Every morning I wake up to the tinkling of Charlie’s nails hitting the wooden floor. It is always between the hours of 6:30-8:30, depending upon how well she slept and how badly she wants to go out.
There is a baby gate that my parents put in place to cordon off the living room from the rest of our apartment. When she wants me to wake up, she stands by the baby gate and begins to do a little dance, wiggling her body and moving her feet to and fro–thus making the tinkling noise, telling me she is up and ready to go out. For some reason, I always hear it. No matter how tired I am, no matter how late I slept, I always hear the tinkling and it always wakes me up.
I get out of my room, give her a morning greeting, tell her to wait just a little bit in Korean, take a pee-pee, put on some clothes, grab her toys and then make our way to a grassy area that is hidden by a wall of trees on one side and a fence on the other.
Here, Charlie runs about freely, she chases squirrels, we play fetch, sometimes I dance , jump up and down to get her excited, but in general we just play.
On the other side of the fence, every morning, the clean-up/management crew of the apartment complex starts to get ready for their days work.
I always marvel at how clean the complex is. Yes, I live in a ghetto neighborhood but the apartment grounds are always meticulously clean and makes the ugly worn down brown colors of the buildings look slightly better.
If one of the huge trash bins is clogged with dirty trash and overflowing, it is almost certain the next morning it will be cleaned. Litter, and anything that looks relatively offensive to the eyes, is picked up in record time.
I started to take notice of this because I am out two, three times a day and the area where I take Charlie is close to some of the trash cans. And always, without fail, whatever mess was left the other day, the next morning, it would be gone.
On this particular morning, while I was getting ready to head back home, one of the workers walked up to the fence where Charlie was playing. He said something very softly but since I had walked ahead, I wasn’t close enough to hear him.
I was a bit apprehensive because I thought he would tell me that I wasn’t allowed to play in the area with Charlie anymore.
I said, “excuse me? I’m sorry I didn’t hear you”
He looked at me trying to repeat what he said, but did a quick shake of his head, and began to slowly walk closer to me.
All the while, Charlie, elated to see someone who might be interested in her, began to follow him along the fence, wiggling her body and tail in excitement.
When he got close enough to me, I could see that he was a middle-aged man, probably in his late 40s or early 50′s, had soft eyes and the lines on his face were kind, the kind of lines that form when you smile often. I relaxed.
“I see you every morning here, playing with your dog. I just wanted to say you have beautiful dog.”
He spoke in a slightly broken English that was barely noticeable and tinged with a hispanic accent that was not too strong, but clearly there nonetheless.
“O thank you! She loves people, and she is very very sweet.”
“Is she a girl?”
“O yes, she’s a girl. You can pet her!”
He pulled out a brown worn hand that I immediately saw was weathered from hard manual labor.
“does she bite?”
“O no she doesn’t bite, Charlie never bites.”
And he began to pet her head, cooing to her and making my little pup beam with happiness.
“You have a beautiful dog.”
“Thank you! She’s a lot of work though. haha”
“Yes, you are out here early mornings.”
“O yeah, she wakes me up every morning and tells me its time to go out. She complains when I’m not fast enough. Do you have a dog?”
“No, no I don’t have a dog.”
I wanted to tell him, that I noticed the great job they were doing on the grounds so I quipped in,
“You know, you guys do a great job around here. I am always amazed at how clean this place is.”
“Thank you, we work hard. But they fire us. We work until Friday and we have to go.”
“O no…! Why? You guys do such an amazing job? Why would they fire you?”
“I don’t know. Every day, we clean and work hard. But they fire us, tell us that Friday our last day.”
“O no. Did you find a new job?”
“No, but I will have to find new job soon.”
“I’m very sorry to hear that… My name is Anna by the way, what is yours?”
“Manuel.”
I extended my hand out for a handshake and we shook hands.
“It was very nice to meet you Manuel.”
“It was nice to meet you Anna.”
“If I see you tomorrow morning Manuel, I’ll say hi!”
“Okay, Anna.”
He smiled at me and I waved back.
I walked away with my heart so heavy.
Anger, helplessness, despair, sad…I felt all that at the same time.
The world is unfair. The world is so unfair.
I wish I could have helped him. I have no money, no connections, no job, no power.
What I do have though is my membership. I have citizenship. But these people do not. We forget what a scary world it is when we are without papers, when we are without place, continually in transition, living in unknown, undefined spaces. There is no safety net. Uncle Sam is not for them.
Clearly, Manuel was an illegal immigrant. Clearly, he could do nothing about being let go without word, without reason.
This is the reality that so many of us don’t see. The reality that so many of us ignore.
The jobs that nobody cares to have but is so essential towards the safe maintenance of our streets, our public spaces, are filled up by our illegal immigrants, yet we fail to acknowledge the magnitude of their contributions.
Depressing.
