Americas, of course, but in other distant parts of the world, too, producing a mixture of descendants. Today, the term Hispanic is typically applied to the varied populations of these places as well.

It's kind of like modern-day kid's soccer. No winners or losers--everyone gets a trophy. If you can spell Hispanic, or have acquired a Spanish-sounding last name through marriage, or you bought one on e-Bay, you get a sticker.

When my parents and grandparents moved to California from Albuquerque, it wasn't because the Golden State was giving away free stuff. It was because there was ample work to be found, money to be made, and more opportunities for a better life for their children and grandchildren.

My maternal grandparents managed apartment buildings in West Los Angeles back in the early 1960s. I remember seeing my grandmother washing windows and my grandfather standing on a ladder painting walls in a recently vacated apartment. Grandma collected the rents and did all the bookkeeping and cleaning. Grandpa was the handyman. At Christmastime, he worked every extra hour he had at a local tree farm. The only time he relaxed was on Sunday afternoons, when he'd watch the Dodgers on television or, if the team was home, take the bus to the stadium and buy a seat in the pavilion. And Grandma kept busy cooking, mending, and making home-made (from scratch!) tortillas.

Come Sunday morning, these hard-working individuals who never took anything for granted or never expected anything from anyone they didn't earn would don their best outfits--he in a suit, she with her gloves and hat--and walk to Mass. They were not rich, they never owned a car, and yet they were so very grateful for all of God's blessings bestowed on them. Now that's something to be proud of.

My paternal grandmother in New Mexico raised four children on her own, the youngest my father. Grandma Reyes worked three jobs to keep her family fed, and she instilled in Dad the values of self-reliance and hard work. When she found out he was smoking as a teenager, she told him, "Just be sure you can pay for them with money you earn honestly." That's when he started working as a caddie at the Albuquerque Country Club, beginning a lifelong love for the game of golf. A love I share.

My heritage is not our family shares from the 17th-century Atrisco Land Grant, handed down from generation to generation. Nor is it the house my parents worked so hard to buy 50-plus years ago, where my mother lived until the day she died. It isn't even all the magnificent turquoise jewelry I inherited from her and my grandmother.

My heritage--and my pride in it--stems from the sum of my character taken from the very best of all my past relatives. It is the blood spilled