I am a Malibu resident with a simple but important story. Two years ago, I was remodeling my home and needed help with the demolition. I drove to the Labor Center where I was given a number. The young man who had the matching number introduced himself as Hector. I was impressed he spoke some English. I told him to hop in the car and I would return him later. He told me he had his own car, would follow me, and again I was impressed.
Hector did the work I needed in a meticulous manner and I asked if he cared to return the following day for more work. A year and a half later, Hector is still working with me and has become as important to me as my own family.
He came here a few years ago from Guatemala. He and his wife and their two children live in a studio apartment in Inglewood. He has his work permit, a social security number, a credit card, a car and car insurance. He is in that seemingly eternal process of immigration to become a U.S. citizen. He wants that more than anything. He, like so many others, came here for a better life.
That is where this story really starts. Hector has taught me what I have to be grateful for to live in this country. Something I have never really stopped to think about. Something I and so many others have taken for granted. And now I want to pay him back for that priceless gift. So I decided to help him with this very difficult process that almost all those men face standing on the corner hoping to work doing anything.
I started by having my workmen teach him everything they could. He has learned carpentry, tilework, drywalling, painting — you name it, he can now do it.
I then thought about his living situation and what it would be like for a family of four to live in one room. I found out one basically needs four lines of credit to qualify for ever even being able to purchase a home. I added his name to a few of my credit cards and loaned him the money to buy a small house in Santa Monica. He, his wife, and daughters will live there until the house has appreciated to the point where he can sell it and have the profit to buy a home on his own. He will have some money, be a legal tax paying citizen, and have some good credit. He, his wife and his little girls can then have a chance and truly live the American dream.
Hector’s 43rd birthday is Sunday and the whole neighborhood where I live here in Malibu that have been hiring him as an all around fix-it-man have chipped in for various presents including “Handyman” business cards, a pager, a tool belt, some tools, but most of all I think, self esteem. He moves into his new home soon after his birthday. His oldest daughter will start the Immersion School in Santa Monica where she will learn English. She then moves right over to the regular Santa Monica McKinley Grammar school and his youngest will follow in her footsteps.
We are not rich. We are not famous. We are regular people that have done this because he has an appreciation for this country that all of us, quite frankly, had forgotten or even, more truthfully, never even had. He stands tall now and I now know and understand the American dream. Happy Birthday, Hector. And thank you.
This letter was submitted by a person who prefers to remain anonymous