One of Many Inheritors of the American Dream

We believe, or at least in my home the belief is, the more college degrees earned the higher the quality of life. Which is why my parents instilled in me the importance of receiving an education, because they came to understand education as the foundation of achieving and fulfilling the American Dream. Education and the American Dream are interchangeable terms. In my home they mean the same thing. One night my dad said, “cuando nosotros nos morimos no les van a quedar nada. Lo único que les va a quedar es la educación. La herencia se las quise dar en vida.” Basically, saying his inheritance to me and my sister is our education. What he said that night reminded of this post. Before reading it, I struggled to articulate what it meant to be a child of immigrants. There are certain expectations, and nowhere does that include failure. There’s pressure to be perfect, successful, and overachieving. I never understood why I felt this pressure, but after reading this post it was obvious. Of course. I was an inheritor of the American Dream. At no point did my parents sit me down and say, “we expect you to fulfill our American Dream.” It was unspoken, but it was understood they expected more. My self-imposed pressure for perfection, success, and achievement is rooted in understanding all the sacrifices my parents made to come to this country and the countless hours of work they undertake is, so I can fulfill what they couldn’t, and not fulfilling their idea of the American Dream means everything my parents sacrificed for me, to even exist as an American citizen, was and will continue to be futile.

I guess so far, my greatest achievement would be graduating college. I completed the first step in fulfilling the American Dream. College was expected. It was the only appropriate step after high school. The belief is a college degree will unlock doors and opportunities that include a salary and vacation days, not minimum wage and federal holidays. Following in my sister’s footsteps I crossed the stage with a college degree in my hand. But I’ve come to realize this college degree isn’t mine. My success isn’t my success, it’s there’s — it’s ours. It’s my parent’s degree, my sister’s second degree and it extends past my nuclear family and into my cousins, tia’s, tio’s, abuelita’s and abueltio’s. It’s a generational achievement.

I’m not just Catharine anymore. I’m Catharine, la que acaba de graduarse de la Universidad.

Now I feel even more pressure. I have the key which should metaphorically unlock opportunities previously unattainable. Suddenly, the door is right in front of me and all I have to do is turn the knob, but the door still won’t open. I failed to realize the second aspect of college. The networking. The interning. The meeting with professors. The making friends. My life revolved around getting a college degree, I was so hyper focused I missed the point. It isn’t the degree that gets you ahead, like I was raised to believe, it’s the network and support of people who walked the path before you that’s going to provide the assistance, guidance, advice, and the opportunities. College is a resource, and as the child of immigrants no one was there to show me the ropes. The resources of people college provide is worthwhile. I missed that. Completely.

My father came to America with the phone number of his only U.S. contact written in the seams of his jeans. My mother came to America at 13 and worked as the help to another family, hundreds and thousands away from her own.

There were days when I would cry the entire drive back to my house — my parents house. I would cry because I was terrified of what the future had in store for me. When I would close my eyes and try to picture myself in the future I couldn’t. I cried because I was exhausted. For the entire week I’d spend more than eight hours on campus and more than two hours commuting each day. On the bus and on the train, I would write papers, read articles, take quizzes, and study for exams so I could come home and eat dinner with my parents and give them an hour of my time. I would cry because I was appreciative, because even though I was scared and exhausted I was proud. I was actively pursuing something, a degree, which could change the course of not just my life, but my families. The fear and the mental, physical, and emotional exhaustion were worth it, because it meant I was overcoming and fulfilling something bigger than me, because it meant I was on the way to achieving the American Dream.

My abuelito bought my mom her first pair of shoes the day they were leaving. She asked my abuelito why and he said, “este camino no se puede caminar descalzo.”

Lately, all I can think about is retiring my parents and giving them everything and more, because they deserve it, because they’ve worked every day of their life to provide me with the opportunity to achieve and accomplish more. Although I want to give academia up I can’t ignore the truth of their consejos. There is pressure to keep pushing, to keep going because at the end of the day I’m still a woman, I’m still one of the first, and yet I’m one of many. My shit has been easy. I’ve had every door open and accessible to me. I’ve had all the opportunities to succeed and I still feel like I failed. I could’ve and should’ve done more and I didn’t, and I sit wishing I wouldn’t have sulked and hated myself for so long, because maybe then things would’ve turned out differently. Maybe if I had inherited an ounce of my parent’s courage, mental fortitude, and work ethic I would have had the resolve to pursue a degree that would’ve led to a higher salary and even more vacation days. A degree that would’ve allowed me to repay my parents three-fold. What have I sacrificed? What have I given up?

My dad heard the buzzing of electrical wires and recognized those as the sounds of America, then he jumped into the trunk of a car stacked like plank wood with six other people.

I don’t know what my next step is, but I do know what it should be — graduate school. My parent’s advice to me growing up about the importance of education flows through my veins.

Failure was never apart of the plan, and even though I told myself I deserve a break, I don’t know if I’ve earned one. I know what a second degree, a Master’s, means. It means greater specialization in a field which means higher pay, which means a higher quality of life. It means I would be another step closer to fulfilling the American Dream. But then what? And what comes after a PhD? Accumulating knowledge in the form of degrees is the American Dream. The structure of school is all I know. So why do I shake my head when asked about graduate school? Why do I keep searching for avenues and outlets that would allow me to “succeed” without having to go back to school?

My parents have worked hard for themselves and have continued to work hard to give me everything and I owe it all to their unspoken sacrifices and work ethic. I can’t deny my inheritance, because even though the successes are ours, the failures are mine, and I can’t go through life knowing everything my parents risked, everything my parents gave up and sacrificed to come to America went unnoticed, unappreciated, and unfulfilled by me.

I want to finish by saying my experience has been easy. I am one of many first-generation Americans/college students and I have been blessed with supportive and loving parents and a sister who did it first. I was also lucky enough to be born in the US which granted me access to federal aid, scholarships, and universities across the country. I’ve been lucky enough to live in a state that covers most of my tuition. I won’t deny how easy I’ve had it, but I will accept how dense I was to not realize it. I also want to say nothing I do will ever amount to the moment when my parents left their respective mother, father, brothers, and sisters to trek across borders in pursuit of promises. That sacrifice was and continues to be unparalleled. It takes an immense amount to courage which is often made because of dire consequences and it’s a decision often met with dire consequences.