Article October 25, 2004 Issue

'WHEN OUR FAMILY IS HEALED' WE'VE FOUND GOD'

By Natalia Darling, as told to Suzanne Smedley

I WAS ALMOST FOUR when my mother left El Salvador with me and my older brother and sister so that we could join my father in the United States. My father had left our country six months earlier, at my mother's insistence, to begin a new life in New York City. We had had a comfortable life in El Salvador, but my dad's drinking problem had begun to affect his work and our home. My mother felt it was best if he separated himself from the family and friends who had enabled his alcoholism.

I was old enough to know that my father wasn't well, and that we were struggling. We were living in a poor neighborhood, one of a few Latino families in a predominantly African American section of the Bronx. Like many immigrants, we moved around every few months for various reasons: Our building was unsafe, or burned down, or rat-infested; there was no heat, and so on. Although my father had been an accountant in El Salvador and spoke fluent English and Spanish, he could find only odd jobs. My mom, who spoke only Spanish, worked as a seamstress.

When my dad was drinking, he was not my "Papa Bear," the person I loved. He argued often, and there was a lot of volatility in our home. It's not surprising that this instability was reflected in our poverty and lack of education. As one can imagine, it was always difficult for me and my siblings just to get to school and to concentrate on our studies.