Growing Into My Peruvian Nose

Thank God I grew into my Peruvian nose. Correction, thank god I grew out of the bullshit prison that is Eurocentric beauty. 

I can’t recall a lot of my childhood, which is probably due to something bigger than this piece, but that will be saved for another time. Though I cannot recall my first-grade graduation or the name of my kindergarten best friend, a statement sticks with me a decade and a half later. 

“You would be so beautiful if it weren’t for that nose…” An Aunt of mine says to me (my age unknown, but very young) at the dining room table of my grandparents’ house, sitting beside my mother. My aunt twirls a long strand of my hair in her hand and then drops it. She speaks about my features and their ugly nature so casually that I do not know it’s an insult until I turn seventeen. My adolescent mind looks up to the woman meant to be a support system or role model critiquing the nose that is my father’s. I hadn’t given much thought to my nose, considering it fits my similar Peruvian features just fine.

I would soon become aware of my physical misfortune. As if the ugliness of my nose was a regular topic of conversation, my mother’s siblings never failed to remind me of its too-big structure.

In elementary school, my extended family would gather each Friday and order takeout. I looked forward to the days I could spend hours with my cousins and eat Taco Bell while adults chatted over card games. A Friday, at my grandparents’ home in Queens, an uncle grabbed me by my ankles and suspended me upside down. Despite my protest and screaming (adults rarely respect boundaries children express), I dangled with my head towards the ground and was forced to hear poisoned words. 

“Wow, I can see your brain through your nose!” The collection of adults around me laughed. I am unphased, still too young to know they were mocking me and being cruel. Another Aunt adds. “Your nostrils are so wide.” Her tone is soaked with disgust. 

I cannot remember if my mother ever told them to mind their mouths considering I was only a young child, easily molded by their racism. I’d like to think she told them they were equally ugly for commenting on a child, her child’s, perfectly acceptable genetics.  

Now at 25, I am abundantly aware of what features are accepted by my white family. Prominent noses are unfavorable. Tan skin in the summer is good. Tan skin in the winter is okay if you do not pose a threat. Speaking Spanish is sexy for men they fetishize, but not important enough to teach their children.

I’ve never asked my father how he felt when the collection of pale-skinned in-laws called the nose he gave his daughter her biggest flaw, a flaw that ruins her beauty. My skin burns with anger imagining my Father sitting there, unable to say anything in fear their racism would turn on him. He had been accepted by the family, but he has never been protected from the fetishization, the name-calling, and the unconscious (or deliberate) microaggressions. 

An aunt, hair dyed blonde though she grew out of that trait in puberty, calls my father “papi” when he walks through the door and places her hand on his arm. She asks him to get her another beer while she settles deeper in the backyard deck chair at a Fourth of July party. She flashes a gummy smile at my father, then at the table of women around her, raising her eyebrows as if to say “Take a look at this sexual foreign object I have to serve me.” My father brushes it off and gets the beer to avoid conflict, but I know it angers him. The saliva that floods my mouth tastes of vinegar, rotted with the hateful words and names I want to call her. 

As a middle school girl, after years of being told my nose was too big, too ugly, and too ethnic, I lived in fear of being seen. I hoped no one would notice the boulder that scarred my otherwise beautiful face. If I dressed my developing body in tighter-fitting clothing, I could show I was desirable despite the genetic massacre. This did nothing for my self-esteem, especially when at this age, my peers of fellow teen girls were pointing out each other’s flaws to subdue our deep self-hatred. Not to mention the shame that came from our over-sexualization before we knew what sex was. At 13, I plotted how I would collect enough money to get a much-needed nose job. I would ask my parents- I'd beg if they said no. 

At sixteen, I’d stare at myself in the mirror. Looking forward, I could admire my eyebrows, lips, and long eyelashes. My eyes would skip over the two wide nostrils at the center of my face. When I turned my head to the side I loved my small ears and long thick brown hair. My chin was fine. My cheeks were fine despite some acne…but my nose. It protruded out of my head with a bump on the bridge. It taunted me. I would be beautiful if not for this nose. With my finger, I pushed the tip of my nose up to resemble the one my cousin had. They never made fun of her nose. I turned to view myself straight ahead again and pinched my nostrils between my fingers until they mimicked the small slits of the rest of my white family. I remained like that, the increased sound of my restricted breaths, until I got light-headed. 

While in Graduate School I pierced my nose- I was 22 years old. I contemplated the idea of a nose piercing for a few months and worried about how the jewelry would draw attention to its size. Like a young teenager looking up “Am I gay?” quizzes on the internet late at night, I searched “Should I get a nose piercing?” in hopes that a stranger (white) online would tell me all noses look good with a piercing, even the big ones. To no one’s surprise, the conversation was dominated by button noses similar to the ones my aunts all possessed. My eyes rolled. It was then, after scrolling through several videos on a social media app, that I found a woman of tan complexion, full lips, wide nostrils, and a bump on the bridge of her nose sharing that the piercing made her more confident in her nose. It was then that my mind was made up. If this woman, with a beautiful nose, felt more confident from a hoop in her nostril, I would too. 

And I did. 

Shortly after, I worked in an office while in my final year of grad school. I began eating lunch with an older woman in the office, who made the worst year of my life almost bearable. I never told her this, but our shared meals in the back kitchen of the small office were my favorite parts of the day. She was smart, funny, sweet, and laughed at my inability to see reality beyond the bubble of youth I lived in. One particular lunch, this time, we were joined by a friend I pierced my nose with, she pointed out our matching silver nose rings. I told the sweet, perfectly made woman she should get a nose piercing. I thought the statement comical at first, the idea of the three of us in a team meeting with matching nose jewelry.

She laughed and shook her head from side to side as if I had said something unthinkable. 

“No, really, you should!” I prod. 

“I always wanted one, but I can’t.” 

“Why not?” 

She laughed again. “Not with this nose.” She pointed at the down-turned nose with a high arch that fits her face gracefully. I stopped my jaw from falling slack. 

How could an adult woman feel insecure about her nose? Had she not grown past the insecurities of her girlhood, like I had assumed all women did? More importantly, who made my favorite coworker feel insecure about the piece of flesh that tied her face together with harmony?
The woman older than me transformed into a young girl in front of my eyes. I didn’t know if I wanted to hug her or shake her of the nonsensical insecurity that plagued me just months ago. 

“No, it would look incredible on you!” I said this with my genuine opinion. I was not lying. I was not trying to comfort her. I was stating a fact. 

She was a young girl again, and this time, I was the adult who knew better than to speak ill of the features that made her. 

A year later, out of the blue, after I graduated and moved back to New York City, my phone lit up with a Facebook message with her name attached. I unlocked my phone and pressed the notification. In the blue and white chat, there is a photo of her profile, newly decorated with a sparkly stud. 

Pride filled me. She had done it, and she looked complete. Her nose was made for it. 
At 25, I examine my Peruvian nose in the mirror and am in disbelief at the insecurity I once had towards it. My nose sits flatteringly in the middle of my face, with rounded nostrils and lacking a small button tip. When I look at my nose, I see myself, and I see my father and his father before him. A genetic privilege that was passed down and I hope to pass it down to my children.

I wish someone told my aunts they were beautiful as children so they didn’t make fun of me in order to feel beautiful themselves. Or at least, I wish people weren’t so ignorant of their racist biases. I hope, as we all grow older and our features shift, we recall the young girls we were the first time we were made aware of our “flaw,” and tell her she is just fine. 

I am grateful I never grew into my nose. My nose did not need growing in to. I simply needed to outgrow the environment that did not appreciate it.