Family Dynamics: Father and Son

Castillo shows us the different sides of his father, almost as if he is on the outside observing him. Yet his narrative does not separate himself as someone who is trying to understand his father. I feel like the narrative surrounding his father does not take any specific negative or positive tone, rather one that is admirable of someone that they feel is above them, despite any flaws or mistakes they have. An example of this can be found in chapter 8, when Castillo is describing the different structures of the room and uses that metaphor to explore themes of compartmentalization. He continues to explain that his father can be easily stimulated into either ends of being happy and angry, and that Castillo also realized that he has the same habit. To me, the contrast he makes between himself and his father is more on the realm of realization and acceptance, rather than denial or any other negative aspects towards his father. This helps us understand more about Castillo and that his ideas about his father is of understanding about how he was shaped, and that Castillo has the same conflict of being shaped by an environment much different than his fathers. 

In a much different sense of understanding and acceptance of how Castillo sees his father, he also studies him. As he was helping preparing him for an interview in El Paso, Castillo tells us how he studies his father: "There was the broader image of my father, which I knew well, and then there were the smaller subtleties that I had forgotten over the years, some of which I never knew. Even in the short moments we'd already had together, I could already observe he didn't like the cuffs of his shirt to touch his wrists, he kept a pen in his shirt pocket with a small memo pad filed with names. Between both the large details and small, they composed the entirety of my father. I was content with having only part of him" ( pg 1956/4755 on Kindle). The way that Castillo observes and describes his father is very much disconnected, at least in this passage, from himself and their relationship. The habits that Castillo describe are not connected to their relationship as father and son, yet it can help us understand the way Castillo views his father; as a being whom he can only understand through observation. The last sentence eludes to the fact that his father is still a mystery, and with that in mind, he accepts that he cannot possibly understand or unravel identities of his father that are strange to him, or not apart of their relationship. 

Questions:

1) How do you classify the relationship between Castillo and his father? In what ways does the narrative about that relationship help us understand larger themes in the text?

2) Is Castillo's view of his father healthy? Can it be viewed as too objective/subjective?

"The Tidal Wave of the Past:" Intergenerational Trauma

Even though memoirs are expected to be centered around one person’s—the author’s—memories, Castillo’s memoir includes many short chapters that contain stories about multiple generations of his family. Castillo’s deep ties to his family’s past reflect the idea of intergenerational trauma—the theory that trauma can be passed on through multiple generations of families,communities, or cultures. Even as Castillo is grappling with his own immigration status, he also carries the weight of the trauma that the border and the immigration system has caused his family. Furthermore, he implies that his own story cannot be separated from his family’s story, as his parent’s struggles have permanently impacted the way he moves through the world.

               In the very first paragraph, before he describes the ICE raid on his home, Castillo suggests that many of his behaviors are inherited, as they seem to come naturally to him. He writes that in some moments, even if he had never experienced them before, “something inside [him] knew exactly what to do… as if I had been practicing for the Olympics” (1). His simile suggests automatic, repetitive motion, but he does not attribute it to instinct. Rather, he insists that “[it] was memory,” and that he was “tapping into an inheritance that up

until that moment [he] didn’t know he had” (1). Castillo points to his “inheritance” of trauma in the rest of this section of the memoir by sharing the experiences of his grandmother, mother, and father in Mexico, on the border, and in the United States. He suggests that due to their trauma, his body is wired to react in a certain way.

               Furthermore, since he imagines his memories as being older than his body, he thinks of his life not as a series of events that are happening for the first time, but as a continuous experience of déjà vu. He writes that, “[in] this way life appeared monotonous, nothing was a surprise, but my body couldn’t stop shaking,” introducing the reader to his constant state of anxiety and dread—the fact that he is always anticipating a disaster (1). Instead of seeing the past and the future as separate, he suggests that the past has the potential to affect the present. He positions himself as the border between the two, comparing his body to a “small breakwater holding back the past” (1).

How does Castillo relate his body to his family’s intergenerational trauma?

Do you think it is possible for Castillo to heal/recover from his trauma?

Moments of Erasure

        One of the things that immediately stuck out in the text is the reoccurring idea of erasure. Castillo includes a quote by Wendy Xu at the beginning of First Movement: "I am trying to dissect the moment of my erasure" (Castillo 9). Castillo describes his life as a long sequence of day to day survival, and he wonders what may have come of his life had he "been spared the energy it took to survive" (Castillo 8). Castillo's way of survival was a strategic method of erasing himself―to go unnoticed, to avoid getting caught. Not only does Castillo reveal how he erased himself but how the U.S. contributed to erasing him as well.

"I am trying to dissect the moment of my erasure"

        Castillo makes it a point to tell the ways he hid himself. Castillo describes his desire to blend in when he introduces the idea of Americanism that his father despises. Apa wanted Castillo to dress like him, not a representation of American culture. Castillo reveals that to dress a certain way leads to being noticed: "Why couldn't he see that I didn't want to bring attention to myself, that I wanted to hide?" (Castillo 38). Hiding himself led to facades that convinced him that they were who he was, when, in fact, they were erasing who he really is: "I had hid so much of myself through behaviors foreign to me, that I started to think those facades were in fact [me]." In the midst of his acts he "lost a sense of reality, a sense of who and what [he] was put on this earth to be" (Castillo 24).
        Castillo questions how much of himself he will have to give up as he pursues his green card from America. After erasing a lot of himself for survival, will he need to erase even more?: "I already had to erase much of myself, trying to survive; how much more was needed?" (Castillo 102). To become more American or a part of America, it is implied that immigrants must become less of their original culture. In his interview, Castillo says that the personal folder the woman carried about him "detailed everything about [him], and yet nothing." The government keeps every detail of his life, yet still fails to acknowledge the fears and longings that weave together to form who he is (Castillo 99). The woman tells Castillo and his wife that they most likely passed. "Welcome to America," she says, as if he had not been there for over 20 years. Such language suggests that, to the American government, he did not exist as anything other than an undocumented immigrant before that moment.
        The dissecting of Castillo erasure first begins with himself. He evaluates how his childhood was stolen from him. His mind erased his past because his mind decided some things were best not to remember. The profound moment is when he figures out how to find the parts of him that were erased: "Maybe if I touched the places where I (and those who came before me in my family) were born, then something would come back to me" (Castillo 24). Dissecting his erasure is not just analyzing when he was erased; it is dissecting who he and his family were before being erased.  

Life After Death

In the first part of the novel that we read for Tuesday Marcello talks about a brother Manuel who was born years before him and died hours after being born in the mid-80s. He mentions how Manuel was meant to be source of stability for his family. Since neither of his parents had citizenships their son could have been something that rooted their family in the U.S. and may have offered them a better understanding of who they are. Marcello is possibly indirectly talking about the 14th Amendment which has become very controversial over the last couple years. The 14th Amendment talks about Birthright citizenship, which is the principle that every child born on US soil is automatically a native-born citizen, regardless of the immigration status of the parents (vox.com).  Under the Trump administration many are making the arguement that this shouldn't apply to children of undocumented immigrants, despite multiple Supreme Court cases recognizing these children as U.S. citizens (vox.com). 

Throughout this part of the story he talks about Manuel as something that gave them purpose to be in the U.S.. When he talks about when they would return to Mexico he says that Manuel was the only person in their family who remained in one place (52). Throughout the novel he mentions many times how he had hard forming an identity of who he was because he was undocumented living in a country that he felt like he didn't belong in. He stresses how the border was not only a physical thing on the outside but something that he felt on the inside. I think in a weird way he is kind of jealous of his brother. His brother, if he had lived, would have been able to say he was Mexican-American, he would have an identity that would be accepted and understood by society. I also feel like he may be holding some resentment. If his brother were to live his family would have most likely stayed in the U.S. and could avoid run ins with immigration. I think Marcello tells us this story because he wants to reader to see the conflict he is facing with this identity crisis. Even though Manuel died over 30 years ago he had more of an identity that Marcello did at this time.

Vox Article 

1) Why do you think Marcello tells us this story?
2) How does the story about Manuel tie in with what he has been saying about the border throughout the book?