Dreams Deferred
By Christopher Edwards on 08/17/2010 @ 11:10 AM
"Falling in Love" by Diego Medrano
Staying together shouldn't be this hard.
Nine years ago -- August 16, 2001 -- I went to San Francisco's long-running Brit pop dance party Popscene with my boyfriend. It was our first date. I still have the set list from that night.
We had met the previous month at a show; he bought me a beer. (There is some debate about who spoke to whom first.)
None of this is remarkable of course.
Just your normal met-cute story of two twentysomething San Francisco college students. Even that my boyfriend was born in Japan is not remarkable. Lots of binational couples meet while in school.
No, what makes this story unfortunately difficult iIs that we both happen to be male. And in the U.S. -- and his native Japan -- that gives us few options for staying together.
Over the last nine years, we've become nomads in my own country. We eventually left California seeking stability and work for both of us on the East Coast. First in Washington, DC, which was an all-around failure, and now New York City, which has been more successful.
But the cost — physical, emotional, and financial — of these moves and our attempts to forge a life together cannot be understated.
Our peers are settling down, buying homes, having or adopting children, going to grad school, starting businesses, and otherwise stepping into their adult lives.
All of these things, we'd love to do. Dreams we've shared that have been denied by our broken immigration system that does not recognize us as family.
Each year that goes by gets more and difficult and the problems compound. He hasn't seen his much beloved-grandparents in years. I'm increasingly frustrated by my country's refusal to make our situation right. My family traces its roots in the U.S. back to the 18th century. We had land grants in Michigan signed by James Monroe.
Not that any of this should matter.
I'm an American citizen. Born in Pennsylvania, raised in the midwest by midwest--born American citizens. I have no out-sized sense of entitlement here. I'm lucky to have been raised by loving parents in a good home in relative affluence under the rights and privileges of American democracy. And yet the very promise of that democracy is denied to my partner of nine years.
As he and I celebrate our ninth anniversary, I want to ask something of you. There is one national organization with the legal and lobbying prowess to fix the immigration system for same-sex partners — Immigration Equality. After years of volunteering with them, at the dawn of their Washington-focused Action Fund, I joined the staff. We need your support.
Political work -- grassroots mobilizing, lobbying -- is incredibly expensive work. We're up against extremely well funded organizations. To stay in the game, we need your help.
Honor our relationship with a monthly contribution to the Action Fund today. Give what feels right but perhaps $36 per month for the 36,000 relationships like ours. Or, if you are feeling especially generous, you can can make a donation of $90 a month to honor our nine years.
When I first started dating my partner, who has been coming to the U.S. since he was in middle school, why America. He told me, because I love movies and rock and roll where else would I want to be?
Your contributions, your direct action, your stories, can help make his and my — and perhaps your — dreams come true.
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