"I Have a Dream..."

At eleven forty, I got off the subway at New Utrecht Avenue and briskly walked the 6 blocks to my apartment. Fourteen hours had passed since I walked these same blocks in the opposite direction, on my way to the polls before continuing to work a double. The last couple hours at the restaurant we'd all monitered the election results on the internet in the office, and as I left, Obama had maintained his solid lead. Still, my manager Gretchen was tensely huddled in the corner, willing the night to end as quickly as possible so the waiting with bated breath would be over. "We remember the 2000 election," Gretchen and Sara, one of the bartenders, were saying last night. "We voted in 2000. It's not over 'til it's over."


It was over by the time I got off the subway. My cell phone vibrated as I left the train with a text message from my best friend Mark in California:



Mark Hoke: mccain train derailed!



As I walked, my heart racing and my pace quickening, I logged onto Facebook on my phone and scrolled through my cyberfriends' statuses...victory cry after victory cry. Tears sprung to my eyes. When I finally made it to my front door, I raced straight to the TV, just in time to watch the new president of the United States make his acceptance speech.



I knew he would win. I just knew it. And yet, I wept alone in my apartment from the sheer weight of it all. As hopeful and optimistic as I try to be, that cynical little voice in the back of my head is always there. I've turned the volume way down, so low in fact that I can only hear it in the event that things don't work out for the best in the end. Of course, there is no real end to anything...the best we can hope for is a new beginning. And now, after 8 years of residing under a stolen presidency, this country has finally been given a chance at a new beginning that we, it's lowly, floundering little citizens, can actually invest some faith in.


Not that I've ever been one to take things for granted. In my adult life I've always been aware that even at the worst of times, America is still a far better place to live than, say, Afghanistan or Cambodia or Sudan. Our government has never been run by terrorists, and even while it was being run by a Christian fundamentalist fanatic never terrorized it's citizens at gunpoint in the streets, raping and murdering women and burning our houses down. One wouldn't be wrong in stating that, relatively speaking, we've always had it pretty decent. When I moved to New York a year ago, I started to meet people who were so thankful to be in America, even as us natives were bitching about it. Nowhere in the country is the Melting Pot more evident than in New York City. I'm quite sure there are few cities in the world that rival New York's cultural diversity. Morimoto's staff is comprised of immigrants from Japan, Korea, India, Mexico, Sudan and England (ha ha) and every restaurant I've worked in has been a similar mini-melting pot in and of itself. Some of the stories these people have to tell are just amazing.


My favorite examples of the American Dream come from two different Mexican-Americans who both happen to be named Manny. One was a busboy at Beacon, and the other is the head of the cleaning crew at Morimoto.



Last Thanksgiving, being the new girl, I'd been roped into working an 8 hour shift, 3pm to 11pm. It was a long-ass day that miraculously went pretty smoothly...until the final hour and a half stretch. I was the last hostess standing (in blood-filled pumps) around 9pm when a guest collapsed on the landing outside the ladies' restroom. She'd apparently become short of breath and extremely pale. My manager Joe rushed to the host podium and told me to dial 911. My heart was racing--I'd never dialed 911 before, let alone at work--though by the time the paramedics showed up, the guest seemed to be more or less okay. Seeing the ambulance parked outside, another guest got in my face and demanded that her son-in-law be examined by the paramedics as well, since they were there, because he was hyperventilating outside. Both guests were fine in the end--too much turkey and excitement for one day it seems. But then, not forty-five minutes later, Joe appeared again and with the same request. This time, it was Manny, one of the restaurant's hardest working bussers, who had collapsed from chest pains. Manny, I was told, had a heart condition and had had open-heart surgery about ten years earlier. So I called the ambulence for the second time in my life, and Joe let them in the back so they could take care of Manny without alarming the remaining guests. I barely knew who Manny was at that point.


A few weeks later, Manny returned to work. It seemed he had been back in the hospital for a few weeks and the doctor had instructed him to take some time off. He was fine...though his time away from work had set his family back financially a great deal. In need of some extra cash, the general manager had allowed him to pick up some coat check shifts as well. Of all the immigrant employees to whom English was a second language, Manny's English was one of the best. He showed up one evening when I was hosting alone, looking sharp in a sky blue cable-knit sweater and black slacks. It was a slow night, so he ended up spending most of his time up front chatting with me. A sweet little man with a kind disposition, Manny was barely half an inch taller than me on the rare occasions I was able to get away with wearing flats. He told me about his family: he and his wife had been married for 19 years. "I never cheated on my wife in 19 years" he told me. They had two kids, a daughter who was about to start college in the fall and a younger son. "Karen is so smart. She's going to NYU and then she wants to go to medical school. She wants to take care of her daddy's heart. That's what she said when she was a little girl. I had surgery when she was three and she said she would grown up and be a doctor to take care of Daddy's heart. She never changed her mind!" I swooned quietly over Manny. He was such a good person, a loyal and loving father. He reminded me of my own father in the way he'd do anything for his family. He told me about when he was 18 and first came to America. Looking for a job. "There's no money in Mexico. It's better in America. I've been here 20 years!" As the weeks passed, Manny developed a little crush on me. "Are you coming to the Christmas party? I told my wife I wanted to dance with you at the party!" I thought it was sweet.


Manny from Morimoto is even smaller than the other Manny. He's a little older, a little tougher, and much less sentimental. Since the weather's turned cooler he often shows up to work in the wee hours of the morning sporting swanky poly-blend suits to assert his authority over the much younger Mexican boys on the cleaning crew. I have no idea what time they get there in the morning, but by the time I get there for my reservations shift at 9am (well, you know...9:18 or so) they've already scrubbed most of the dining room clean. When the office door is locked, it means that Manny hasn't gotten around to cleaning it yet and I have to find him to unlock it. It's very low on his list of priorities, as it only takes a few minutes to change the trash can liners and windex the manager's desktops. But Manny often takes his time and talks my ear off about his experiences. "Where you from?" he asked me the first morning I came in by myself. "Portuguese? Oh, I see. You in school? I did not go to school." And yet, he came to America and managed to become a business owner, opening a deli that he still owns but no longer operates himself. He told me how his business was in the newspaper, and how President Clinton shook his hand and congratulated him on his success in America. "My mother is still in Mexico. She doesn't come to visit me. She's too old. It's too expensive to fly to Mexico. But I talk to her on the phone. I send her money." Now, every morning I work, Manny greets me: "Como estas, Senorita? I am happy if the senoritas are happy."


The Mannys are what America is all about, aren't they? The right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, no matter what your background or education. American children grow up being brainwashed by "America the beautiful", the land of hope and plenty where anyone who works hard can achieve all their hopes and dreams. A country where the world's less fortunate can take refuge from government and economic oppression...where all men are supposedly equal, as God created them.


I was 14 in 2000 and living in Toronto with my mom. My Canadian friends and I followed the 2000 election closely, and though we all made adolescently flippant comments about what was going to happen to America if George W. Bush was elected, I couldn't help feeling personally affected by the circumstance. I was still an American citizen, after all, even if I was currently living in Canada. In Toronto, I contradicted all the stereotypes about Americans that were posed to me by my little friends. I assured them time and time again that we were not a nation of gun-toting rednecks, that just because I was from Southern California did not mean that I was rich. Then along came this new president who spoke with hideously improper grammar in a dumbed-down Texas drawl, and all the stereotypes became impossible to deflect. I had no idea which country to be loyal to when people I met in each place knew nothing but stereotypes about the other and I came to the decision that the concept of patriotism itself was worthless, like worshipping a false idol created by man to gain power over the masses. American Bible-belt patriotism started to look more and more like a cult and I became nationally indifferent to both of the countries to which I claimed citizenship.


I've felt displaced my whole life, split between two places that I did not choose as my own but were thrust upon me. For many reasons other than national orientation, I've always struggled with defining myself. But one thing I am very thankful for is that my lack of national devotion provided me with a great deal of common sense. I try as often as possible to exercise intellect over emotion, and I think that is what compells me to continually strive to learn more about this complicated world we live in.


I voted for the first time in the 2004 election, an experience that was truly one of the first empowering experiences of my young adult life. I was 18 and so excited at the prospect of change. The people I'd grown up around had all opposed the war in Iraq from the beginning, and though I'd heard my father rant and rave about the corruption of an administration who could wage a war for control over a country's energy resources then lie about their motives to the American people, I was really just starting to open my eyes to the gravity of the situation. I'd gone to a school-sponsered screening of Farenheit 9-11 with my friends, and we'd all sat dumbfounded as Michael Moore spent two hours explaining to us that our country didn't respect us, didn't care about our needs as citizens, and didn't care about the lives of our peers who were being sent overseas to die for their phony cause. I started to feel like an adult that fall, and the prospect of voting against Bush felt like taking matters into my own hands. Of course, Kerry was running a campaign to defeat Bush, not a campaign that was ultimately focused around change for the greater good. Defeating Bush wasn't enough... Kerry lacked the necessary strategies to help guide the country out of its gradual recession. Perhaps most importantly, Kerry lacked the passion that was necessary to guide the American populace.


Maybe we really needed to hit rock bottom before we were collectively ready to make some serious changes. Some of us could see it coming years ago...others evidentally needed more persuasion.


Since casting my vote for the losing candidate in 2004, I've definitely felt a collective downward spiral in morale, one that unfortunately has coincided with my generations transition into adulthood. We've come of age in a time of extreme social despair. I've felt my adolescent hopes and dreams slowly corode into jaded cynicism far beyond my years. Those of us who are still in the early stages of post-academic "real life" have felt the odds rising higher and higher against us over the past couple of years. We're all broke, struggling to keep our heads above water, and barely finding the strength to persevere in the name of our artistic ideals. We are artists because we fundamentally believe in the good of humanity and that the world is a beautiful place that we should strive to take care of. These ideals have been so very difficult to maintain in the face of all the pain and suffering that has been surmouting in the world. I've often felt helpless, trapped between pursuing my dreams in the spirit of American opportunity that was supposedly my birthright, and desperate guilt for not working harder to oppose worldwide injustice and intolerance. I've been weighing my options for a long time, and I know I'll be weighing them longer still. But at this point in my life I've arrived at the conclusion that I do not have to sacrifice my duty as human being to contribute to the betterment of society in the interest of pursuing self-fulfillment, or vice versa. I can do both at the same time. That is what I believe the purpose of art to be. For me, in my life, I am an artist because I know that my artistic talents are my God-given means of reaching out to other human beings. This conclusion has led me to the decision to return to school, to pursure my MFA in Acting, in order to deepen my understanding and practice of my artistic craft, as well as to continue to pursue more diverse means of artistic collaboration. It is important to me in my career to be constantly redefining my ideas of art and its relationship with its audience in an effort to seek out more effective and meaningful means of communication and collaborative expression of the human condition. It is also important to me to pursue teaching as one of the facets of my career, for my teachers have always been my greatest role models, inspiring me endlessly with their selflessness. The gifts of support, inspirtation and encouragement that I've been given are such that I feel strongly about giving back to others.


Fuck. I've been trying to start writing an effective, yet concise personal statement for my application essays for weeks. I think I might have just found the heart of this decision of mine.


For that, and for many other things, I have President Barack Obama to thank.


Seriously, dude. A country that can transition from slavery and civil war to electing an African-American president in less than 200 years can't be all bad. Other countries have been waging the same civil wars for thousands of years. This is a great change... of course, tomorrow morning the world will still look exactly the same as it does today. But already I feel a little lighter, a little more hopeful. I only hope we can all see that Obama is a man who is bound to make some mistakes. It will take a lot of time to pull this country out of it's slide into impending social and economic ruin. Likewise, it will take time to repair our foreign affairs with the nations of the world. However, the first step has been taken. All we can really do is continue to put one foot in front of the other and focus on the future as it becomes the present.



I don't think I've ever felt quite so empowered and humbled at the same time.



What a day.