and someone corrects me, I get so hard on myself.
I get like, “oh my God, like I’m not blending in”. Like, and I have to recognize like, Violet, Violeta!
Consuelo:
Don’t blend in. What’s Consuelo’s tagline? ‘Don’t blend in.’ We’re not blending in.
Violet:
Right. Yes. Thank you. And like, but there’s that little voice that makes me.. it’s awful. Like it still creeps in, like, there’s like two.. there’s like Violet and Violeta. Violetta reminding me like, no, like ‘F it’, like, let them hear what I sound like.
Who cares? Be unapologetic. They need to…
Consuelo:
Yeah.
Violet:
But then, it’s hard. It is hard to be in that space because it’s a practice, it’s a practice.
Consuelo:
So, I have a question.
Violet:
Yeah.
Consuelo:
So this brings up a lot. This is very on point and. This is what needs to be heard. This is the story that needs to be common for people to understand what it’s really like. So you’re coming from a family, you described, you were poor and you were in California, all your life, and yet, and yet, you pick up and leave and move to New York on your own and you have a masters and now you’re in corporate America.
So, Hello? Talk about the Latino power? Now, come on. I mean, yes, you’re exhausted from going through all those barriers by yourself, without any mentor, without any template to follow, you’re doing it all on your own and you get here and you’re 30.
Violet:
Yep.
Consuelo:
Do you stop and sit in that a minute and go, “oh my Lord, Violet.Yes, the struggle, but oh my Lord, the glory, right now?
Violet:
Yeah. I mean, I, when I’m down on myself, I had a hard day going through some kind of financial stress or something, any stress, I’ll think about like how far I’ve come. And realize like, not a lot of people, in my situation, could have made it out of that.
Consuelo:
You’re so humble. You have such a soulful presence. So many people of privilege don’t have your level of success. So maybe every morning, perhaps, remind yourself of what a badass Chica, you really are. Because so many people would’ve stuck with their comfort. Like you were describing, you stay with your comfort rather than going out on your own and figuring it out. “Well, yes, what life do I really wanna have?”
Violet:
Exactly. And I think that’s where I’m at right now because corporate America is not where I wanna stay. It was definitely something I wanted at some point to prove to myself, to prove to everyone else, people who knew where I was coming from. Um, maybe those racist ass people out there like that don’t wanna see us achieve. Like, yes to them, too!
But yeah, to all of them, like I’m gonna be a survival guide. I’m gonna be an example. I’m gonna be an exploration.
But now I’m here. It’s like, okay, I did what I needed to do to survive. I put all that energy and effort into getting where I am today. Now, I need to shift the focus to what’s gonna make my spirit alive. What’s gonna feel important to me. Where can I show up every day my most authentic self? And in doing that, inspiring people to be their most authentic self.
So, that’s where I’m at right now. It was once a goal, but now it’s a stepping stone to what my true calling is. And, I’m still figuring that out.
Consuelo:
Yeah!
Violet:
Hopefully, you know, staying here in New York city and building that community and meeting other Latinas, other first generation folks, I’ll figure it out and it it’s not gonna happen overnight.
Having these type of conversations are important for sure.
Consuelo:
Right! I think of life in three stages. And I call them not stages because I call them utopias. I really believe that you have a childhood all the way through your schooling, uh, for whatever it is, it can be really great.
And I think it’s much more obvious when you’re little that you can’t wait to get through that first utopia to be older, right? How many little kids just can’t wait till they be older? You just want to tell kids, why?
Violet:
I know.
Consuelo:
Why do you want to get older? Love it as long as possible, get away with it as long as possible.
But you successfully have your master’s, corporate America. You’re in your second utopia. Just getting all of those successes and hitting those goals that you put yourself. Well, this is your second utopia and it’s undefined. It has no structure. It has no, this is what you have to do next, Violet.
It has no, “this is where you’re supposed to be, this is what you’re supposed to do, this is what you’re supposed to say”. It’s all up to you! And you have a good 25 years of this. You literally have 25 years of crafting this second utopia, all according to you and based on your identity, how you self identify.
Violet:
I love that.
Consuelo:
Because there’s a third one. God willing, you get a third one. I’m more like the third one I’m sitting there going. Yes. Okay. I’m leaving. I want to live in Spain. I wanna get the heck outta here. I wanna go.
Violet:
Nice!
Consuelo:
Yes. Yes. So come over, come visit.
Violet:
For sure. Um, that that’s awesome.
Consuelo:
Yes. Yes. So, you’re not supposed to know. If you knew what your second utopia already had in mind for you, would you even care? Like if you were 30 and you knew what you were supposed to already be doing the rest of your life, you would just be, you know, dying in it. Right? It’s just like, no, you’re building it.
You’re not supposed to know because it’s not there. It’s all up to you to create.
Violet:
Exactly. And, just find, live your truth.
Consuelo:
Hm-hmm.
Violet:
I would hear that like, “live your truth”. What does that mean? And now I’m feeling what it means.
Consuelo:
Yeah.
Violet:
This is what’s real for me that you can’t tell me I’m not gonna be living anybody else’s dream. Unfortunately, that’s the case for a lot of people, a lot of millennials, more specific, and then it’s even harder for first gen folks, because it’s a whole other layer of battle and navigating that whole, “you gotta find what you do, what you love as a profession, and make good money”, at least.
So, yeah, it comes to a point where you just kind of have to accept that people will think what they wanna think about you, but, you know, what’s true to you.
Consuelo:
Well, let’s talk about that a little bit because the podcast is the Life Lnxx. And, Life Lnxx is speaking to who we come from. Yes, we’re first gen, but we’re not first out of all this DNA and personality that’s pulsing in us.
So, you were saying most of your community, most of your family stayed in their comfort zone, and yet you, and only you, took the leap, a leap of faith, a leap of excited unknown. Do you know anyone else in your family who was like that?
Violet:
My dad like is the first person I think of. I think about how he was the first out of all of his 13 brothers to leave.
Consuelo:
Wow.
Violet:
Yeah. And he, he’s not the youngest, but he’s like more on the younger, one of the younger brothers. My grandmother, right? Having 14 children. Imagine!
Consuelo:
No!
Violet:
Imagine, no!
Consuelo:
I mean, no, no, thank you. No.
Violet:
I mean, let’s not even imagine that.Yeah. But…
Consuelo:
I have two two and I survived it. Wow. God bless her. Yes. So there’s that! There’s that!
Violet:
There’s that woman… that strength and that’s in my DNA. Like I know that woman wasn’t taking any shit from anyone with all the stuff.
Consuelo:
All those boys!
Violet:
Well, there was most of them were men, but then there’s my Tia Lorena, who lives in Maryland. So, there was her and there was another aunt. She’s in El Salvador right now, but most of them are boys.
But yeah, he was the first to come to New York City on a visa to work. I just look at him and how eccentric he is, this man. He’s very flashy. Wears whatever the fuck he wants to wear. He likes to have his sombrero, his botas, his, uh, belts, big belt buckle. Just represent where he’s from, like straight to the bone.
Consuelo:
Live your truth! Live your truth.
Violet:
That man is living his truth! He always tells me he cannot work for a boss. He always worked for himself. He, and I think it’s part of the reason like Spanish, it’s like a form of resistance to white supremacy to what the U.S. did to that country, to his country.
Consuelo:
Aaaah.
Violet:
You know, caused the civil
war, and all that.
As far as like people telling me who I remind them of, my dad will tell me, all the time, about how I remind him of his sister, Tia Lorena.
He said that my grandmother told him, “oh, she’s like Lorena”. And so, I do wish that at that point I reached out to her.
She was already in the States. She’s been here since 1984 and
Consuelo:
So, she’s still here?
Violet:
She’s still here. Still alive. She has four children. One of them actually passed away. So I have four cousins, three cousins, actually. Yeah. Yeah. So you could only imagine that pain that she has.
Consuelo:
Yeah.
Violet:
She’s very spiritual woman. A very religious woman.
Consuelo:
Have you met? You haven’t met.
Violet:
I met her once when I was 14 and I remember her heart of gold. Like I was about 14. My mom had undergone surgery. It was during the like Christmas during the holidays.
So, she was in the hospital. I went to my uncle, my Tio Gino’s house, and Tia Lorena was there. She was visiting. And, that was the first time I ever met her ever, ever seen her in person. Maybe, even the first time I even was aware of her. Because I was like, I just turned 14, I remember.
She was talking to me, wanted to get to know me and you know, that time my mom was in the hospital. I remember just feeling like sad and scared and yeah. So, I remember her probably gave me this money for like the holidays thinking about it now. But, she was also encouraging me to do something good with it.
She takes out money, gives me like 40 bucks. And she’s like, “here, this is for you. Think of it as even a gift”, you know, whatever. “Maybe buy something nice for your mom so she can’t be here”. And I never had met her before.
To wipe out cast like that and just to give it to me, never having meeting me before. That meant something to me, it meant like, “okay, like, I’m not alone. There’s family that cares for me and they want to see me happy. They want to see me that I’m okay. They care.
I definitely have to visit.
Consuelo:
Yes, please. Yes. Yes.
But it’s the beauty of the culture. And again, it’s, why you don’t want to blend in because I think the Gen Z and the Millennial generations are so much kinder than my generation or my parents’ generation, for sure, when it came to being here in America. But, the Latino culture, widespread, I think the black community, widespread, there’s just this joy.
There’s this love of people. There’s this expression that’s just constant. And, that feels so good.
Violet:
Yes!
Consuelo:
Everyone’s invited in.
Violet:
Yeah, no, I definitely could see that. Our parties would be so big. That’s one thing I do miss.
Consuelo:
Right? I love it.
Violet:
I miss that. Once I really establish myself here in New York city, you know, if I end up staying here for more than five years, I want it to get to that level where I have people coming over and they’re not just my friends.
Those are my sisters, those are my brothers, you know, and that’s as we should be looking at our people in our community. We have to look out for each other like that.
That’s another thing too, is, like giving. I grew up with being, you know, being around people that are always, particularly my dad’s side of the family, they’re always willing to share like, what’s mine is yours.
What’s yours is mine.
Consuelo:
Hm-hmm.
Violet:
And, seeing that only here and there in my mom’s side of the family, I reflect on that. And like, that’s, it’s sad, you know? And I think that’s individualism at play.
You know, that’s really big in a part of American culture and just having Tia Lorena, giving money to me like that, where for me that was, so that was a lot of money and I’m sure for it was for her.
It was like, duh, of course I’m gonna come through for you like this. Because this is what we do. And it was just like I have to remember that. That’s just a part of who we are, you know, we’re sharing. That’s what we do. We share. We share everything.
Consuelo:
Mm-hmm
Violet:
What’s mine is yours.
Consuelo:
Mm-hmm and we take care. We take care of each other, which I find in my lifetime it still causes me conflict, sometimes. Because you’ll act, like you say, from the soul, you’re acting from your soul. And I think it can cause a lot of conflict personally, for myself. And, maybe for others, where you go automatically do this, like Tia Lorena.
Violet:
Yeah.
Consuelo:
She automatically just gave it to you. You can always make money. Money’s just extra. Taking care of my mother was the priority. Taking care of my children was the priority.
Caring for each other is like the ultimate gift. It’s the ultimate honor, too, to have someone care for you, to just willingly give without you asking. You feel so honored. You feel blessed.
Like, wow, they really love me.
Violet:
Right! It definitely makes it hard, just being a, woman and knowing that’s the expectation. It’s not accommodating. It’s hard, especially when that’s such a big thing in our culture.
I don’t think I’ll ever want have a nanny like that would be missing out in so much.
And, that development and what I want to, the kind of knowledge I want to share and what I want to expose my children to.
Consuelo:
What would that be? As you’re learning your culture, as you’re getting more empowered in it, what do you think you’ll bring forward?
Violet:
Definitely gratitude and just to enjoy life. Life is yes, it’s ugly and it’s terrible and it’s, it’s awful things out there, but you do have a lot. There’s people that don’t have what you have. So, you have to be happy for what you have. Love it and, when you have that kind of mindset, that’s when you could sing and you could dance and you could be joyful and connect with other people that are seeking joy in life, in that way.
Consuelo:
That’s a sense of spirituality because you have a humble sense. And the humble sense comes, perhaps, from knowing that there’s a greatness out there in the universe and, we can just be simple. We can love what we have and have gratitude for it because it does bring you immense joy.
And, we’re not here to compete, you know, who has the bigger rocket. Because you’re still just a little speck of dust. Did you not see the pictures from the Webb telescope, people? You are just a speck of dust. It really has no influence.
Violet:
I know it sounds kind of negative to say that nothing really matters. But, you could take that as “well, if nothing really matters, then let’s enjoy this time that we’re here”. We don’t really know why we’re here. We don’t know what we’re doing, but let’s enjoy each other and enjoy what we have.
Consuelo:
Ah, you are a beautiful messenger of the culture. You have it thriving in you. You have so much to pass on to the next generation.
Okay. So do you have any stories either from your mother or your father? When they were raising you, did they ever give you the scary stories?
Violet:
All the time.
Consuelo:
Isn’t that a thing? I think we need to write a book about that. That is a thing. Tell me one.
Violet:
That is so funny, you bring this up because like, I haven’t thought about this in years. So, El Cucuy is a monster. If you were to run off to the dark, yet you can’t go too far from your parents, because if you do, it will snatch you, just take you away.
That’s what he does. He looks out for little kids. So there’s El Cucuy. And then, for whatever reason, I don’t know why this is such a thing. Maybe because Mexico or Latin America’s a big Catholic part of the world, but like the demoños and the devil, El Diablo.
I remember this one particular story where my dad would tell me. There was this woman who love to go out and, uh, she would get all dressed up. She would like get her nails done, her makeup, uh, single woman.And then, what she would do is go to the clubs and dance with different men.
One man, she ends up meeting was the wrong man. So very handsome, buys her a drink. She’s having the time of her life. She’s getting drunk. He’s getting drunk with her. They’re dancing. And, I think, at the end of the night, she like is so drunk she falls and lands on the floor just to see that the man’s feet aren’t feet, but they’re goat feet.
Consuelo:
Ooooh!
Violet:
And the whole night she was dancing with the Devil. And that’s what happens when you go out and drink as a woman.
Consuelo:
And have a good time.
Violet:
You’re not gonna meet a good man. That man is gonna be a devil. The lesson to be learned.
Consuelo:
Right! See?
Violet:
and like that sticks with you. And I remember hearing that as a kid, a little girl, a little girl, like , what does that tell you?
What are the lessons that you’re, you’re learning there?
Don’t go out. Like, don’t go out partying. That’s like what the bad girls do.
Consuelo:
Don’t be independent. Don’t make your own choices. Don’t have your own fun because that’s the Devil’s work.
Violet:
Yeah. Don’t have your own agency.
\
I haven’t thought about that in a long time. Thank you for making me like… (laughter) I’m still thinking of El Cucuy. I’m still thinking about those demoños. They’re coming out.
Consuelo:
That’s a very cultural thing. It’s a very cultural thing. They made fairy tales from them. Right? You had the wicked witch and you had the old lady who would eat children.
I was little, my mom would say if you misbehave, if you’re a naughty girl, at night, it’s always at night, you know, at night the gypsies will come and they will kidnap you and they will take you away. I was like, and she goes, you’ll know they’re coming. Yeah, gypsies, the gypsies will come and they will take you away. And you’ll know they’re coming because you can hear the bells on their wagons.
Violet:
That’s so much anxiety,
Consuelo:
That is really kidnapping, and that’s okay with you, mom? You’re not going to protect me from the gypsies.You’re just gonna sit there and go. I told you so
Violet:
Like, just watch you go away.
Consuelo:
Excuse me. I know. “Oh, well, she must have been naughty”.
Violet:
I know, like I deserve this. I deserve to be taken away. I have to be good. It was the same thing with, uh, do you remember La Llorona, was that ever a thing for, I’m not sure if Peruvian… I think that’s more of a Mexican thing.
But, La Llorona was a weeping woman who she… Oh God, the story…
There’s all these different versions, but there, she killed her own children, I’m going to say, and fed them to pigs. I forget why, exactly.
Consuelo:
That’s kind of an important part!
Violet:
Yeah. Like, I know she wanted to run away with the man, but the man didn’t accept that she had children.
She didn’t know what else to do with the children. So, she killed her own children, fed them to like her farm pigs. The guy doesn’t really want her anyway. And so, she ends up killing herself in the local river because she realized what she had done. And, so now, every night, she screams for her kids like weeping, like heavily, for her children. And, sometimes she’ll take you thinking that you’re one of her children. I’m like, that’s terrifying. That would scare me. That one was scary.
Consuelo:
La Llorona. God. Okay. That one’s, that one’s worse. That one’s scarier.
Violet:
Oh, and there’s another story. La Chupacabra. It’s like an animal beast that lives in Mexico and people have claimed like, it’s kinda like the Bigfoot of Mexico.
And people have claimed to have seen it. It walks on two legs has red eyes, but it’s like huge.
Consuelo:
You know, what’s really funny, is my friend, his mother’s Mexican and, this is like now, so he’s in his sixties. And, he adopted this dog and he had to go get the license for it in his, um, city.
So, he takes the dog in and the woman’s like filling out the forms like, “oh, what’s its name? Oh, how old is it? Oh, what’s its breed?”
You know what he said? Chupacabra. And she wrote it down. It’s on his license.
Violet:
That’s, that’s hilarious.
Consuelo:
Bring the culture forward.
Violet:
I know, right? Like little do they know? Oh, I want to do that.
Consuelo:
The silliness is definitely a beautiful balance in dealing with struggle. Did you lean on your sense of humor growing up?
Violet:
Like growing up in the household I did grow up in, yes. We didn’t have a lot. We didn’t, we moved a lot because my mom couldn’t make rent, my parents couldn’t make rent. Whatever.
The end of the day, we always had humor. We always laughed at the situation. Our house was always full of laughter. There were times where we didn’t have food, like enough food for everyone. But like, with all that we dealt with, we still had a sense of humor.
Even if it was just between my siblings and I. We would always remember when this happened and then like, just talk about how it played out and then just cracking up so hard. That’s one thing I really miss.
Consuelo:
That’s definitely cultural. That is definitely cultural. The silliness. I think there’s a silliness, a simplicity and just that love of goofing around, but not in a demeaning way. It’s a very life…
Violet:
Not to bring anyone down. It’s laughing at ourselves, but like, just laughing at the silliness of what life is.
Consuelo:
Exactly.
I like giving shoutouts to all our small businesses and coffee is usually very loved in the Latina culture.
So, do you have a favorite cafecito place that you’d like to give shout out to?
Violet:
Yes, definitely. So, in my time in LA, there is a cafecito place called, La Monarca. La Monarca Bakery in Boyle Heights. Check it out. They have the bombast pan dulce. They make some lattes that are, um, like Horchata base. So good.
Consuelo:
Ooh, nice. Awesome shout out. Yes. Okay. We’re going to put them in our show notes so you can go ahead and click through on the link and if you’re, this is in the LA area?
Violet:
East LA, yes.
Consuelo:
East LA. go check them out. That sounds amazing. I haven’t seen that up here.
If you find yourself in LA Boyle Heights, definitely check out La Monarca. Great people run it, too.
Beautiful. Beautiful. Okay. We’re going get them on there. They’re going to be in our show notes. They’re going be on our website and the transcript link.
Violet:
Thank you so much, Consuelo. No, really though. I appreciate you for allowing me to just tell my story. I’m still in the process of finding my power, still in the process of being the best possible version of myself and being my number one cheerleader.
Having the space to be heard and recognized how far I’ve come and share my story and, hopefully inspire other women that have these kind of identity issues and have these insecurities about how they grew up and where they fit in.
Like, I do hope that, what I’ve shared today resonates with them. You know, it’s for those women, I hope I’ve inspired them to, you know, find their own power.
Take up space that’s for sure. I wanna leave off there, uh, take up space and be your own authentic self and everything that that’s meant for you will come to you cuz that’s what I’m realizing for sure.
Consuelo:
Thank you so, so much for sharing your story. That was amazing. Oh, you have done so much soul searching and you brought me to tears at one point. I thought, “oh my gosh, this is too early to fall apart”, but it was such a beautiful story.
You have so much strength and compassion and passion. That’s just pulsing in you from your family, your culture, your own trajectory that you’re living this beautiful life on. It’s just exhilarating. It makes me so hopeful. It makes me happy and realizing that yes, it’s out there. This positivity, this light, this beauty is out there and we need to live that large so we can find each other.
I really appreciate you, Violet. It has been an amazing time together.
Violet:
Muchisimas gracias, Consuelo.
Violet”s story will be available on our website at lifelnxx.com, that’s L N double X, where we’ll have a transcript of today’s episode. And also, an article encapsulating what she spoke to here today.
Her contact information, that she’s provided us, will be available in the show notes of this episode that you find on any of your streaming platforms.
They will also be linked in the transcripts and the articles that we spoke of. So, reach out to Violet. Let’s create the comunidad worldwide and validate each other’s story.
Thank you for being with us today. Step into your truth, ladies! Ciao!
[Outro]
