In Between - Olivia Prado by University of Michigan Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design

In Between este lado y el otro lado

Olivia Prado

To mi familia en este lado y el otro

In Between este lado y el otro lado

Olivia Prado 5

We say nosotros los mexicanos (by mexicanos we do not mean citizens of Mexico; we do not mean a national identity, but a racial one). We distinguish between Mexicans del otro lado and mexicanos de este lado. Deep in our hearts we believe that being Mexican has nothing to do with which country one lives in. Being Mexican is a state of soul – not one of mind, not one of citizenship. Neither eagle nor serpent, but both. And like the ocean, neither animal respects borders. Borderlands|La Frontera Gloria AnzaldúaWW

. t abl e of c onte nts

13. dirt covered 24. bean picking bean 28. popo and itza 34. phenotype 44. mexican-american gothic 54. chicken-coop 63. institution 70. bill 79. can you believe it 88. mi familia 98. a wall of words 110. papers

. d i r t c ove re d

I often try to remember my earliest memories to the best of my ability. I like to think about the time I didn’t care about dirt being between my toes, and how it collected along the backs of my arms, and sprinkled itself throughout my scalp. The rows of asparagus that resembled tiny tree lines across each spread of acre.

I stopped quickly at each tower of milkweed to inspect it for creatures, my trusty bug box in hand. I knew that my parents cared about my bug interest, but others who worked in the field were only there to get the job done, and soon these plants would be uprooted and discarded. Once I inspected each plant top to bottom, I made my way back to the truck where my siblings and cousins huddled together to play hangman on a pad of paper. Once in a while I would show them my finds, they didn’t care. I remember my mom being excited that I wanted a bigger bug net. She and my dad brainstormed materials to buy to build a place for my caterpillars. In the corner of my room, I hung my hoops and netting so I could share my space with these companions. I watched over the weeks of summer as my caterpillars ate the leaves of milkweed that I filled their home with until they were ready to leave me.

Have you ever held something so fragile in your hand that you didn’t feel that you were touching it, instead it was touching you? It is as though it is made of air. You are aware of its presence, but it holds no weight. Two towering wings engulf a tiny body between them. They look to be bright orange upon first glance, but with time, a million tiny iridescent flecks begin to appear in the light of the summer sun. Suddenly, what was once orange and white becomes speckled with every color of the rainbow and in between. I felt like these beings were always mystical and mysterious. Where do they go when they leave me? Who are they when they come back? I once heard that monarch butterflies return after four generations. They leave and reproduce and then return, following the blossoming environments that trickle throughout the Western Hemisphere.

Migration is something I think about often.

How do I define it?

To me, migration is what brought my family where we are today. Both naturally and because of diaspora. I think back to the time of Aztecs, the trail of tears, the industrialization of southern California, these events displaced people. I think about the movie Mi Familia, and the character El Californio who said When I was

born here, this was Mexico, and where my body lies, this is still Mexico. El Californio did not immigrate, or migrate, or naturalize, yet he was labeled as the other.

I don’t have those feelings toward my home. I do not live on land that I can say will always be Mexico. My family moved here. We migrated, drifting until we could drift no longer.

But that was never my story either. Like the butterfly, I am the generation between travelers.

. b e an pick ing b e an

I remember laying in the dirt alongside the tiny green bean plants. At the time they were small enough to look like individual leaves of spinach. I was tired of standing, so I army crawled on my elbows. I was twelve. I had tan lines from my shirt collar, which I hated because it fell under the category of farmer’s tan. At least it would only be bean season for a few more weeks and the worst would be over. Weeding acres of beans in the scorching sun was much less appealing than picking up rotten apples in the cool fall. When we did apples there was no dirt or baking sun, but sometimes the squish of the rotten fruit in your hand made your stomach turn, and put you off apples for the next few weeks. The apples weren’t ours like the beans were. We picked apples for other people, we picked beans for ourselves. We were the hired help when it came to the rotten apples.

I remember one summer of beans specifically. My brother and I drove an old green truck down the back roads to get to the field everyday where my dad was already waiting for us. We kept a bag of cereal in the seat between us for our breakfast and breaks. Usually we got there early enough to see the family of deer that feasted upon the beans every dewy morning, if my dad had not scared them away by then. This was our first year using a harvester. Even though this was a nice addition to the family, there still had to be someone there to catch the beans that came out of the machine, and that’s where we come in. If you can imagine, the harvester looked like a big yellow tractor, only it had two spinning brushes underneath to pull beans off plants and a belt that pulled them to the top of a chute that emptied over a small wooden shelf. The shelf was just big enough to hold one and a half trays, so my brother and I took turns manning the lever on the chute and emptying the trays into the larger boxes.

what am i doing here? how did i become a figure standing in a field that people drive by and think look at those

illegals. which beings of the past made this the trajectory of my life? i’m not illegal. but maybe some people think i am when i’m out working in the dirt as a beaner picking those beans. once a substitute teacher said to me that she could tell who the illegals were when she was in the south because they were the ones carrying weapons.

. p op o and it z a

I belong to a nation, in which I have a number and pay taxes and travel within the boundary of. my father belongs to a different nation. in my nation, he is considered an alien. i’ve never understood that word, but he appears other-worldly to me too. he was an invincible man growing up. a mythical being

that accumulated his strength from his ancestors. he is the luchador, the apache, the aztec. in my country, my mighty father and those like him are not welcome with open arms. and in his own nation, he is no longer welcome either.

like the mighty aztecs, his home no longer exists. my father has changed too much to return and mexico has changed too much to be called home. my father does not belong to a nation that exists.

. phe not y p e

I don’t look like my father. I do and I don’t. My dad has dark tan skin and coarse black hair, grey and black now. His arms and chest are almost entirely bald. He says that’s from his Apache grandmother. I have always wanted my skin to look like my dad’s. I wanted the same thing my dad got from his ancestors. I wanted to look like someone.

Or my mother. With her curly fire red hair. And white freckle covered skin. To the outside world I was her adopted brown daughter.

my sister was mom’s carbon copy. when we go to large gatherings we are introduced as a family, except for my sister.

who is la guera? she is also our sister, we clarify.

Once my sister was a toddler and my parents were grocery shopping, my mom was going to one aisle and my dad was headed toward another. First my sister tried to go with my dad, but she soon changed her mind and threw a tantrum screamed, “NO! I want to go with my mom!” My dad, frustrated trying to calm his crying toddler, was approached by a woman. He wasn’t approached, my sister was. She said, “I’ll take you to your mom, little girl.” My sister immediately retracted, “I want to stay with my dad!” I still don’t know how to feel about that story to this day.

I’ve never thought of my grandma as Mexican. My mother’s mother. Jam. She’s a small curly haired woman who hosted all of our family gatherings. At every gathering her father would be there. Old Grandpa, I call him. He was the first of his family born in America after they immigrated from Mexico. Looking back I’m not sure why I never saw Jam as Mexican or Mexican-American. Every summer Jam would hold our hands out in front of us and compare tan lines running from our index fingers to our thumbs. Every Christmas she would sing Feliz Navidad with her father while he played guitar. In reality, I think Jam and I are more similar than I thought. Half mexican. Non-spanish speaking. Not specifically connected to the land of Mexico. As I got older Jam started to share more stories from when she was young. Like getting a job picking asparagus with her best friend Sue.

A kid came up to me and asked me if I was Black.

No, I told him. Are you Asian? he continued. I shook my head. Do I look Black? Or Asian? He didn’t ask me if I was Mexican. Maybe I didn’t look like what he thought a Mexican would look like.

. me x ic an -ame r ic an got hi c

instead of white they are brown they work for the people in the big white house. you can still see it in the distance if you look for it where the rich white farmer lives in the big white house.

When I think about buses and migrants now, I think about manzana. A select few know about the manzana bus. Driving around small towns, it would appear bright white over a hill with huge red letters facing you down. MANZANA. As it got closer and closer you could make out the drivers and passengers of the packed buses. We’d always know to avoid the grocery store when the manzana bus was there because the line would be too long. Manzana is apple to those of you who haven’t taken a basic spanish class. I picked apples, but I’ve never been on a manzana bus.

Sometimes I think I remember the other bus. But then I think maybe I just remember the pictures of the bus. Apparently it had desks, just like a classroom. Because it was a classroom. We used to ride in the bus with our parents to all of the migrant camps. I don’t remember the camps at all or the people in the camps or the people learning on the bus. I don’t think I even know what my parents did all day driving the bus around. So I asked them. And we went for a drive.

Thats me with the bus parked behind me in our front yard.

During our drive I photographed various housing units and listened to the stories my parents told me along the way. My mom told me about one farmer who agreed to let them park the bus at the camp, but if they had to go to the bathroom then they would have to go across the street to the corn field.

i think about the difference between those two buses. one as a classroom and one as a ride to work. one bright yellow and the symbol of education, one white and dust covered. maybe people ride in the big white bus as they strive to live in the big white house.

. chicke n -c o op

We drove up to a building my parents called the chicken coop. A long blue metal building, something that is easily recognizable to people from rural areas as a poultry barn. Old rust covered a/c units jutted out of the walls as evidence that birds had once been raised there. Now box fans occupy the windows, old grey waterlogged furniture sprinkled along the sides of the building.

Something catches my parents off guard. A dumpster. Only places with people living there would have a dumpster, but surely the chicken coop had been decommissioned in the years since my parents had taught there.

I got out of the car and made my way up to a white paper in a clear plastic slip attached to a wooden post.

It was for a permit of the c u r r e n t y e a r .

People were still living

in the chicken-coop.