For Pedro

I clicked through the channels and landed on PBS, mid-way through a docu-mini about a young Mexican boy, Pedro (in ‘The first to learn English from Mexico’).

He felt betrayed by his parents who left him for America, only to send him to them five years later. He loved his home, and hated this land. His parents would say they want the best- they want him to learn English, read English, speak better, be better.

“Do you want to be on the street or do you want to go to college,” they say. 

But he is not a good student, he is hyper, he picks on the performing students, he is violent – throwing his pet cat about before hugging it and saying he loves it.

He is failing.

His teacher tells him he is failing, and tells his parents in front of him.

His mother scolds him.

He lies upon the grass as helicopter flies but Fascinated he calls to it “Take me with you!”

At first, upon landing on the scene where he is tormenting his cat, my first thought was “what is wrong with this kid?” Secondly, I thought he was mischievous and malevolent. Then I watched until the ending, and by then didn't know what to think...

It wasn’t until I saw the film for the second time, this time in full, that I understood Pedro’s pain – 

Of course he would be abusive to the creature he loves – that is how he feels his parents treated him.

Of course he picks on the American born achieving student Maya – because she is what he isn’t, or at least what he has been told he can’t be.

Of course he does not focus on his assignments and scribbles – he finds solace and departure from his reality in his daydreams – the dark of is too much to feel real.

And, of course, his parents do not see this. His teachers do not see this. Like myself, they only saw a fragment of child and took it upon themselves to fill the rest of him with their own dreams, imaginations and assumptions.

And in that moment of realization – I see myself in him, not my wanting, just myself as this boy, this child, hurting and wanting for nothing more but love and beauty.

I see the young Haitian teens I've , their teachers, their probation officers, their parents telling them 'all you have to do is study and be good, why is that so hard for you?'

This is for Pedro and all the immigrant children, struggling to find solace in America.