My American Dream by Julissa Villaverde
One of the Hispanic community’s most triumphant successes, Sandra Benitez, once stated, “Life gives us lessons and it’s just a circle” (Readers’, 2004). Some may assume that this is Benitez’s denotation of the “American Dream” that so many yearn to achieve in the United States. Growing up, Benitez did indeed learn the lessons life threw her way. Living in Mexico and El Salvador for much of her life, she realized that life was “frail and capricious” (Levine, 2004) without many guarantees. Later, Benitez’s parents considered the fact that their 14 year-old daughter would be attending high school and college very shortly. With Mexico containing less than 24 institutions of higher education with only about 30,000 students (Elliot, 2007), Mr. and Mrs. Benitez found it essential to send Sandra to the United States with her grandparents. Benitez moved between Latin-American and Anglo-American cultures during the summertime, and shifting between the two diverse cultures was a difficult task for her. This seemed to make her American Dream of becoming a writer grow increasingly difficult and distant. In due time, Benitez became an award-winning novelist and an inspiring bilingual motivational speaker who discusses how to overcome life’s obstacles and ensure happiness. I can relate to Sandra Benitez because I had to move and adapt to a new culture, while still striving for my American Dream to graduate from ASU as a nurse. Growing up, I was showered by the love of my mother, father, and baby sister. Our small family contained what every family desired: love, happiness, and unity. Together, my sister and I would hunt for treasure in the backyard, play secret agents, and when things got extremely serious, I would perform surgery on her with my toy instruments when we played “nurse.” We lived life optimistically and blissfully each day, and we were positive that it would only get better as the years progressed. I had my whole life mapped out; my American Dream consisted of two goals, which were to attend and graduate from ASU, and live my life as a nurse to help those in sickness or injury. Unfortunately, when I was nine years old, my parents went through a messy separation that changed my life forever. I recall the nights when my cheeks burned from the salt of my endless tears, and how scarlet my eyes were as I 117