To begin my story, I wanted to start off by sharing that my parents although now US citizens of the United States, were immigrants that came from Colombia. The picture that I am providing is not the actual family antique sewing machine, but this picture is a spitting image of how it really looks. The reason why I am sharing this picture is because when my mother came to the US, it was with this sewing machine that she started off making a living to aid in her survival in this new country. She came to this country at a very young age, 18 years old, and she had my eldest sister in which she was 1 years old at the time. Therefore, due to her circumstances, she came to the US, the country of opportunities, with the idea of the American dream, for a better life not only for her but as well as my sister and of course for the rest of my siblings as we came later. With this sewing machine you can pretty much say my mother was involved in both a family based and family waged economy. She worked at home as she had some customers that new about her work and she tailored clothes at home, but she also worked in a clothes factory. It was with this sewing machine that with my mother’s blood, sweat and tears she was able to help my father in bringing in more money to the house. Therefore, this sewing machine is very important and significant because it was also passed down from my maternal grandmother to my mother, and it represents the fight and struggle to accommodate and make a living in this new country, in other words for my family this sewing machine represents the American dream. 
 

– R

Relationship:  Im/migrant Im/migrant