The Invisible Bride
In Najla’s kitchen the other day, Najla, while preparing dinner for me and a couple of friends who hadn’t arrived yet, reminded me that it’s foolish for me to not consider marrying Wael, a journalist friend of hers from back home who wants U.S. citizenship so bad he’ll pay me enough to make the whole venture worth my time.
I don’t believe that marriage should be a business – least of all an illegal one. It’s something very serious, very emotional and I’ve told her this every time she’s brought it up. She always gets quiet immediately afterwards as if I’m being holier than thou and need to get real – but the other day, she said something that offended me:
“You’re lucky. You were born here.”
I know that Najla is very proud of her cultural and national origins. In a few minutes, her apartment would flood with friends of hers from her country and their kids who will use the language of their homeland with each other, who even having lived in the US after a number of years, mostly socially interact with each other, their notion of being an American based on it seems having access to jobs and services that don’t exist back home.
So I know that Najla wasn’t undermining her origins when she referred to me as the lucky one.
But she was undermining mine. Because she was saying that being an American is just a matter of paperwork that I could sign off on to share the wealth or not.
I’ve never felt so arbitrary.
But it’s not just Najla, it’s so many of my friends, Hicham, a cool Moroccan contractor I know who ‘just wants to make enough money so he can get the hell out of here’ or my French friend Fatima who hasn’t been around for more than a year but who likes to take both fists and gesture as if she’s squeezing water from a sponge to portray the US quality of life.
OK, in an economic crisis like the sort we’re in, the numbers are very important. But just focusing on numbers alone does not address the dilemma of being an American today.
In fact, it’s this notion of America being a mega grab bag that all we have to do is refill to restore, that causes this cynicism.
Increasingly, whole communities full of memories are being erased.
The southernmost area of Harlem becomes ‘Soha.’ Instant neighborhoods like this are invented in every major city eliminating real neighborhoods rich with urban history.
Surging numbers of people enter the U.S. every day with the popular conclusion being that if this constant social churning feeds the economy, it’s healthy. I’m not convinced of that. I’ve seen blocks transition from one ethnic group to another. It’s seldom this natural wave that pundits who live in static, affluent communities, say it is. Afterwards, you wonder where people and stores are that are gone, filled with nostalgia and loss.
There are those who say Obama bent over too far during the G20 – see that obsequious bow to King Abdullah for an embarrassing example – but I feel like he’s trying, really trying to get the point across that America’s not just an economic and military empire, not just a dropper of bombs or a revolving door for the world’s work force, but a country with a heart and soul.
Everyone agrees his eight day tour of the world was a success in this regard, but now let’s see if this case can be made right here, at home — or have I become too much of an irrelevant spectator to refer to this country with such familiarity?
April 12th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
oh. let’s hear it for the irreverent spectator !
April 12th, 2009 at 8:10 pm
Your commentary reminds me how complicated our relationship to Africa and Africans remain. I always think of relationships to families on the continent that I befriended and of how it became a matter of time before I realized that when I stopped arriving with armfuls of gifts (that I couldn’t afford) that I was no longer endeared. Once, even, needing temporary shelter for a day due to a mix up with a local hotel…was going into another 24 hours later. I was told…pas de place, Portia! I learned later that I had been replaced with a white American student who was paying good money to have a bed and meals and entertainment there nightly.
So I have had mixed feelings about these friendships ever since. Our Obama did look pretty awkward bending at the waist. oh Joy! I wondered.
April 13th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
I love your writing style first of all, but i think your point goes further.
Personally my patriotism is tied to history. Being black in this country means so many things and my personal identity is wrapped up in this blanket of American values.
I get the impression from speaking with my foreign friends that their sense of patriotism is less to do with their countries and more to do with their culture; that the two can be separated. I know that to be the case here, but especially in black culture, the country itself is so ingrained in our heritage that the seperation is a lot more subtle.
The point you made about your friend basically feeling like being American is about access and not identity is one of the challenges with this country’s place in the world because from the outside we look prosperous, but that prosperity comes at a cost that forigners aren’t always interested or willing to contribute to. Our patriotism isn’t for sale, but so often the outsider’s view is that we have no sense of gravitas with reference to our heritage which is less the case in black culture.
April 15th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
yeah! wonderful post!
April 28th, 2009 at 6:36 am
Kinda veered off a bit there in the essay, but yes. The understanding of what it is to be American has always been ‘cloudy’ at best.
I live in a predominately Arab neighborhood and during the past 2 years its turned noticeably Spanish. The Spanish neighbor was up from us and now its moving down - it is not some slow change. As whites are moving into the Spanish neighborhoods, the Spanish are moving into mine. It used to be very quiet here, and that is changing - se la vie right.
I think people just get their feelings hurt. They don’t understand what they are looking at when they envision “American prosperity” and so go looking for their pot of gold. Then once they are here, they stick it out because either they are ’stuck’ or think “one day my number’s gonna hit” I sympathize with your friend. Honestly I had no idea of the “citizenship” culture until someone approached me - I’m already married.
April 28th, 2009 at 8:22 am
Very thought provoking post Jen.
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