Creative title
At a very young age, many challenging situations were forced upon me that although I shouldn’t have had to go through, allowed me to learn so much. When I think back on the many events that occurred all those years ago, it really makes me realize how much I’ve grown as an individual. I learned that I shouldn’t hold the grudge, to be grateful for what I have and to not judge people based on their appearance
The circumstances I had to grow up in were very complicated and far too long to explain, but I’ll share as much as I can without oversharing. Growing up I was away from my siblings and my parents for a few different reasons. My parents; a drug addict mother who didn’t take care of her kids too well and who I didn’t see much of, and my father, an immigrant man who also did drugs, but from what I can remember, he was a hard worker who tried is best to provide for his kids when he came back from being away.
Between the years of 2008- 2013, my dad moved into a little studio apartment right next to his parents, my grandparents’ house where I lived. Often times my siblings would be there when things with my mom were messy. That’s how things were, my mother would sometimes say and do mean things which would result in my siblings having to go somewhere else to sleep at. Since I didn’t really grow up with my siblings and parents, it sadly seems like they are strangers to me. I didn’t get to experience all the things my siblings did, but it’s a good thing for many reasons, but it makes me feel alienated.
I remember the times when I’d go with my dad and my brothers up to a really big expensive house on the Northside to pick up his payment from that week, he was a landscaper. He’d split the money evenly between him and the 2 or 3 other workers with him. Afterwards we would go to the grocery store, and if the pay was good he would tell us to get whatever we wanted. He would also never check the prices of things and every time my sister or I were to say something his response would be, “Don’t worry about it Mija, that’s what I work for” with his heavy Mexican accent.
There would be times where we would get odd looks from people, who were typically Caucasians. They would look at the cheap clothes my siblings and I had to wear and my daddy’s dirty work clothes. At school I was picked on because I didn’t have nice brand clothes like everyone else. We often had to wear hand me downs or cheap clothes from stores like Factory 2 U and Savers. They would give us looks of pity and sometimes it even looked like disgust. Some old white lady once called my dad a “ no good, useless wetback who doesn’t belong here.” That same day I cried in my room at my grandparents’ house because I saw the way my dad’s face dropped at her words.
Money was always kind of tight, not only in my living situations but my siblings’ as well. There were times where we struggled to have enough food to feed six hungry, growing kids, and my dad, and sometimes even my mom. We had to each get a small portion of the already little food we had, but my daddy always found a way even if it meant sacrificing his portion of food. But he always tried his best to make sure we didn’t struggle too much, even if he had to overwork himself.
Things remained the same for a while longer. In 2010, I returned from school one afternoon to get be informed my daddy is gone again, for who knows how many years this time. My father was stopped on his way to work that day and was sent to prison in California for a few years. All the while my father was gone, my siblings went back to my mother’s and I spoke to them little to never, aside from my sister. My daddy was like the glue that stuck us siblings together, and without him, the already painful and increasing hole in my heart increased when we had no contact for years.
When I was a little kid, I had always been told what kind of people my real parents were, it was almost taboo to bring them up. I was angry and I left abandoned. My mother left me a my nans one day and I didn’t see her or my siblings for years. It felt like she just left me and kept my brothers and sister. My father had got arrested a few times, for reasons my young self didn’t understand. I thought my daddy too, had left me behind. Growing up without them was very lonesome. I felt like such an outcast where I was at. I remember the whispers of people asking “ Oh who is that little girl?” They’d look at me strangely. “ Oh Miguel, who’s her mom? Why is she with you” Those words from people im related to, not only made me feel unwanted but they also added fuel to my growing anger. I didn’t understand why my father was always away. Or why my mother left me. But in all honest, aside from the circumstances of our lives, even though I was angry at my father he was my favourite.
After my dad got out of prison he was sent him to mexico again. My father had gotten caught and deported a few times, but he had crossed illegally to come back to Tucson. Something I wish I would’ve realized sooner was the fact that my dad would risk coming back and getting caught to come back to his kids. I remember he would tell me it would take him 3 days, since he had to walk. Once he was settled in his little studio apartment it was 2012ish.
My father had searched for jobs to earn money to support himself. My sister and some other relative would send him money when he couldn’t find any jobs. I even sent him money when I had earned some from cleaning my cousins room for like 15or 20 dollars. Whilst my father was in mexico I had been coming to the age where I wanted to know why I was where I was and my family where they were. I had been told two different stories. One by the people I lived with. The other by my mother. I still to this day, have no idea why I was left behind. When I asked my daddy when I had visited him in Mexico, he told me in his Mexican accent“ When your crazy, bitch of a mother did that, I wasn’t here. I was in the bote. Im sorry mija. But I knew you’d be alright. Im sorry mija. I love you kids, your daddy was a pendejo sometimes, I don’t like leaving you guys.”
sorry it’s late*********
Giax 