A Boy And His Country

I let him pick out a book to read, this first grader whose winsome smile sends little bursts of light down the hallway, across to the open doorway. We've read together before, he and I, and after he haltingly read his small book, his accented voice attempting to pronounce each word with careful precision, he asked if I was his classmate's grandmother. He knew this but I pretended that we hadn't already had this conversation. "My grandma died." His tender brown eyes conveyed a certain spark of understanding, of hindsight about her death. "I miss her, she died in the Phillistines." My eyebrows pinned the unspoken question. "That's where I was born, the Phillistines." Before I could correct his place of origin, before I could tell him we were out of time, before I could take another breath, he began to paint a brief snapshot of life in his home country, a harsh world he and his family escaped, the place where his grandmother is buried.

"My dad was fighting, he shot with guns." Earnestness washed over his face, leapt into his words. "He had to fight, they made him, they would have killed him if he didn't." A child's innocence stolen from the cradle. "My grandmother, she spoke Arabic, like all of us." I complimented his English, his sweet eyes shone, emitting radiant childlike innocence. He continued on, his arms stretched out wide in passionate emphasis, "We had nooooo electricity, none! No power, no refrigerator, nothing! No phones or cars." The filtered water fountain across from us made a humming noise. I forgot to thank the gas station attendant. I don't think I kissed my husband goodbye this morning. We threw away the left-over hummus yesterday. A throng of young students shuffled down the hallway, quiet so as not to cause disturbance, each one different from the other, freedom taking up rear guard. This young little man, he lived and breathed the foreign air of injustice, hatred and war. He made it to America and I was glad.

"Do you like America?" I asked him as he stood up from the tiny metal chair. "Oh yes! My dad has a cell phone now and he talks on it." The exuberant smile pasted on his face righted all the wrongs, all the evils, if only for those transient moments shared. My heart, it sang right happy.

My fellow Americans, we are and always will be a nation of immigrants.

 We were strangers once too.

~Barack Obama~