The Purpose of Sunday

By Chloe Hodnett Editor

Stepping off the plane and onto the drab, gray LaGuardia airport carpet below, Jerónimo EscuderoYepes had accomplished what he was striving towards since he was twelve years old: moving to the United States to study engineering in one of the American universities he had seen in movies. Though excited, he couldn’t help but feel the ache of homesickness, as he’d just left his mother, his beloved dog Napóleon, his girlfriend, his friends, and the green pastures of his small Colombian farmtown behind him.

He now lives with his sisters and his father, who had moved here about 10 years prior. His lust for life is evident, both in his manner of speaking and the way he describes his life back home. He is in this life to live, and that’s exactly what he’s doing.

This new stage in Jerónimo’s life is currently characterized with the juxtaposition between his idealized perception of the US and his view now, from the inside.

“Don’t come to the United States if you don’t have a goal, or you’ll get swept up in the current of moneyProductivity,” Jerónimo told me, having been bombarded by American billboards advertising get-rich-quick schemes and energy pills.

Though his objective is clear, his goals steadfast, he still finds time to be human - to breathe. He’s spent his time between work and school reading, playing guitar, taking walks, talking to his friends and family back home, and looking out at the stars above. Many, like me, are consumed with achieving, garnering clout, clothes, success--whatever to feed the monster of productivity, without ever allowing ourselves the space to breathe. Jerónimo, on the other hand, has achieved both the greatest goal of his adolescence and the greatest goal of each day, and by default, the greatest goal of one’s life: maintaining one’s personhood; a skill underdeveloped in today’s world. Using strength garnered through hundreds of late-night chats with friends and early morning dog walks, Jerónimo has put his smalltown sensibilities to the ultimate test: withstanding the heat of the fifty states’ frying pan.

“No one talks to each other…....people have forgotten what it means to be human,” he says. When describing his friends back home, he noted how each of them were vastly different from himself. He talked of their intense and lively conversations, of parties and potlucks on plowed fields, and the feeling that his friends weren’t just with him for a good time--they were with him, as a brother or as a sister. This sort of community camaraderie is exceedingly rare in the states, particularly among our generation. Maybe it’s because of social media, maybe the urge to succeed trumping our humanity, or maybe it’s something else. Either way, Jerónimo’s achievements and perspective serve as a helpful reminder (or maybe a desperate plea) to never forget who we are, beyond all goals.

“Think of me as your reminder of the purpose of Sunday,” Jerónimo said. “I am your reminder to rest, to let yourself be, to be human. Tomorrow you will need another reminder, whether it be a book, a walk, or just a breath, but you need to remind yourself every day that you are alive.”