Forgive me for going off-topic. Or maybe that's a good thing, I don't know. "Just brown enough to count." A thread.

My ethnicity is a constant question, and it's so unbelievably frustrating. I can't tell you how often I'm asked if I'm "diverse". What's your "background"? What's your "mix"? Personally and professionally, people feel entitled to put me in a box for their own comfort.

As an actor, 95% of the time I sit in a waiting room of "diverse" peers. The women of my age group that until recently, are accustomed to primarily reading for "satellite characters". Until recently, we rarely ever read for the lead.

For the majority of my career, I was too brown for no.1 on the call sheet. Finally ( fantastically and thankfully ) the industry started to tell underrepresented stories. Now I'm often told I'm too white.

When people ask "what's your mix?" they don't actually want to know your "mix", they want to know which ingredient isn't white. I am British. What's my "Mix"? My Grandad was born in India.

In the same week, I was told I was too white to read for one role and too "diverse" to read for another. I once lost the same job twice before finally booking it ( as the third recast ) later finding out my questionable "diversity" had been a huge roadblock.

I read for a role that was open to all ethnicities, and after I was cast they gave the character an Indian name. When the show aired someone commented that I took a role from an Indian actress. The role wasn't Indian until I was cast.

The year before, I booked a "satellite character" during pilot season. Two other actors from one of my social circles also booked shows. A few of the actors that didn't, said the reason we three did, was because we were "diverse".

I hate feeling I should wear my genetic makeup as a badge 2 define my value. Like I'm supposed to pimp out 1/4 of myself. I feel like I don't have the right to Identify as a woman of color whilst simultaneously not being accepted as anything else. Like I don't belong to anything.

We live in a world that is so demanding of racial identity while becoming more and more blended. As a huge advocate for underrepresented communities, all I want to do is jump on a soapbox and fight the good fight. I can do that clearly for others.

But when it's for me...I feel discrimination, but I don't have a box to stand on. They called my Mum "Black Jack" when she was a kid.When I was a kid I remember them telling her to "go back to her own country". Words like "Paki" made me afraid to identify with my Indian heritage.

My Grandad passed away when I was young. My whole family makes "Grandads Curry" but I've never worn a Sari. I remember him speaking different Indian dialects, watching a homemade Chapati on the stove, enormous dinners with friends...tables and tables of beautiful colorful food...

But I don't feel a deep connection with Indian culture. My Irish Catholic Nan was the boss... She made the home, and her daughter made mine. As I get older, I get more curious about my roots but I want to grip onto them for the right reasons.

I've been fortunate to celebrate the last four years in great company. My husband is a series regular on @OneDayAtATime. The latinx community is joy, and warmth and strength and power. When I sit in a room with my friends, surrounded by their peers, I feel their sense of home.

The entertainment Latinx community is a family. I'm a fly on the wall watching the celebration of who they are. Their right to belong. I so badly want that...But after suggestions of taking roles from Indian actors, I worry how deserving I am to stand in the Indian community?

While white friends sit at dinner discussing "diverse actors" taking their jobs. Which job is mine for the taking? When do the years and years of hard work and grit become the reason I was hired? When do I earn my right to anything?

So there's your answer. About my "mix". I'm anxious up to my throat typing this. Will I lose work? Am I unintentionally disrespectful or offensive? Is it really "all relative" or should I be paying more attention to the fact that people are dying while I'm "posting a tweet."

I think I'm typing because it weighs on me. Does anyone else feel like me? Can we be proud of our identity, without being forced to identify? I dunno, sometimes twitter is healing and I've got a hole in my pocket folks. Anyone got a little spackle? :-)

Grandad.