Many years ago when I was living in Los Angeles, I had the opportunity to teach English as a Second Language classes to the many groups of recently arrived immigrants from Central America. These students came to class with little formal education — many of them unable to read or write their native language.
They quickly learned that some knowledge of English was a great advantage in getting a decent job, and also needed to just cope with daily living among a mostly English-speaking community. Many came to class shortly after crossing the border from Mexico. Many were young men fleeing the horrendous civil wars in Central America. Many were like Miguel.
Miguel was a teenage boy from El Salvador forced to leave that country by his family to avoid a certain death. Young men and boys in El Salvador were forced into fighting for one side or the other in that civil war. With most of the fathers already killed in the war, mothers of the remaining boys faced the heartbreaking decision to send their sons out of the country in hopes that they could live out a normal life in the United States.
Most ESL students came to evening classes at a local church school. We reviewed some basic English grammar and vocabulary — comparing English words and phrases to the Spanish equivalents. Because time in the evening classes was limited, many students, like Miguel, wanted more practice and attention. So I also spent several Saturdays teaching them in their homes — mostly large apartment complexes where they lived together with other family members and friends.
Miguel was somewhat behind the other students in learning English. He had only a few years of formal education in El Salvador, and limited ability to read and write in Spanish. To help him keep up, I spent some time working with him individually. We met a couple times at my apartment to get away from all the distractions that made it difficult to accomplish much at his place. We had the chance to talk about his experiences as a new immigrant to this country, and how his life here compared to life in El Salvador.
I asked Miguel about how everything was going for him. He would always just smile and say “Pues, estoy vivo!” (“Well, I’m alive!”) Life was not something that he took for granted. Just being alive was his measure of success!
At that time, I never gave much thought to Miguel’s outlook on life. I was probably not mature and wise enough to appreciate his situation. But for many years after my time in Los Angeles, when I faced some challenging times and difficult decisions, Miguel’s words and perspective came to mean so much more to me. I was better able to view my particular challenges from a higher and broader point of view. At least in a small way, I was able to appreciate my gift of life, and to see how relatively small and insignificant my daily problems were in the overall scheme of life.
I was able to see my life a bit more like Miguel.
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