One of my good friends in Minneapolis is Gloria Kumagai. Gloria and I first met in our thirties, I was pregnant with my second child and volunteered to be on a Metropolitan Council advisory committee representing people of color. Gloria was already on that committee.

When you are one of the few minorities in a community, and as Japanese American, we were a minority within the minority, you think you know all the minorities out there, there are so few. I will never forget the look Gloria had on her face when I walked in, and I am sure my face reflected the same. Her eyebrows raised, a “what’s this?” look in her eyes. She had to wonder where in the world I had come from. Here I was, a fellow JA, and she had never heard of me. This was almost forty years ago–I can only imagine how we must have circled each other, politely but curiously asking the “where did you come from” questions. Though these were not the “where did you come from–Japan” questions, but more the “where did you come from that I wouldn’t have heard about you” questions.

Gloria’s story about growing up in Minneapolis reminds me that while my experiences were similar, they were also very different. I had grown up in Montana, another very white state, but my hometown was next to the Crow and Cheyenne native reservations. I was a minority within a minority group of brownish people.

I had a large family surrounding me, and we had a few other Japanese families we spent Memorial Day and 4th of July with, but we were not that close. There was one other Japanese girl in my middle school–Marie Shirasago–but maybe because we were both Japanese, or maybe because we had different interests, we were friends, but not best friends.

It turned out that after serving on the Met Council Advisory Board, Gloria and I continued to bump into each other around the Minneapolis Twin Cities. It turned out we both played tennis, and when I retired from corporate life and had time to volunteer I spent time with Gloria on the Twin Cities JACL Board.

Gloria speaks frankly about the difficulties of being “other” growing up in a predominately white community. She didn’t have, as I did, older siblings who paved the way and broke barriers. I followed siblings who were football stars, cheerleaders, 4-H winners, Girls and Boys State delegates. I had it relatively easy. So easy, I didn’t find my community involvement roots until much later in life.

And in spite of the similarities and/or differences, or maybe because of them, Gloria and I are now co-workers, co-writers, friends.

Growing Up in a Sea of Whiteness is just one of the many stories that will make you think, help you understand, build your empathy. Read it now in Windows of Light, an anthology by Nikkei writers. Click here to order from Amazon.