Tuesday Scribblings
The October 3rd edition of thoughts & commentary on seemingly random things
Back story: a few weeks ago, I started Tuesday Scribblings, a regular post for the thoughts & commentary on the personal, regional, and global events and stories that are rattling around in my brain. Paid subscribers get access to more personal stories at the end of the post.
For unknown reasons I didn’t write this week’s post earlier in the day, or draft anything yesterday. Well, I say “unknown” when I know damn well I was procrastinating about writing. I didn’t even journal this morning and I started a new one this week, and there are few things more exciting to me than cracking open a new journal, taking a big whiff of the paper, and sitting down to write using one of my favorite pens. Instead I faffed about online, had an iced coffee, played my usual games on the NY Times app, did a short workout.
It’s okay to not force yourself to write when you’re not feeling it, or to take a day off to reflect and recharge. I am one of those writers who hates the term writer’s block because I refuse to see myself as blocked. It’s all semantics, and sometimes the words for the essay or story I want to complete aren’t flowing but they are for another story or essay, so I follow the flow. I often wish for a device that would plug into a port in my skull and transcribe all the witty sentences and ideas floating around in my brain so that I can later review them in a Word document and decide what’s worth pursuing. Instead I have 2 or 3 notebooks around with random scribblings on story ideas, character traits, quotes, scenes, and the like.
What I want to write about today is the Lyft driver I had on Sunday on the way to Pops’ house. Taiwo* greeted me when I got in the car and we talked for the 20 minute ride. Well, he talked and I listened. He told me that he purchased a dashcam because he’d had several instances of unruly passengers who put his job in jeopardy. The stories he shared were appalling examples of how badly behaved some folks are. Then Taiwo told me he was 66 years old and had moved to the States from Nigeria at the age of 60. There hadn’t been enough opportunities in his homeland and he wanted to make money, become a U.S. citizen, and eventually retire back in Nigeria. Taiwo got his citizenship last year and works several jobs. “I have many bills here,” he said. “When I go back to my home, I won’t have as many.”
To become an immigrant at 60 is a huge leap of faith. I often fantasize about becoming an ex-pat in France when I’m 80 and living with my friend Emily and her husband; we’ll grumble at each other in Franglish about our aches and pains, and Emily’s kids will take care of us. But I know what to expect in that situation, and I’ll be with loved ones. Not knowing what lies ahead when crossing an ocean to start over is scary, and yet millions of people have done it for millions of years.
On Saturday I finished reading The Farm, a novel by Joanne Ramos about a surrogacy farm, the woman who runs it, and the impregnated women who stay there until they deliver their babies for the anonymous wealthy families who’ve paid for the use of their wombs. One of my favorite writers, Lyz Lenz, chose this novel for an online book club over at her Substack, and because Lyz writes powerful prose about women, reproductive rights, and politics, I knew this would be a novel worth reading and the discussion on her Substack would be lively. The novel is a compelling, thought-provoking commentary on class, feminism, and capitalism, but without ever being heavy-handed about these topics. It reminded me of “Orphan Black,” The Handmaid’s Tale, and even The Stepford Wives.
While the discussion over on Lyz’s Substack was indeed lively, I often felt like there wasn’t much mention of the immigrant’s experience in America, as told through the novel’s chapters about Jane, a young Filipino woman who becomes a surrogate at Golden Oaks (aka The Farm) when she runs out of options for work, and Ate, Jane’s cousin, an experienced baby nurse who is always hustling to make more money. It seemed clear to me from the first few chapters that Jane’s fear of being alone and unable to care for her young daughter motivated her to agree to a risky job that would take her away from her child for nearly a year, because as a relatively new immigrant, what other choices did she have? Ate, however, had been in the U.S. a long time and had extensive experience in working with rich white people, as well as upper class Filipino-Americans, so she was on a higher rung than Jane—and yet she wasn’t in the eyes of the rich people she works for. Mae, the CEO of Golden Oaks, is Chinese-American and while her father struggled as an immigrant, she doesn’t share that experience: she’s got a wealthy fiancé and an enviable job that grants her prestige and power. She doesn’t want any of it to disappear and she’s more than willing to keep the Hosts (Golden Oaks’s name for the surrogate mothers) in line if it means she’ll rise up in the ranks.
When I got into Taiwo’s car on Sunday, and heard his stories about working and living in America, and why he came over here, I thought about all the stories I’ve read and heard from immigrants, and the truth I saw reflected in the fictional characters of The Farm. How the land of opportunity can turn into the land of the opportunistic for someone who is new to the U.S. and forced to take work where they are prone to being debased and belittled. That even if you are brave enough to make the States your new home, you may never know what it’s like to live in the land of the free because of the color of your skin and your country of origin.
I’ll never know what the 21st century immigrant’s experience is truly like. I have to rely on the stories they tell me and the world about who they are, where they came from, what they want for themselves and their families. I have to give them the space to tell those stories, and I have to listen to them carefully, with an open mind and open heart.