Twelve years old, standing alone on a Brooklyn sidewalk waiting to cross a busy intersection. Fifteen years old, standing on the 4 train and having your favorite necklace ripped off of your neck. Twenty-two years old, and walking down the aisle with the man you will be married to for the next twenty-two years. When my mother first arrived in America, she, like most other immigrants, had no idea what was in store for her. A young Trinidadian girl with a thick Caribbean accent and very little to her name, she was terrified of living in a new place.  What made matters even worse, is that upon arrival, her family was separated. They had fled their native island on a whim, and had no place to stay when they landed in the U.S. Her father and brother stayed with a distant relative in the Bronx, she and her sister stayed with an aunt in Brooklyn, and her mother started a live-in nanny job.  That was the hardest part, not having her own mother around. She went from seeing her every single day to seeing her once a week. In efforts to comfort herself, she clung to the blanket her mother had knitted her when she was a baby. Every time she was sad or afraid, she would hold onto it. The blanket provided her with reassurance that everything was going to be okay. Thirty years later, she still treasures it. 

 

– Alyssa

Relationship:  Im/migrant who arrived as a child Im/migrant who arrived as a child