Border Street: Eddie's attitudes on illegals put to the test
By Tina Griego, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)
Published January 22, 2007 at midnight
Not having much of a mind for dates, Longtime Eddie cannot pinpoint the moment he begins to suspect the young man he has grown to love like family might be an illegal immigrant.
The possibility presents Eddie with certain conflicts since he has, on more than one occasion, complained vigorously that illegal immigrants are taking American jobs and hurting working-class people like, well, like himself, a man well acquainted with minimum wage labor and a military veteran at that.
This conflict is not entirely resolved when his friend admits he did enter the U.S. illegally, but now has papers allowing him to work legally. This explanation confuses Longtime Eddie, who typically does not trust what he doesn't understand. "Figuring it out is like trying to stab the wind with a knife," he says.
They've been friends for three years. When they first met, Eddie had just ventured back into a bar. He'd been sober for several years and was wary of temptation, so he ordered nonalcoholic beer and worked on his pool game. He'd once been a good player and it didn't take him long to notice the young man struggling with his shots.
They struck up a conversation. The young man was Salvadoran. He greeted Eddie with "usted," the respectful "you" of Spanish. The boy was well mannered, Eddie noticed, but became a hothead when he lost. After they became partners, Eddie told him: "You swallow that heat and shake your opponent's hand. Act with dignity."
"We started to be friends," The Salvadoran says, during a break at a recent pool tournament. "I used to party like crazy. He opened my eyes to what is good to do in the United States, how to behave. He told me to choose my friends carefully."
"He told me he wanted to be a professional pool player," Eddie says. "I told him he would never be a pro. I said, 'The only thing you'll be a pro at is partying.' That's when I told him, if you come to this country and you want to be a citizen, you have to keep your nose clean. And learn English. English is the language here."
The Salvadoran had taken some classes already. He was working at a restaurant and his boss told him if he learned English, he'd get a raise.
"I started studying like crazy," The Salvadoran says, laughing. "I watch TV in English, I ask everyone to speak to me in English. At work, when I heard words I didn't know, I wrote them on my arm so I could read them all day. Like 'vegetarian.' I wrote that on my arm."
Eddie noticed The Salvadoran once had used different last names in a pool tournament. He later had some trouble with his driver's license. Are you here legally or not, Eddie wondered. "That's when I wasn't sure if he was telling me the truth. I don't know if you have a friend from Mexico. If you do, you know there's a line, an invisible line, somewhere in there that you can't cross because you don't want to hurt them and you don't want them to hurt you."
The Salvadoran told Eddie his story between pool shots and games and tournaments. Born in El Salvador. Father and sister died in a house fire when he was 3. Grandmother raised him. He sold chickens, pigs, flowers, went to school, graduated, even studied business management for two years. His uncle was living in Denver, a longtime legal resident. Come over here, he said, you can make a lot more money. His uncle paid a coyote $7,000 in 2000. He was 20 years old.
"The hardest part was crossing Mexico. I take a bus in Mexico and at every stop, the police come on and ask, 'Where are your papers?' Each time, I just give them 300 pesos. It took me one month and 14 days to get here and I probably eat 20 meals the whole time."
If Eddie was dismayed by his friend's illegal journey into this country, The Salvadoran says he never showed it. "Eddie is my closest friend," he says when Eddie walks away from the table. "He is to me like the dad I never had."
Eddie understands this as well as he understands that he met The Salvadoran the same year his youngest son died. If The Salvadoran was a young man looking for a father, Longtime Eddie was a father who just lost a child.
"I guess I look at it this way," Eddie says. "People have gone through certain things in life and you can't say that you know what it was like for them. Oh, people say they know: 'I can imagine what you went through.' No, you can't. You cannot. You can't know what I went through when I lost my son. I can't know what he went through to get here. I do know he works hard and he tries his best.
"What's the word I'm looking for? Hypocrite. I guess I'm a hypocrite. I have used the word, 'wetback.' It's confusing in my mind because my people have suffered with illegal immigration. It's like I said before, the government says it's going to do something, but it never does and that puts poor people from there against poor people from here."
The Salvadoran planned to return home after two years and get a job in the airport. But, with the help of his uncle and his boss, he was able to stay - on a year-to-year basis - though a special immigration program for Salvadorans. He received a legal work permit, a card with his picture and the words "Department of Homeland Security."
When it was time to renew his work permit last October, Eddie drove The Salvadoran to immigration. "I saw him fingerprinted and the whole thing," Eddie says. "It went real smooth because he stays out of trouble."
A temporary work permit is not the same thing as legal permanent residency, which is what The Salvadoran says he most wants.
"He's always had the right attitude to be here," Eddie says. "It's beautiful. I tell him, 'You'll be here all your life if you want to be.' "
Eddie points to The Salvadoran's baseball cap, which is on backwards, and to his blue jeans, which are baggy. Look at him, he says, grinning. Practically an American already.
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