The week of September 7 to 13 is one that renews annually my fascination with the stories of immigration, identity construction, and American multiculturalism. Not exactly "how to pack for your weekend in Milan in 7 easy steps!" Or "but really, can I wear shorts in Paris?" but nonetheless a series of questions that define and encourage my passion for exploring the corners near and far of this planet we call home.
This past Friday I had to go to OFII, the French immigration office, for a long awaited appointment to say "hey France, I'm here!" And for them to say "yea, yea, we know, but first you have to have a medical exam." Most of my anxiety for the exchange was based on my series of horrible experiences at the French embassy in NY where I mostly felt like I was in a YouTube web series that was steryotyping the French or realizing a series of nightmares. Let's just say it wasn't exactly pleasant. But despite its windowless waiting rooms and topless x-rays and impatient employees, the whole OFII process was surprisingly efficient and organized. That may be because everyone was waiting, stewing in their own anxiety about when the frenchness of it all would come to bite them in the ass. But it could also be because we were just a group of étrangers who wanted to take care of this formality and continue living in France.
I couldn't help but think of Ellis Island. Huge halls bursting with immigrants. After my eye exam I probably would have received my pink chalk x on my coat and been sent back to die alone in Poland. But that wasn't the only difference. Because when I think of Ellis Island I think of my great grandparents, not because they necessarily came through Ellis island, but because they immigrated to the U.S. and had my grandparents, who worked hard and lived well, and they had my parents, who were the first in their families to graduate from 4 year college, who have also worked hard so that I can get somewhere they haven't been. And I chose back to Europe, where they have literally been, but I think figuratively you see what I'm getting at. And I am the first to admit that this linear American dream excludes millions of Americans, for millions of well researched and documented reasons ranging from housing laws to hiring practices to lending policies, but to me it feels like a very real and personal part of my history. Which was particularly strange as I sat in this waiting room that made me think I might be in a holding port on an alien planet 1000 years in the future, that kindly took on the remaining humans after we had used up all of our resources and our hosts were now evaluating the refugees for the extent of their radiation poisoning.
Despite its innacuracy, the divide for me has been past v. future, racist v. multicultural, my parents' world v. my world, suspicion v. understanding. And I think this is probably an appropriately idealistic division of realms for a 23 year old living in Paris off of 4 years in California off of a childhood in a liberal household in NJ. I want to believe that the worst is over and the best is yet to come, for me but also for the world.
I had my book club this past Monday, and in a stroke of fateful coincidence we had read "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," which naturally gave way to a discussion of 9/11 and the detail that I was the only person present who had been in the U.S. at the time. I grew up in New Jersey, a neighbor of New York but I never would or could claim to be a New Yorker. But my mom was working at South Street Seaport September 11, 2001. She took the PATH to the trade center from Jersey city every morning and took it home every night. I was in fifth grade at the time and was deemed too young (as was my entire school) to be told what had happened by someone who wasn't my guardian. So I have three very distinct memories of that day:
1. My teacher being pulled out mid morning and coming back in pretty upset due to unknown causes which later became very clear
2. Running into my house after school and finding both of my parents home, but more specifically my Mom. This was bizarre. I can count the number of times my mom was home when I got home from school on a seal's fingers. Something was clearly wrong.
3. And amid the endless news coverage, replaying the same videos and pictures and clips I remember seeing a line of nurses and physicians waiting at ER entrances for victims who would never come.
These are unoriginal, but specific enough to satisfy me. What I found far more interesting were the perspectives of the other 20 people in my book group who hadn't been there, who had watched from afar. And what was remarkable to me (as I think I may overcorrect the issue of American arrogance to a fault) is that they cared. They told me that the world had perceived America as being untouchable. That it was horrible. And in my response to the book's connection between Dresden, Hiroshima, and Manhattan (my concern being that perhaps this was the author's way of saying you can only kill so many civilians before it gets back to you) a particularly insightful reader and woman responded "no." "No, that's not right. They were all just civilians. And that's never right. That's never deserved. That's never 'what's coming to you.'" Which, in the divide between past and future, I hope we can hold more steadfastly to going forward. But, in not sure that we did. Immediately following 9/11 there was so much hatred, fueled by xenophobia and aimless fear, towards Arab Americans. It didn't really matter what their religion was or where their family came from or how many generations of their families had been natural born citizens of the United States of America, only that they were different and dangerous. It was the most thorough racism that I think I'll ever see. And take note that in my immediate response, my clearest memories, and I suspect this is true of many many people, it was the shock of the event, trauma on a human level, that grabbed us. It was only injected with venomous politics in the after math.
And now, in some basic, minimal way, the tables have turned. I am the stranger in a strange land, one without any history of hospitality towards outsiders, or even towards insiders. I am in the place of my great grandparents, but with an escape hatch. I am in the place of so many citizens after 9/11, confined to a box because of my loaded nationality, with the obvious improvement of aggression towards me being slighted and more subtle. And yet, I don't find myself craving home.
Last Sunday I went to see Le Magicien d'OZ at a revival movie theatre and was surprised by the message that eluded me as a child. Before heading home to wake up from her fever dream Dorothy proves to Glinda she has learned her lesson by saying, "Well, I - I think that it - it wasn't enough to just want to see Uncle Henry and Auntie Em - and it's that - if I ever go looking for my heart's desire again, I won't look any further than my own back yard. Because if it isn't there, I never really lost it to begin with! Is that right?" And with a release date of August 25, 1939 I suppose this opinion make sense. What could be better than the good 'ol US of A? Why would anyone want to leave? But to stretch this deeply isolationist dictum 75 years into the future would be a great disservice, to the individual and to the world. First of all, Dorothy never would have learned her meaningful lesson and just generally gotten her shit together sitting on the couch in Kansas. And second of all, by heading to OZ with her earthly knowledge bordering on magical, she is able to rid them of their public enemy #1. So I can't help but be pleased with my choice to head to the emerald city in search of a way home, not as much to return, because my friends at United could help with that, but to understand it better. And I'm keeping an eye out for buckets of water.
