Candles and Colors: A Tale of Cultures

By Sophia Doshi

I think I am behind on weaving my ethnicities together like a well-made quilt, akin to those found in your mother’s childhood home. It should be fuzzy, warm and remind us of nostalgia or comfort. Instead, mine is bits and pieces of unmatching hues, shapes and sizes. It’s rough and ragged and lies strewn about as if tossed on the ground by its artisan out of exasperation.

I don’t know how to sew. How am I supposed to put these pieces together? I have spent much time searching for the answer to this question.

I may be able to trace my family tree back a couple of generations but what does that mean for me? How could my great-grandparents in India and my great-grandparents from Ireland, Scotland, Lithuania, Russia, and Italy find any common ground among their cultures?

I descend from many different people across oceans, deserts, plains and mountains. I have to consider how I will stitch together the dozens of fabrics in my quilt, like the rolling green hills of Scotland and the vast flatlands of Lithuania. What feelings should I have about eating meat from animals that are considered sacred in the religions of my Gujarati grandparents but a staple part of most European diets? And my chameleon skin is pale like the snow that falls in Russia then darkens to the caramel dust that settles across Mumbai. Of course, biology explains how my eyes turned from bright blue like my mother's to light green, perhaps like the jade necklace gifted to me by my grandmother.

I accept who I am. I was brought up to understand the different aspects of who I descend from. School projects on family history supplemented my curiosity about where my last name comes from. ’Doshi’ in Gujarati means ‘rough cloth seller’ or ‘hawker selling cloth’ –and prompted me to trace back my roots to my grandfather’s adoption and how he became a McDevitt. My roots grow under vast oceans and through compact bedrock to curl their tendrils through mult-continental dirt.

I live and breathe as a testament to cultural diffusion. I light candles, give and receive gifts on Christmas, and help distribute candles for Diwali before exchanging small tokens with loved ones. I dress head to toe in green and celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, and jubilantly fling colorful paint upon kind strangers for Holi. My cultures may not necessarily align on the calendar or feature similar traditions, but Christmas and Diwali have candles, and St. Patrick’s and Holi are known for their color.

My quilt will be sewn somehow because I am a beautiful, colorful patchwork of unity and festivity, and I would not trade my vibrant quilt for any other.