Claire Rosinkranz grew up in South Florida, the daughter of a Cuban father and a Brazilian mother. She was five years old when her parents separated and she and her brother were sent to live with her grandparents in Chicago, Illinois. At that time, according to Claire, they were not allowed to speak Portuguese and they could not read nor write Spanish. Her grandparents made all of the necessary arrangements for Claire’s educational needs, but she remembers that her parents never mentioned anything about being American. This has left Claire with a very confused and often contradictory view of her past.
Growing up, Claire identified as female, but this was a result of being assigned female at school, and also because her biological parents never identified as American. As an adult, she had already come to terms with both her nationality and gender, but she struggled throughout her professional and personal life trying to find a sense of herself. As it turns out, Claire’s story is not unlike many others, but she did have a sense of identity crisis even during the early parts of her adulthood. While she never married and had children, the confusion over her nationality and gender continued to affect her relationships for the most part.
Claire is now a freelance writer living in New York City. She describes herself as “a little bit of a tomboy” but she knows she is really an American by birth. Her story offers an interesting insight into the confusion and contradictions we face throughout our lives as we move from our childhood to our adulthood. It is interesting to note that throughout her youth, Claire never fully fit the typical “American” mold. Instead, she was a scrappy, independent woman with an enormous passion for writing, who became a writer in order to make a living.