I encountered an article from The New York Times (you can read it here), called The Tire Iron and The Tamale. It is basically recapping experiences a man named Justin Horner had, as far as having multiple blow outs on the road or car trouble of sorts and the only people to come to his rescue were Mexican immigrants. Justin Horner is a graphic designer from Portland, OR. Be forewarned this has absolutely nothing to do with illegal immigrants or immigration policies or opinions on the “Arizona” law, (which I’m completely against) it’s about attitude. There are two reasons why this has semblance and has struck me. One, I can painstakingly relate to this ordeal. With one contemptible exception; I had to pay one hundred dollars to the highway patrol for use of their jack… Two, the only thing Americans need to be threatened by sometimes concerning immigrants is their American spirit and humanity.
In the article, the man watched tow truck after tow truck; car after car ; pass him by without a crumb of help being thrown his way, even though he posted signs in the window of his car and offered money. A family of four Mexican immigrants, transiently in the country for the tedious task of picking cherries and peaches on a farms and then returning home; altruistically stopped and donated their assistance. But not to the extensiveness one would expect. At first the jack was too small and the father took out a saw and cut a log that was on the side of the road, to prop the jack on to. The tire iron broke; the wife devotedly and blissfully walked to a gas station to go by a new one. This irksome and burdensome ordeal had taken hours and after trying to pay the Mexicans for their troubles, they so graciously responded by asking the gentleman down on his luck if he was hungry. “The two of us were filthy and sweaty. His wife produced a large water jug for us to wash our hands in. I tried to put a 20 in the man’s hand, but he wouldn’t take it, so instead I went up to the van and gave it to his wife as quietly as I could.” He said. The daughter benevolently handed him homemade tamale, where the man discovered the father had put the money inside the wrapper of the tamale. “The guy just smiled and, with what looked like great concentration, said in English: “Today you, tomorrow me.” This family was here for such a brief time, probably underpaid, to perform work most Americans would not and all too grateful of this; all the while portraying the morals and character that Americans say they posses and standby but too often falling short.
When my car broke down on a highway in the south, in the winter and late at night; it was a tire blow out by an exit ramp and right in front of a toll booth; I did not have road service of any kind and I realized the monumental mistake of that. Myself and the person I was with asked the toll booth attendant if she had a jack, or if anyone inside the building had one; there was about seven cars in the parking lot. A security guard came out and said she did not have one either but would call over to the construction crew vigorously working on the opposite side of the highway and see if they had one. In the meantime, I was pitifully asking a couple of people who were stopping to pay a toll if they could offer any assistance. The toll booth attendant “allowed” this a couple of times but then proceeded to say we couldn’t do that anymore, even though no one complained, I suppose it was parallel to panhandling. The attendant had been weary to some degree from the start as if this was a set up and a ploy for a much bigger crime in the process. I made a sign just as the man did in the article, offering money as well and only one group of young kids traveling in a band stopped to help but their equipment was too small for our car. When desperately checked back with the security guard after an hour or so, she said the equipment the construction crew would have would be too big. What am I trapped in the Goldilocks and the Three Bears? I certainly wasn’t running into the surrounding forests; mind you there was nothing for miles and miles that we could see. I didn’t realize how desolate these areas were. I was also under the impression that southern hospitality wasn’t a myth. I certainly vocalized that. The toll booth attendant said to call the highway patrol and after calling, it was out of sheer principle that I wanted to avoid having to pay that much for use of a jack. We decided to drive the car as far as we could take it, in hopes there would be a gas station, going about 10mph with the hazard lights on, I watched state trooper after trooper zoom by with absolutely no regard to one of the only cars on the highway with hazard lights on crawling at a snail’s pace. When I came to the realization of no rescue and no gas stations were present, we pulled the car over, right by wafting wildfire smoke nonetheless, and called the highway patrol.
In the article the man thought to himself “This family, undoubtedly poorer than just about everyone else on that stretch of highway, working on a seasonal basis where time is money, took a couple of hours out of their day to help a strange guy on the side of the road while people in tow trucks were just passing him by. I sat in my car eating the best tamale I’ve ever had, and I just started to cry.” It also made me think of my experience and past experiences. I remember once in my early twenties when I was in college and budgeting wasn’t a priority, I was outside of a 7-11 counting change so I could purchase milk. While other patrons were looking at me like I should be mortified and ashamed of my affliction and situation, a Hispanic woman came over and handed me whatever was in her pockets. Thinking of this and the situation with my car trouble; I thought to myself after paying enough for a month’s worth of electricity for use of the highways patrolman’s jack, being jerked around by the only people around for miles at the toll booth and silently being accused of a possible crime suspected I’d commit, being passed by half a dozen state troopers and suffering minor smoke inhalation, in retrospect, I would have given anything for a Mexican immigrant in shining armor.
No comments:
Post a Comment