The Alien in My Guest Room: An Immigration Story
Part 4: Working for that Yankee Dollar
For three days, Fernando has not left the house. When we went grocery shopping, he jumped every time he saw a police car or even anyone in a security guard uniform. I felt it was important to tell him that Trump was threatening massive raids on undocumented migrants, and though that has not yet come to pass (and anyway, Fernando is a legally documented asylum seeker) he is clearly nervous. I assured him he was safe in our home; that he should never open the door for anyone who doesn’t already have key; that he has the right to remain silent, even with ICE; and if he is stopped by anyone with a badge, he should sign nothing and learn one word in English: “Lawyer.”
But he needs to get out and breathe the open air of Los Angeles. It may not be clean, but it is free. I called my neighbor Melody and we arranged to meet at the foot of a nearby park, with an easy hike that takes you up to an expansive overlook, from the ocean to the Hollywood sign and beyond.
Mel brought her 20-year-old son and we four started up the path. I was pleasantly surprised that she speaks quite good Spanish (I knew her son had some fluency). Fernando and Mel’s son chatted about how pretty Los Angeles girls are. When we got away from cars and signs and people, and into hawk and bunny habitat, Fernando’s face started to shine. Food for the soul.
Once on the top, he saw that there was a direct way down: a steep flight of stairs that acts as an open community gym, with people moving up and down like ants hard at work. He wanted to return that way. Mel, who is wiser than I in many matters, bid us farewell and returned via the easier route, with her son. Though I had agreed to the stairs, my hips did not appreciate the exercise. I did my middle-aged best, but we had to finished our descent winding through yellow wildflowers.
The next day we had a compulsory excursion: my Jewish community is changing homes, and we had to move out the items from our old storage area. “Old” is the operative word: among the questionable treasures we unearthed was a vintage projector with a brass tag reading, “Gift of the Class of ’62.” (I looked it up on eBay — it’s not worth anything.) As a chair of the organization, I was able to exercise nepotism and bring in Fernanado as hired muscle. Good thing, too: the rest of us ranged in age from 40s to 70s, plus one mom with her infant in tow. Emily and her boyfriend joined us: three strong spines.
When the first truck was loaded, Fernando said he felt okay to go to the new space with one of my co-chairs and Emily’s friend. I stayed and helped sort through the astonishing piles of stuff that somehow emerged from the storage unit like clowns exiting a circus car. The two-hour job turned into five, and Fernando worked constantly and cheerfully with people whose Spanish is as limited as his English. When I paid him in cash, he tried to tell me it was not necessary.
At home, Fernando makes his bed every day, does his own laundry, sets the dinner table, puts used plates in the dishwasher (a novelty to him, to be sure — he didn’t realize we don’t run it every time there’s a dirty dish), and takes out the trash without being asked. (This last almost made me cry.) Hermes sets an example for contemporary Latin manhood by cooking several days a week and always cleaning up after dinner. Fernando has never left the toilet seat up or a towel on the floor. He looks for ways to help: he sharpened all our knives, saying it was easier than maintaining his machete. I asked him who taught him to be so very civilized (I think I used the phrase “bien educado,” or well educated), and he gave credit to his mom. In that, at least, she did a great job. Emily assures me she’d behave that way if she were in someone else’s house.
Fernando has applied for a Social Security number and a work permit, which hopefully will come through within a couple of weeks. We introduced him to our gardener of more than 20 years, a living example of the American Dream: an honest and industrious Mexican immigrant who, through decades of hard work, has been able to buy himself a little horse farm and send his daughters to college. He said when the work permit comes through he will hook Fernando up with one of his gardener friends who is looking for help.
Fernando likes the idea of gardening, and looks around constantly for other work opportunities as well. Passing a construction site, he asks how to become a carpenter. (Lucky for us my sister is a retired union carpenter and can answer that question.) What about driving those big trucks? (Not a good career choice with driverless vehicles on the horizon.) I see he wants to use his body to work hard, not be enclosed in an office or restaurant or store.
This is who Emma Lazarus meant when she invited “your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free” into this nation of immigrants and their descendants. I know I am falling off my soapbox and into a river of cliché, but some clichés have truth behind them. It is people like Fernando who make America great.
Next: The ICE Check-in