The lab coat stays folded in the back of Shahid’s closet, unworn and still in its packaging. He said it was one of the last coats he bought, but retired before he got to use it. When I asked him why he still keeps it in his closet, he said it reminds him of everything that came out of his lab. Shahid grew up in a farming village in rural Iran, one of eleven children. In 1988, he arrived alone in New York, and stayed in a small apartment in Astoria. Eventually he started working in a medical laboratory, processing blood and urine samples. During this time, he sent whatever money he could spare back to his family.
Years later, he opened his own lab in the Bronx and got married back home. One by one, he sponsored his brothers and sisters to come to the US to work in the lab. He bought an apartment overlooking Central Park, and watched nieces and nephews graduate from college. 
The lab coat reminds him of another lesson too. As the next generation assumed responsibility for the business, financial setbacks accumulated, contracts disappeared, and eventually the lab closed. Much of what had taken decades to build disappeared in only a few years. When people talk about the American Dream, they often imagine a straight line from poverty to prosperity. But for Shahid, yes, hard work mattered, but that hard work alone couldn’t guarantee permanence. What endured was the family that made it all possible, and the opportunities that spread outward from one person’s decision to leave home.

– Ariba Hassan

Relationship:  Im/migrant Im/migrant