Proud in Denial

“I told her that she was ridiculous and that she was going to be a laughingstock, not knowing how close my words were to the truth. She didn’t care what anyone thought. She said her wedding was hers, and it was one thing no one could ruin.” (7)

Rochelle attempts to deny her Latina identity and escape the culture she appears to resent by constructing this alternate reality of an “Anglo” wedding. However, it is Rochelle’s effort to expel this lifestyle from her identity that ultimately confines her to it. The night of her prom she wore “a salmon colored version of her wedding dress,” foreshadowing the night as the closest she would come to having a “classy” wedding. “Ro didn’t have a plan B,” and when confronted with the reality of her pregnancy she was forced to adapt her perspectives in order to survive the clash of her class ideals with the stark truth of her situation and the future it implied. Instead of rejecting her Latina heritage to demonstrate her pride at the wedding, she embraces it, maintaining her dignity in the face of the gender and culture challenges she confronted. Her denial transforms from a denunciation of her cultural roots, to a refusal to admit the tragic nature of being a young mother without a “money tree,” essentially, to the tragedy of becoming the opposite of what she had for so long planned to be.

Is Ro’s denial admirable? As she stands “erect” in the courthouse, ignoring the very things she had declared would never be at her wedding, do you see her as immature in her denial, or brave in the preservation of her pride?