"I really hope you don't think I was snooping, Sonia, but I couldn't help noticing that letter in your wastebasket ..."

"It's just junk mail from some club. They want you to pay for membership, and then they want more money for some trinket engraved with your name. What a scam!"

Felice now looked more embarra.s.sed than ever as she tried to explain that Phi Beta Kappa was totally legitimate. More than legitimate, in fact: an honor of such prestige that she insisted I had to accept the membership even if she had to pay for it. Felice was not only exceptionally kind and generous; as the daughter of two college professors, she knew all the ins and outs of academia and had guided me through many such blind spots. After four years at Princeton, I thought I knew the terrain pretty well, but every once in a while, even as a senior, I'd hear about something that made me feel like a freshman. I wasn't going to take Felice's money, but I did take her advice.

Something similar had happened not long before. I was asleep when the phone rang; the voice on the other end said it was Adele Simmons, dean of student affairs, calling to congratulate me on having won the Pyne Prize. You'd have thought it was Publishers Clearing House from the excitement in her voice describing this honor I'd never heard of, obviously not paying attention to it in The Daily Princetonian, but inferring it was important from her tone, I found the presence of mind to express how astonished and grateful I was. It wasn't until after I hung up and dialed Felice's number that I got a full briefing on the Moses Taylor Pyne Honor Prize. It seemed I would have to give a speech at an alumni luncheon where the award was presented. Felice and I were already into a discussion of appropriate attire, and planning a shopping trip, when she let drop the most important detail: "It's the highest award that a graduating senior can receive."

I had not shopped for clothes seriously since the day I acquired my going-to-Princeton raincoat, which was now eligible for retirement. My complete wardrobe fit in one laundry bag, easy to carry home on the bus. It consisted of three pairs of dungarees, one pair of period plaid pants, and an a.s.sortment of interchangeable tops. When my summer job demanded a more professional look, I managed to avoid the problem by wearing a hospital uniform. Felice and her mother took me to Macy's and helped me pick out a gorgeous suit for fifty dollars. It was the most expensive outfit I'd ever worn, but to judge by how I felt wearing it, it was a good investment.

The gymnasium was transformed by tables dressed in white linen, flatware, and flowers. The crowd was vast-alumni, professors, and deans, all abuzz with greetings and congratulations, their hands extended, smiling broadly, gla.s.ses raised. A part of me still felt uncertainty-or was it disbelief?-about all this fanfare and how to take it, but there was no denying that whatever it meant, it felt great. I had worked hard, and the work paid off. I had not disappointed.

Among the recent graduates were those who, as women or as other minorities, had already altered that old image of a Princeton alumnus long cherished by some. There were friends who had graduated a year or two ahead of me, like Margarita Rosa, who came down from Harvard Law School for the occasion. Others were only names to me until that day. Nearly every living Hispanic who had ever graduated from Princeton showed up, overflowing with pride and camaraderie, for what amounted to a triumphant reunion. My family, of course, was there en ma.s.se, Mami sitting there with a dazed smile that burst into beams of happy recognition with each friend or acquaintance who came over to congratulate her. My own face was sore from all the grinning.

The vault of the gymnasium and the blank scoreboard were a distant frame, filled with the upturned faces of many hundreds of strangers. This was the view as I took to the podium to give my speech, stricken with the usual bout of nerves. With the exception of our small cl.u.s.ter of "Third World" friends and family, the faces were uniformly white. It was a fitting reminder of what I was doing up there. The Pyne Prize, often shared by two students, recognizes excellent scholarship but also leadership that provides "effective support of the best interests of Princeton University." My efforts on the Discipline Committee had been a significant factor in my award, but so had my work with Accion Puertorriquena and the Third World Center, which Princeton recognized as a benefit not merely to the few dozen student members of those organizations but to the broader community as well. The dynamism of any diverse community depends not only on the diversity itself but on promoting a sense of belonging among those who formerly would have been considered and felt themselves outsiders. The greater purpose of these groups had not been self-exile or special pleading. It had been to foster a connection between the old Princeton and the new, a mutual acceptance without which the body as a whole could not thrive or evolve.

This was the work not of one person but of a community: y Amigos. And in my speech I wanted to acknowledge that collaboration, as well as bow to those among the newest alumni, like Margarita Rosa, who, walking in shoes very much like my own, had cleared a path for me to follow in.

"The people I represent are diverse in their opinions, cultures, and experiences. However, we are united by a common bond. We are attempting to exist distinctly within the rich Princeton tradition, without the tension of having our ident.i.ties constantly challenged and without the frustrations of isolation. In different ways and in different styles, some loudly and others quietly, Princeton's minorities have created a milieu in which I could act and see the efforts accepted. In this way, today's award belongs to those with whom I have worked to make Princeton realize that it contains groups which are distinct and honorable in their own traditions.

"However, Princeton's acceptance of our existence and thoughts is only a first step. The challenge to both myself and Princeton is to go beyond a simple recognition. I hope today marks the beginning of a new era for all of us: a new era in which Princeton's traditions can be further enriched by being broadened to accommodate and harmonize with the beat of those of us who march to different drummers."

Looking out at that crowd, I imagined those who had not yet arrived, minority students who, in years to come, would make this mult.i.tude of faces, the view from where I now stood, a little more various. If they could have heard me, I would have confided in them: As you discover what strength you can draw from your community in this world from which it stands apart, look outward as well as inward. Build bridges instead of walls.

SPRING EASED into summer, exams and final papers were wrapped up, my thesis review completed. Graduation brought one last unfamiliar laurel when Peter Winn called me into his office to tell me that I would graduate summa c.u.m laude. Once again, facing the pleasure with which this news was delivered, I didn't have the heart to inquire what it meant; for now it was enough that I should act very glad and honored. When I'd finally looked up the translation of the Latin phrase, the irony of my needing to do so was not lost on me. It was perhaps then I made a measure of peace with my unease: the uncertainty I'd always felt at Princeton was something I'd never shake entirely. For all the As and honors that could be bestowed, there would still lurk such moments of estrangement to remind me that my being there was not typical but an exception.

I marched out of Na.s.sau Gate with my cla.s.smates in a final ritual of return to the real world, knowing that I was headed back to the Ivy League for law school at Yale in the fall. Meanwhile, a summer job doing research in the Office of Social Responsibility at the Equitable Life a.s.surance Society in Manhattan would provide my first glimpse inside corporate America. It was, to say the least, a letdown: I was shocked at how much time presumably productive people were capable of wasting. It was similar to what I'd observed the summer before, working in New York City's Department of Consumer Affairs, only stranger perhaps, considering it was a business with the aim of making money.

Junior by then had graduated from Cardinal Spellman and completed the first year of a program at NYU that would lead to medical school. He hadn't grown up with dreams of becoming a doctor. His ambition at that stage of life was only to do something different from whatever I was doing, to find his own path out from under my shadow. Though our constant bickering had mellowed by then, and mutual respect prevailed, each of us was too involved in his or her own life to pay much attention to the other's. But in a bind we would always turn to each other first, and given the experience that we alone shared, not much would need to be said. Family was family.

The big event for ours that summer was the wedding. That Kevin and I would eventually marry had been a given ever since the day I introduced him to Abuelita. With hindsight I can see how unexamined that certainty was. I had long mapped out a hypothetical route to marriage at the age of twenty-eight, which had less to do with the reality of my relationship with Kevin than with a desire to avoid the mistakes of others. My aunts had married at fourteen or fifteen, my cousins at eighteen. I was going to do things in the right order and finish my education first. But with the prospect of my beginning law school at Yale, and Kevin's own plans for grad school still up in the air, it seemed sensible that he should move to New Haven with me. In our world that couldn't have happened without our getting married.

My mother and I had radically different views of what the wedding would be like. My vision was frugal, modest, and practical. Hers was extravagant. Her own wedding had consisted of a visit to city hall and dinner at Abuelita's. She had not walked down the aisle, and therefore I had to. We battled over every detail, and she wasn't above playing dirty. If I crossed someone's name off the list in an effort to trim the numbers, she'd find an opportunity for us to run into that person and mention, to my well-masked dismay, that the invitation was in the mail.

Once I recognized that this whole production had more to do with her needs than mine, I resigned myself to simply getting it done as painlessly as possible. I scoured the city for the cheapest ways to furnish the essential elements. The prices horrified me, each piece of the fairy tale seeming a bigger rip-off than the last.

"I'm not spending hundreds of dollars on a dress that I'll only wear once. I'm just not doing it!"

"So what are you going to wear, Sonia?"

How many times could we repeat that exchange? Elisa was my savior. She was an old friend and neighbor of my mother's from the Bronxdale Houses and also a seamstress. It had been a while since I'd gone back to the projects after our move to Co-op City, and I was stunned by how tiny and cramped the rooms seemed when we visited Elisa. I drew a diagram, a simple A-line dress. "That's all I want." I could see the horror rising in Mami's eyes like water in a sinking boat.

"It's too plain. You have to make it fancier!"

"It's my wedding! You've decided everything else!" I couldn't believe we were fighting so shamelessly in front of Elisa, but she handled it with a skill that hinted at plenty of prior mother-daughter experience.

"Sonia, we can keep it simple and still make it elegant with a little beadwork here and here ..."

And so, with help from friends and family, gradually the plans came together. Junior was still working as a sacristan at St. Patrick's, and it was one of the privileges allowed employees that they could arrange to have wedding ma.s.ses for family celebrated at the cathedral. Through his job selling insurance, Alfred had a client with a limousine rental service who gave him a spectacular discount on three antique Rolls-Royces.

Marguerite, who had remained a close friend since high school, was my maid of honor. She graciously volunteered to host the bridal shower, but it was not such a simple proposition given that we were all New Yorkers, among whom a.s.sumptions and traditions run deep and are as varied as the places we come from. Would it be tea sandwiches and punch for ladies only on a Sunday afternoon? Or rum and real food and dancing on a Sat.u.r.day night, with the men of course invited too. Somewhere equidistant from Poland, Germany, Ireland, and Puerto Rico we negotiated a path.

"Sonia, what are we going to do about los regalos?" Mami looked seriously worried. The gifts she was concerned about were those rather risque items traditionally given a bride, who is a.s.sumed to be innocent and in need of instruction about the wedding night. Along with these oddities, there are of course practical gifts: the toaster, the vacuum cleaner, and other household necessities. Typically, the women arrive early for the giving of the gifts; the men don't need to know about such things. Asking my aunts and cousins to abandon this custom was not an option. It would have been seen as disrespectful, and anyway they wouldn't have listened. The best we could do was contain the danger of Irish sensibilities being scandalized by Nuyorican humor: we would deploy a strategic seating arrangement and various other diversionary tactics as the boxes were pa.s.sed around for inspection.

The Puerto Rican idea of a registry was for the bride's aunts to check in with her mother to see whether they could help to furnish anything needed for the wedding itself. t.i.ti Gloria, for example, took me shopping for a gorgeous pair of silver shoes to match my dress. The traditions in a modest Irish family like Kevin's were not so different. At the wedding, people gave cash in substantial amounts. That was how a young couple could be expected to pay for the party, as it was their obligation to do, and also start a new life.

ON THE BIG DAY, I was woken and dragged out of bed by a gang of women bent on getting an early start at the beautification effort. They were yakking nonstop, also running my mother through her own preparations, just one step ahead of mine.

"Celina, get out of the shower now!"

"You want the hair first or the makeup first?"

"Ay! Who took the iron?"

I felt like a mannequin pa.s.sed from hand to hand, until at the very end, when, with the cars already downstairs, their engines idling, I finally got a word in edgewise. We had forgotten one very important thing: I needed to eat something and have a shot of insulin. My mother froze in panic: whatever she had in the kitchen had disappeared in the comings and goings. So my cousin Tony ran to the diner across the street to get a turkey sandwich. I gave myself the shot and devoured the sandwich with a towel for a bib as the roomful of women screamed at me not to get mustard on the dress. With that, we were off.

At the church, Kevin was waiting, dressed in a rented but very fashionable beige tuxedo, beaming proudly. Marguerite showed me the sugar cubes she'd tucked into her bouquet, a.s.suring me that the maid of honor would be sticking very close by in case the bride suffered any drops in blood glucose. I was especially thrilled to see my cousin Milly arriving with her husband, Jim, and her mother, Elena. They were yet another family of Mami's brother Mayo, and when they had first arrived from Puerto Rico, before I was born, they had come to live with Mami and Papi. I rarely saw them anymore, because they lived upstate, but they were very dear to me. It was Milly, a champion at dominoes, who finally taught me to play. With them beside me, my wedding felt like one of those parties from my childhood that I missed so much.

And so it would be: after the ceremony in the Lady Chapel, we danced into the wee hours at a wedding hall in Queens, along with a dozen other nuptial parties in neighboring rooms. We ended the night by tossing frugality to the wind and splurging on a room at the Hotel St. Moritz overlooking Central Park. I was happy to sign the register as Sonia Sotomayor de Noonan. Room service was closed by the time we checked in, and I was starving; the banquet fare had left much to be desired. Kevin walked several blocks in the rain on a chivalrous quest for a greasy hamburger with cold fries.

Inside the room, Kevin opened the last of the wedding gift envelopes. It was a handful of quaaludes, compliments of his buddies at Stony Brook. I gave him a look of horror and insisted he flush them down the toilet.

"I should just give them back to the guys," he demurred. "They're worth a lot of money."

But I wasn't having it. I watched as he shook the pills into the bowl, muttering, "Man, they would kill me if they could see this."

All told, having a real wedding wasn't as bad as I'd feared, although it didn't increase my taste for such extravagance. I still tell all my cousins-and every bride-to-be I know-skip the pageant and take the money instead. n.o.body listens.

CHAPTER Nineteen

IF OUR DECISION to get married was essentially unexamined-it was what couples like us were expected to do-we were hardly more reflective about the marriage once inside it. We simply set about playing house, which seemed a natural enough extension of our companionable coexistence before exchanging vows. Like me, Kevin was young when he'd lost his father. Neither of us had observed particularly inspiring models of married life, TV sitcoms providing what baseline we had. If we'd thought about it, we might have imagined ourselves among the more progressive of those exemplars, this season's new series, in which the couple share the housework and the financial burdens, taking turns supporting each other through grad school.

Kevin's own plans were still uncertain. He was applying to medical schools while also contemplating a research track in science. Law appealed to him too; we had taken the LSAT together, he getting the higher score. He was intellectually equipped for any path he might have chosen, but the gears hadn't yet meshed to drive him forward. So in the meantime, he took a job as a laboratory a.s.sistant in the biology department, and I picked up one in the mimeograph room of the law school. A full scholarship covered my tuition, so all we needed was money to live on.

We scoured New Haven for something affordable in an unthreatening neighborhood, finally finding a small apartment in what was once a boardinghouse on Whitney Avenue, a mile from campus. Our landlord betrayed a not very high opinion of lawyers, so I let Kevin do the talking. Home was a living room with a built-in storage chest that doubled as a couch; there was a real bedroom, separate from the living room, and a tiny cubbyhole of a kitchen. We loved that place and would keep it for the three years I was at Yale. Though furnished entirely with hand-me-downs, it never lost the glow of a first home, the sweet mix of nesting and independence.

Kevin decided that we needed a dog to complete our nuclear family, and Star was the much-loved addition. He was a tiny, camel-colored greyhound mutt with steel springs for legs and a pa.s.sion for chewing. The very first sacrifice to his toothy enthusiasm was my wedding shoes, that pair of gorgeous silver sandals that t.i.ti Gloria had spent an unthinkable fortune on. Well, they were wretchedly uncomfortable the one night I wore them, anyway.

The housework, as I said, was a team effort. I handed Kevin my paychecks, and he paid the bills. I dusted and made the bed; Kevin mopped the floors. He washed the clothes; I ironed them. I did most of the shopping and cooking; he did the dishes. I learned how to boil an egg, and much more, from the Joy of Cooking. When in doubt, I phoned Mrs. Gudewicz, Marguerite's mother. One time I found turkey drumsticks on sale for pennies a pound, and she helped me wrangle them long-distance. Every few months, Marguerite and her boyfriend and future husband, Tom, would come for a weekend visit, always with a care package of quality meat we couldn't have afforded. Marguerite's mother was a second mother to me, and nothing says "we believe in you" like a New York sirloin.

YALE LAW SCHOOL WAS and is uniquely small among the top law schools in the country. There were only about 180 in our cla.s.s. The numbers reflect not only highly selective admissions but also a commitment to fostering a supportive environment on a human scale. Not surprisingly, I found myself surrounded by the most brilliant, dazzlingly articulate, and hard-charging people I'd ever met. Many were entering the field having already established stellar reputations doing something else. There were PhDs in philosophy, economics, math, and physics. We had writers, a doctor, a film critic, an opera singer, not to mention several Rhodes scholars in our cla.s.s. It would have been even more daunting if we could have known at the time that the cla.s.s of 1979 would go on to extraordinary success even by the school's extraordinary standards: so many members are now deans and professors at top law schools, federal and state judges, or otherwise in the highest echelons of government or practice. I'm told that this rarefied company made everyone feel as insecure as I did, but that would be difficult to verify.