As I come to the close of our 3rd Annual NPS Academy and commence the 4th Annual Pura Vida program I can't help but think back to the beginning. Not only to the beginning of when I developed these programs and began my work as a Youth and Diversity Outreach Coordinator, but to the beginning of my ancestral line.
Now I should say that as Latinos, my family isn't really into written documentation so I can only tell you the stories that have been passed down to me from my parents and grandparents. I come from a line of migrant workers on both sides of my family. My Paternal grandfather migrated into Texas at the young naive age of 14. As he struggled to get on his feet and pull himself up by his own bootstraps he worked the only job that he knew to do- a ranch hand. With little to no English skills and a 6th grade education, he knew he wanted to fulfill the American Dream. He came to this country to do just that, no matter the travesties and tribulations he had to endure, he wanted to give his family a better life. At the age of 22, he married my grandmother a 1st or 2nd generation Texan. She's the type of family you hear about that claims "we didn't cross the border, the border crossed us!" As far as she can remember they've always lived in the same town and who really knows for how long. My grandmother, a 4th grade educated woman, also grew up knowing the value of hard work. To this day, she still practices her reading and writing by reading magazines. There isn't a page that goes by that you don't see her name written in cursive letters.
When my father was young he and my aunt would be pulled out of school early every year to work the "piscas" or the fields. They traveled the country by car to pick cherries and apples in Washington and potatoes and cotton in Wisconsin. It was a tough life to make ends meet.
My maternal grandparents migrated from Mexico City into the States. My grandfather worked the fields and eventually mastered the English language, so well in fact that you'd never know he was a foreigner. A man with conviction to better his family and fight for the people he organized strikes against the pecan company where he worked as a union pecan Sheller. He organized along side Emma Tenayuca, a Mexican-American Activist to earn better wages and working conditions for the workers.
My parents believed in also giving us, their kids, more than they had. Growing up, we watched my parents struggle to make ends meet. Sometimes they had to decide between putting food on the table or paying bills. They strongly believed in making sure we got a strong education and doing whatever we wanted to do as long as you worked hard and were passionate about it.
My story is like that of many others like me. We have come a long way. To think of the hard work and dedication that my ancestors working the ranches, fields and in unbearable working conditions had to endure to open up doors for us, their future, their children.
Today, I work for the same reasons. I work to introduce youth to their national parks, made possible by those that came before us. I work to open doors for those that come after me, so that they too have the same and even better opportunities that I was given. It is for all of them and all of those that worked their fingers to the bone that I'm able to pick berries for fun and live my American Dream.
