El apátrida

Mark sent me a link to a posting that summarizes the conundrum very well indeed. Uncannily so--it's almost as if chisparoja had gotten into my brain and started siphoning thoughts and feelings out.

I'm thinking of this relocation business. From having relocated four or so times in my life, I can tell you that it never becomes easy. A part of your soul gets ripped out and left behind, the torn tendrils of lifememory waving in the air laden with smells that will forever trigger memories of places not to be lived in again in the same way, the remaining solid chunk of soul firmly pinned to the ground that infuses all its foods and drinks with its essential flavor whether sweet or bitter. My thinking that I should once again rip out my roots and hope I can successfully survive another transplant, after having become fond of the idea of settling in my comfy three-bedroom condo with city view for the long haul, is the closest analogy I can conjure for emotional shipsinking.

Displacement versus persecution. I went and saw a terrible production of Ragtime last Friday. I've never been a believer that the Broadway musical is laden with meaning and depth. Seeing this show of three groups, white landed gentry, black musicians in Harlem and Latvian immigrants speak of their own dreams, aspiration and disappointments with this land between Canada and Mexico vibrated like a poorly tuned chord between being American-dream-cheerleading and American-nightmare-exposing. People have survived tougher environments--my family, the people of Latin America over centuries, the folks in Afghanistan--and maintain a sense of life. But those who can, leave for better worlds and opportunities. My folks did that in 1980 when they left Colombia for the prospect of a 100-fold increase in standard of living through my dad's new career in Peru. Gradmas and Grampas left their towns for the big city of Medellin as the farm life seemed to appeal less and less to their children. Nola, who worked at our house for many years in Peru, had left the violence and poverty of her beloved Tarapoto in the Amazon to seek fortune in Lima.

Flight or self-protection?

Canada beckons. UK beckons. Europe beckons. Modernity and global awareness beckon. Provincialism and fuck-you-all-ism hold no appeal. You're with us or you're with them. Well, I'm with them--not with the terrorists, but with the Rest Of The World. Always have been. In spanish, we have a word--apátrida, one without a countrynation. I've always been one of those. Citizen of the world. Allegiance to my fellow humans, not to my fellow nationlivers.