I know why the caged bird sings: A story of an undocumented teen
A person’s teenage years can be an incredibly formative period of life, one for asking questions about ourselves, and going forward to answer these questions as well. Teenage angst lends itself to the questions of visibility and worth, particularly in relation to the self.
Add another layer onto that — the layer of living in a country where your very existence is contested everywhere from courtrooms to social circles. For a girl — who for the sake of her legal status will be called “Songbird” — who has grown up in Essex County, New Jersey, without the proper documentation of that of a citizen, growth of that nature has felt stunted.
A year ago, Songbird was caught in the fervor of the SATs and college applications, prom dress shopping and track meets. Now, post-graduation, the only way she feels she’s running is in circles — away from any real change or progression. This is her story. It has been lightly edited for clarity.
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I came here when I was 7, around 2006 — I was born in Mexico. I don’t remember much about Mexico, or anything important at least. I don’t even know countries or cities around it, because — mind you — I was like 6 years old when I was brought here, so all I know is America. I don’t know any history of Mexico, or important information that most Mexicans would know. If I was raised there I would’ve known a lot more.
When I was brought here … I didn’t know who my biological mother was. I was left behind for six years of my life with my grandmother, believing that she was my mom. Six years later, my mother appears and she told me that she was my biological mother. She stayed in Mexico for a few months, and the original plan was for her to get my two oldest brothers but not me to America but since my grandmother was getting sick, my mom decided to bring me with her as well.
[In Mexico] we were like strangers at the time because [my brothers] were roaming the streets, or they would go to school and not come back. They would go hang out with their friends and they wouldn’t come home to sleep so we basically made the family once we came to America. When we came to America, my mom didn’t have a place. She knew where my father was living. When we got here, we were living in the living room. My father was in one room, and there was another person in the second room in this two-room apartment — another unrelated, undocumented person.
Growing up to me wasn’t very easy, but then again I could cope with it because I was growing up here. Outside of growing up, I had to deal with the language barrier, learning Spanish and English at the same time, learning how to speak to other people.
The culture was really different and my mom was one of the types of parents that is very overprotective, and it was complicated because I was trying to live the American lifestyle but I was also living the Mexican dream with a Mexican mom. So there would be things that I wasn’t allowed to do, that I would’ve liked to do. So that was hard.
For example, in America a lot of teenagers hang out after school, get some ice cream, go to the movie theater or just hang out at the park. My mom had a perspective that we can’t hang out, that’s not right, we’re not from this country therefore we’re in high risk of getting ourselves in trouble, so it’s better to stay home for our own safety. We weren’t allowed to go out so I would mainly stay on social media or read books, and I didn’t really have the party lifestyle or a lot of friends. None of my friends ever came over to my mom’s house at all. And it was very hard at that stage, the teenage stage, that you’re trying to make friends and trying to find who you are and all that.
It was also the fear of getting myself in trouble. When I was living in West Orange, and that’s a complicated community and sometimes you just don’t think right when you’re with friends, and you decide to try out different things that could get you in trouble … Once you’re in this group of friends, they would always assume that you belong there and you can’t be any better than that. … People would rather look at you one way.
[My legal status] didn’t really affect me until my high school years because there were trips where you’d have to fly out, and even the track team had meets out-of-state. I couldn’t be involved in that because I wasn’t able to travel, so that closed my door to that. There were also trips to go to Georgia, and to meet the president and stuff, and I wasn’t able to do that because of my legal status. Or even student exchange — a lot teachers mentioned it to me, brought it up to me, but I couldn’t do it. It was like a closed door for me.
I have a lot of things I can’t do because I’m not legal. Like I can’t get a driver’s license unless I’m in Maryland or New York.and from my experience, what I’ve heard is a lot of Hispanics do decide to go to Maryland and get it done, but from my own point of view I don’t want to do anything illegal that could wrap me up in jail. So I would rather just not do that, but like any other teenager, I would have loved to drive, but I can’t,. I took a driver’s ed course, I passed the exam — but if I show up at the DMV they have these six points that I have to have, which I don’t. One of them is a Social Security number — I don’t have one.
It affects me a lot, because from my experience, I have to work and I have to commute and I usually use the train or the bus to move around, but since the weather is changing and New Jersey’s transit is not the best — sometimes there’s certain delays and I’m late for work and I would make perfect timing for work and I could also travel a little bit farther from my house if I was able to drive.
You graduated high school in the spring, are you doing college classes at all?
No. No no no no no. Even that has detained me from a lot — for example, scholarships. Because I can’t receive scholarships since I’m not a US citizen. Even my financial aid is very complicated compared to American citizens and every time you call they’re making it seem like it’s your fault that you’re illegal. For example, I called recently and asked for help on how to fill out some forms, and they’re like “You don’t know what day you came? You don’t know how you came?” I was six years old when I came here, I would not remember the exact day I came to America, and how can I give you a specific date if I don’t know?
And [doing] my mom’s taxes and my taxes — how am I supposed to know how to do that if I [don’t have that information]? I took finance in high school, so I know how to do it, but I can’t do it with my mom’s history.
We cannot leave the state. Well, recently I did leave the state by train for a little vacation, but even that I didn’t even tell my own mother I was leaving just because of her reaction about it because there’s just the fear that you might go and not ever come back, or they’ll deport you and [your family] won’t know where you are. When ICE was doing raids, I heard that a lot of people get deported but a lot of people don’t.
For example, I have two brothers that are in jail. They’ve been in jail for at least five years and two years, and they have not been deported but yet ICE has other people that they have just taken away from their families and they’re stuck behind bars and they can’t get deported — I just don’t understand why they’re just locked up like animals. But yet there’s jails that have undocumented people just sitting there and everyone’s taxes are going to those people that are in jail. My sense is to deport the ones that are in jail already instead of the ones that don’t have any criminal records other than them being illegal.
Luckily I have not been in any situation like that [with ICE] and thank God for that, because I don’t know how I would react to that, emotionally, but I was in fear about it because my mom lives with fear in her heart and she knows that we don’t belong here and she’s just lost on her own, and it’s like “Pretend you don’t exist, don’t do anything crazy, follow the law.” And I like to do a lot of stuff — I like to go to Six Flags, I like to go to Dorney Park, I go to the park, I like hanging out with my friends. And when they were doing the ICE raids, I had to stop doing all that because I wasn’t feeling like I was safe.
My mom has gone all the way under the radar, I’d say, but where she lives is like a main spot where there have been ICE raids. There have been ICE raids by the train stop, too.
My mom has been here about 20 years and has been afraid to apply for citizenship because she has heard a lot of stories about people applying for citizenship and they can’t, or they just get deported as soon as they try to apply for citizenship.
I was actually waiting for the DREAMers Act but I had to turn 18 in order for me to get my passport, but I didn’t have a state ID other than my school ID and now that I have turned 18, I have my passport, but they shut down the DREAMers Act, so I wasn’t able to apply for that.
I’ve always wanted to do things on my own, do things for myself. I would’ve already been driving, in a better job, I would’ve already been in college by now. I would’ve taken college credits and I would’ve been fine, like any other American citizen. I would actually go into criminal law or psychology. With all the legal things going on as far as undocumented people being seen as criminals, even though they haven’t broken a law. Their only break is that they’re here in America. And a lot of the millennials were brought here. Personally, I don’t remember a lot on how I came here, where I went or who took me. Like that part is so closed in my mind that I really don’t remember anything. I do have a lot of friends, too, who don’t have any memories of when they came, and I think it’s unfair for them to be treated as criminal or that they broke the law when they were just kids.
My family is close, and we try to also help out people around our community who are going through a hard time. For example, my brother has the DREAMers Act and sometimes he helps out to send messages to people in the prisons from our community who were already taken by ICE.
As a DREAMer, he can drive, he can go to college, he can apply for financial aid, and he has a social security number so with his financial aid, he has a specific section where he can use that social security number so he can identify who he actually is, and he has multiple ways of proving who he is with his ID, driver’s license, passport. And with the DREAMers Act he can just voice himself and he’s not walking around in the street terrified of what may happen because he has the DREAMers Act.
When I was younger I would always think I would vote because I hadn’t known I wouldn’t be able to so I would always be watching the news and the Democrats and the Republicans, but once I got into high school and got the knowledge that I can’t vote. It became worthless for me to even look at it or what they’re saying or planning on doing because I can’t do anything about it anyway. It’s out of my hands so I just lost interest. It’s like you’re basically looking at the world continue their lives the way they want to. And it upsets me because so many people don’t vote although they are able to vote, and I just feel like people don’t use the opportunities they have right in front of them.
