The Box

A soft stream of light shone through the attic window, illuminating a small, rugged- looking box blanketed by years of accumulated dust. Drawn to it, Alex moved slowly towards it and reaching for it, tentatively opened the box.

Old and mildewed time was obscured in each of the objects inside the box; letters, journal entries, pictures- remnants of an era that seemed strange and unfamiliar to Alex. But it was a mysterious portrait that caught Alex’s eye. Carefully pulling it out from the pile of memoirs, Alex removed the dust that hid the portrait’s face with the ends of his shirt. To his surprise, and after a moment’s gaze at the vision, the deep round eyes that the portrait revealed reminded Alex so much of…himself.

Alex was both repelled and fascinated by the portrait and the box of memoirs. It was as if an unfamiliar force had led him to this discovery. He released, at the opening of the box, an unexplainable energy that he could now not abandon. The magnetism of the mysteriousness that emanated from the portrait on which his eyes were set, initially compelling him to leave, would not allow him to do so either. Alex could not contain himself. He sat on a nearby rocking chair in heavy contemplation. The urgency inside his stomach triggered by the rare discovery, bopped teasingly within him until finally pouring out from his fingertips as he reached for a dust covered notebook inside the box…

The first thing I noticed was the boy. I call him ‘the boy’ because I still do not know his name. He was no more than 11 years old. Strawberry blonde and blue eyes. His eyes, sincere and pleading. I felt an enormous amount of intensity looking into them. Realising the truth in the cliché…his eyes were indeed the windows to his soul. There was a lingering loss about his soulful eyes, becoming more and more evident with each slow blink. The loss…painful. But then again, that was something no one could hide here, no matter how hardened they had become. A person’s eyes cannot conceal what is real or what is desired. They, farmers from the East; Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas and Missouri, have all lost something. Something irreplaceable, something invaluable. And they shared a common desire- to one day be relieved from the hardship they endure.

One thing I couldn’t understand was the boy’s smile. It seemed almost out of place. The boy, surrounded by so much grief and poverty, and constant reminders of an irreplaceable and invaluable loss (for he walked amongst people at a loss), still managed to smile.

In return for such warm welcome, I smiled back. As I approached the dusty camp gates, the picture became more and more grim…

Behind the camp gates, I was looking into a craggy field, manned by people who looked just as rugged as the landscape. There were tents, erected by wooden poles and occupied by busy workers, some stopping for a rest, others forced to retreat. These, I assumed were the homes they had made for themselves. There were also metal shelters and adobes. These were for the more ‘permanent’ campers. The Arvin Federal Camps were supposed to provide healthy alternatives to the poor sanitation of life on the road journeyed by most of these workers. They were supposed to minimise public health problems. But the sight told of an overcrowded and filthy lifestyle. Their faces shadowed by the dirt of their labour and starvation.

Lost in what was to me a heartrending image, I had forgotten that standing beneath me was the strawberry blonde child, staring at me curiously and still smiling. His smile seemed immediately to comfort me.

“Why hey there sir…lost are ya?” He said meekly in his boyish southern accent. I lowered myself to the boy who stood equal to my elbows.

“No…no…not at all. I’m at the right place…” And discreetly, “I think…”

The boy at first appeared mildly startled by the close proximity of my eyes and his as he moved a step backwards. Instinctively, I stood back up. With a hesitant smile, and trying not to put him in an uncomfortable position, I asked, “Is this…this where you’re staying?”

The next thing the boy did was beyond my ‘instinctive abilities’. He took my hand and led me into the field. I could not have guessed that in the few minutes of our first meeting, the boy would be brave and grab the hand of a stranger. He talked while he took me through the camp. Suddenly, I was seeing the grim image I looked at through closed gates, in full dimension. Corners, alleyways, ledges…places that were not so visible from afar.

“Yes sir…I live here with my family…Pa an’ Granma. We’re from Oklahoma. This is our tent….Pa and Ma (that’s what I call Granma for short)….and I stay here…..” He paused. A look of sadness hovered about his face. It was his eyes again. They told me, in its honest way, that he had been reminded of loss. The boy lowered his head. “Ma, my real one…she didn’t make it on the way here…while she was giving birth to Mary…” He paused. “My baby sister…she didn’t make it here either. We left them back on the road. Pa said that God would look after them now. I wish I could see them. I miss them an awful lot…” I was right, there was a certain ‘loss’ about the boy. And…it was irreplaceable and far more invaluable than the ‘relief’ his family sought out here in the west. He had lost both his mother and his sister. That’s a loss most children his age will never experience.

As I reached out to comfort the child, I felt a new energy creep into the tent. When I turned around, I was greeted with a cheery sigh and a quick throw of the arms in the air.

“Aw, there you are. I’ve been expectin’ you!” It was Tom Collins, manager of the camp. I was taken by surprise when he hugged me and patted my back. “Where have you been? You were supposed to be here 30 minutes ago”. He looked at the boy. And tilted his head, as if to say ‘oh, no wonder!’ “Well, I guess the lil kid entertained you for a while!” He ushered me out of the tent and took me on a two and half hour ‘tour’ of the place. Walking, meeting people, learning…

I never got to properly thank the boy for his welcome and I feel guilty for the abrupt exit. All I got time to do before Tom thrust me out of the tent was wink at the boy as acknowledgement and thanks for his company….

A vehicle. Pulling up. Footsteps. Got to see who’s there. It’s coming from the gates. The footsteps… I can’t hear them anymore. Listen. The footsteps have stopped. Walk closer. Around this corner. It’s a man. What’s he looking for? His clothes…they aint rags like Ma and Pa’s. He’s wearing shoes. Black…leather…I think that’s what it’s called. What’s he staring at? They’re just tents. They aint much to sleep in. He seems lost. Better ask him if he’s alright. Walk a little closer. Stop. Wait.

He isn’t lost. He’s at the right place. Oh…he’s come a bit too close. Wait, I’m scaring him. He’s getting up. I didn’t mean anything by it…I swear sir. It’s just that…there aint no one comin’ around here dressed like you for a while. The truth is, I’m curious…and sure am glad there’s someone looking like you comin’ round here. You’re hella different to everyone. Alls I see these days are people. Tired people…I should show him around the place, ‘fore anyone tries anything. Ma and Pa’ say people outside don like us much. Don’t talk to him. No… Ma and Pa will be worried They’d be upset. He’s from outside. He aint from here. But his eyes. They look… sincere…Take his hand.

I always thought that ‘digging up the past’ was morbid. When the only purpose of digging up the past is to ‘get dirt’, that is. It isn’t right. I don’t see how human pleasure could in the slightest way, be associated with it. So you dig up the past. What happens next? You’re ‘enlightened’ to information that no one knows about. You either tell the whole world or become content with the knowledge that only you can say prudently ‘I know what you’ve been up to’.

But what happens if the ‘dirt’ concerned you? Or even worse, if the ‘dirt’ wasn’t for your eyes or ears? What do you do? Breakout. Take the blame because you’re the one who went to look for trouble…. What if the ‘past’ found you?…

…Like an unexplainable force compels you to find the past…one thing leads to another and one day, you find yourself looking through a box of memoirs in an attic you were once forbidden to enter.

…Digging up the past. Morbid I say. But maybe, just maybe…your mind and your body subconsciously yearns to know, to feel, to be informed. Because there’s a void that needs to be filled.

The discovery of the box, you could say, represents my peace of mind. Opening that box didn’t just lead me to distant memories of someone I had never met, it opened my mind and my heart to things I had long forgotten. It didn’t provide all the answers and nothing is for sure…but like I said. It’s my peace of mind. I believe I was meant to find the box. To this day, I still cannot explain what it was that led me to that attic corner. I wasn’t meant to go that far into the room. It was a quick check of the house to find anything worth keeping. I wasn’t meant to find it…but I did…

Alex gently placed the notebook on his lap and put the box back on the floor beside the antique chair on which he sat. By now, the urgency inside him gave him the confidence to proceed without feeling guilty about whose belongings they were. Both his body and mind was convinced there was no other option. Curiosity took over.

As Alex opened the book, he felt the ends of the pages almost crumble on his fingertips. The book had not been touched for years. The handwriting, Alex thought, was hard and passionate. Thick cursive writing. The t’s and the f’s crossed only ever so slightly, telling of the hurry the piece was written in. Alex searched his limited memory of the past. It was limited partly because he had taught himself to forget. Nothing. He couldn’t recognise the hard, passionate writing and he knew for sure it wasn’t his mothers. Her writing was slow and easy. He decided it was the writing of a male. The strongest evidence of this was the lack of care the writer took in staying on the lines and the frequent crossings. Not at all feminine, he thought.

The first page looked like it was a journal entry. The entry, dated October 1936…

My first full day at the migrant camp could not have been more heart-felt than what I could have imagined. I did not expect to be met with such open arms. Once I told everyone why I was here, a new spirit burned within the camp. They told me that they’re glad to see a different face around, even though there are dozens and dozens of new workers coming in each month. There are a few still unconvinced by my intentions. They’re probably embittered by the harsh treatment given to them by the locals. But the majority feel some relief that their stories can be told. Not to get sympathy, but so that the public is informed and not carried away with prejudice. It’s hard to imagine how people could put up such a happy front for my arrival…

…after all they must have gone through…despite all they continue to go through….

I arrived here early morning around 9. The migrants were well and truly into their respective jobs by then. Some harvested cotton, others lemon. Maybe oranges, peas, potatoes or prunes. Can you believe it? A person could expect to be paid 5 cents for each box of fruits harvested...filled to the rim! That’s underpayment. But they are desperate and willing to do anything in order to afford meals for their families. Jobs are also hard to attain because so many have come from the South West.

A young boy, who looked no more than 11 years old, greeted me at the gate of the Arvin Federal Camp. He seemed sad, but he took my hand and led me through the camp gates, past the fields and into a tent, which he claimed, was where he and his Pa and Ma stayed. Eventually Tom found me. He took over my ‘tour’ for the next 2 and half hours.

I am staying in the nearby town of Weedpatch, but no doubt I’ll be here, amongst the migrant workers at the camp more often than I’ll be in town. It is they after all, the migrants, whom I will write about. I need to be with them.

This morning, when I first got to the camp gates, I was staring at a busy field of filth, starvation and weariness. While that is true, I am slowly being exposed to something much more. There is something intensely great about the camp. It cannot be physically touched…but it can be felt. Outside I see weariness and exhaustion, but there is, I am sure, something inside that burns and keeps these migrants determined to survive. The fact that they got here alive is a miracle in itself. And there is more to the camp than tents, metal shelters and adobes, the visible elements from outside camp gates. There is a dance hall, sewing rooms and kitchens. I really think the migrants have built themselves quite a community.

I am here to report the conditions of the migrant camps to the San Francisco News. They will expect a report on the impoverished conditions, the burnt out state of the migrants… the harsh treatment given to them by the locals. My God, I will surely report these. But there is something much more…and I cannot quite grasp it yet. Reporting the conditions of the camp is no longer my priority…it’s telling the truth…telling their stories…capturing in my reports that intangible greatness I feel amongst them…

… “Alex! Alex! Are you up here…where are you?” Alex’s wife was calling him. He closed the notebook and quickly shoved it back in the box, forgetting about its fragility. She was coming up to the attic.

“Yes Grace! I’m up here…. I’m coming!” He turned around. She was already there.

“What are you doing all the way in this corner? You were right, it’s hard to find parking here at this time of day. There’s so many beach goers on the weekend. How can you stand it in here? I thought it was hot outside…it’s hotter in here!…look at you! You’re sweating!…” Alex rolled his eyes. He was sure that he loved her, but damn it, she was a mouthful sometimes.

Grace squinted, either because she couldn’t see properly or because it was a reflex of her disbelief and curiosity. “…And what’s that?” she inquired, eyeing the box Alex held in his hands.

Alex looked down to his hands. It was the box. He must have picked it up out of reflex. He had no intention of separating it from the attic, its home for the past 38 years. He and his mother migrated to Australia from California in 1945 after the Second World War. Alex was too young to remember, but he and his mother (although it was just the two of them) were a struggling family for almost two years. Alex’s mother Diane was lucky enough to afford the house in December 1947, when they first moved in.

In all the years he had lived in the Cronulla house, Alex had never seen, let alone been in, the attic until now. The attic was always closed when his mum was around. He was always tempted as a young boy to ‘tumble’ into there. But as he grew older, he wanted more and more to forget the place existed. It was his way of overcoming the curiosity. He never questioned his mother’s secrecy. Rather, he trusted it.

“Oh…this? I found it here. It’s a box, Grace…” Alex said, feeling a little guilty that he was seen up there.

“Yeah…I know it’s a box, I can see that. But why do you have it? You looked through it didn’t you?”

“Yes. I did. So?” He shook off his guilt. “That’s why we’re up here you know…to check the place out for the last time. I remembered Mum left some things in here. I thought I’d see whether or not there was anything useful to keep.” Alex put the box down on the floor behind him.

“Yeah, like I said, I just checked it out. It’s nothing. Probably mum’s friend’s letters or something. I never knew what she had up here, love. Let’s go. I think the demolishers can decide what they want to do with this stuff…” Alex walked towards his wife and signalled for them to leave. Grace looked past Alex, at the box, still illuminated by the afternoon sunlight.

“Yeah…what about the box?”, Alex questioned casually. Suddenly, the image of the mysterious portrait flashed back through Alex’s mind… and then a memory of the view of the box when Alex first opened it…a montage of letters, pictures…journals. The hard, passionate handwriting. The portrait. The deep eyes. For a second time, the allure of the picture was too much. Alex turned around and grabbed the box off the floor.

When Grace and Alex got to the front of the house, they stood side by side, and took a moment to stare at the two-storey blue fibro house. The veranda. The big willow tree and the hammock that hung from its strong branches. Alex closed his eyes and was engrossed in fond memories of his childhood with his mother- one of the few memories he refused to let disappear. Then for one last time, Alex opened his eyes. Motionless. He photographed with his consciousness a picture of his mother’s house, a vision to remain vividly emblazoned in his mind. In a few days time, the house would be demolished and new dreams would be built on the land. It was a sad thing to look at something you had known your whole life and think it was the last time you would set your eyes on it, Alex thought. But still, he knew there was a time to let go. Alex and Grace made their way to the car and drove home for the rest of the afternoon.

It was 6pm when they got to their suburban home. It had been just over an hour’s drive from Cronulla to their house and Alex never for a moment stopped thinking about the portrait and the box. He wondered why he was extremely bothered by the portrait. What sentimental value could the portrait have for him….after being locked away in an attic for all those years?

Seeing the house today made Alex mellow. It was the first time he had visited the place in one and half years. He finally made the decision to let some other family build a life there. With his mum gone, there was no use keeping the house. And then the box. It was as if the box forced him to revisit the past, although he didn’t want to. After so many years of trusting his mum’s insistence to ‘stay away from the attic’, he finally saw what was up there and of all things, he noticed this box.

As Alex lay in bed with Grace beside him, his urge to look through the box escalated, like a gust of water waiting to explode from a knocked down fire hydrant. It was only a matter of time before Alex would do something about this itch. He just couldn’t go to sleep. The eyes of the portrait continued to haunt him and not much later, he got out of bed.

He went downstairs and sure enough, the box lay peacefully on the coffee table, where Alex had left it. The box had a radiant glow about it, like it was being brought back to life by Alex’s touch. He sat on the couch and resumed his exploration from this afternoon…

Here I am sitting in the pits of an old tent. Being in here makes me feel like I am one of them. Outside, the migrant workers are lined up, looking desperate from starvation and waiting for their measly pay of 5 cents per box of peaches harvested. I look at them and feel immensely inspired by the will power that they continue to show me. I’ve learnt to realise that being at the camp, working and living with them, is a privilege. Unlike me, the locals will never know the value of their labour.

These former farmers, travelling miles from the far South, have left their devastated farms with their families in the hopes of finding a better life out here in the West. Today, I witnessed terrible friction between the locals and the migrant workers. A small group of locals protested outside the camp gates demanding that the camp be cleared. I feel so lucky to know the hardship of these workers and I wish I could let the locals know just how much they misunderstand them. To the locals, they are nothing but ‘stupid Okies’, incompetent and dirty. They with rags on their backs and worn out shoes, bring disease to their country. They do not know that it is these same ‘stupid Okies’ whom they look upon with bitter distaste that this so-called ‘American Eden’ needs for agriculture to continue to prosper.

The locals are ignorant and blind to the hardships that these migrant workers have endured and continue to endure, and the pain they must have felt when they left their homes to be consumed by the heavy dusts that devastate their land. The locals forget that many of these migrant workers would have already witnessed many of their loved ones die of starvation on their way here to the west…they are too busy defending their country from the supposed disease that the migrant workers bring. It makes me shudder to think that the locals are unwilling to share their schools, that Americans shun their fellow Americans.

But as I have already mentioned, unlike the locals, I am lucky to know the truth. Let them protest all they want. Maybe my reports will change their mind.

Tension. Migrant camps. Harvesting fruits, Arvin Federal Camp…5 cents per box. The words flowed through his head. At first fragmented, but then gradually coming together to become one almost clear picture. These terms, these words. They were familiar to Alex. Finally, he remembered his mother’s face again. These were the same stories his mother told him as a young boy…

His own mother was a migrant worker at the Arvin Federal Camp from 1936 to mid 1938. She travelled there from Missouri with her family- her younger brother Joe, her father Jack and mother Hannah- the Montgomery clan. One day her family came home to find that it had been swallowed by the pervasive dust storms and from then on, it was struggle after struggle, camp after camp. The last migrant camp they stayed at before moving onto the Arvin camp was Hooverville, where they met the Wilsons. When it was time to go further west, the Wilsons declared there was room for two to ride in their truck. Diane’s parents urged her and her brother to continue further west with the Wilsons ‘We’ll just take a few more days to get there than you. We’ll meet you there- promise! Just go on and get that ride with the Wilsons’, Diane’s father said. Somehow, Diane had this feeling that her parents knew they wouldn’t make it to the camp. The family was dying of starvation and the ride with the Wilson’s was at least a chance for their two children to be saved. ‘This is the least we can do’.

“No mama…papa! We can’t leave you! Joe and I will stay! We don’t have to go any further west. It’s fine here. We’ll both work double time!” Diane pleaded, holding tightly onto both her parent’s hands. She looked at her father, and then her mother, hoping her parent’s courageous appeals would break. Both showed nothing. Then both turned away and tried to let go of their daughter’s increasingly tight grip. In a final attempt to get through to them, Diane cried, “Joe, please! Tell them! Tell Mama and Papa we’ll stay with them”. Joe was young at 16, with no concept of what was happening. He knew he did not want to part with their parents, but he just didn’t know what more he could do to change their mind.

Brrm Brmm…the Wilson’s were ready to leave. They needed to make a decision. Jack and Hannah Montgomery would not budge and through clenched teeth and teary eyes, Diane and Joe said goodbye to their parents.

Diane and Joe looked back at their parents from the truck window and waved until they became tiny figures, invisible to the naked eye. It was the last time they’d ever see them. They waited every day at Arvin…but they never arrived.

Alex sighed heavily, ‘I don’t think she ever forgave herself for leaving her parents’, he thought.

She stood up from the wooden bench on which we were sitting and clasped her hands, moving them back and forth in a fast but steady rhythm, like she was praising the Lord for sparing her and her two kids as so many had already died. “I just thank God ya know…I’m so grateful that He’s taken care of us. I know its Him.” Phrase after phrase, Julie Risner was living faith.

I got up and stood next to her. “I know. God is merciful. I have no doubt that you and your family will be relieved from all this”. Julie and I had been sitting on the wooden bench all morning talking about her experiences; her and her children’s journey from Arkansas, how she brought up her kids on her own after her drunken husband left them and the enormity of her faith in the new life California would bring them.

From outside the camp gates, all I could see was the poverty. But being in there for just over a day made me feel there was something much more. Something positive. It was their faith. And standing in front of me was a woman who had nothing but faith…not just in God, but also in everyone and everything around her. She had this innate wisdom to ‘know what was best’; to see through the superficial and make significant the things that matter…and what mattered was the wellbeing of the migrant workers. There was no need to lament, she told me, on what has happened. Just think and live for the moment. Most importantly…have faith. This is what was needed to survive.

She didn’t need to say all this for me to realise that that’s what she was all about. She had this incredible spark in her eyes and her soul seemed to pour out from them as we talked all morning. Admiration, that’s all I could feel. Deep and sincere admiration. The world that surrounded her was dreary…filthy…and just plain hard. Yet she remained so pure in her own faithful way. It reminded me of the boy I met when I first arrived at the camp…

“Mrs Risner! Mrs Risner” The voice was familiar, I turned around. Coincidentally, it was the boy. He slowed down to a walking pace as he saw it was me that Mrs Risner was with. “Mrs Risner!…It’s Gary…He’s been hurt!”

Mrs Risner froze. Her widened eyes and drawn out mouth illustrated shock and disbelief. The boy grabbed her frozen arms and looking up at her implored, “Mrs Risner! Gary’s been hurt!…he’s broken an arm!”

Finally Mrs Risner regained some consciousness and displayed that innate strength like I knew she would. “What?! Oh my baby!!! What happened?! We better get him some aid or something. Call Your Pa!” The boy quickly led us to where Gary had been hurt. He lay on the ground in tears. “Oh Gary!! What happened? I told ya so many times Gary! You play too rough! What? Ya fell off the fence? What were ya doin’ on it in the first place? I don’t understand you sometimes Gary!” She paused. “Aw… C’mon now. Don’t cry baby…” On the ground to where Gary lay, Mrs Risner hugged Gary tightly and in a comforting voice, “Don’ worry…someone will take ya to the hospital in a moment. You’ll be fine… Sssh…don’t cry…” And just like that, Gary had stopped crying. Two minutes later, a tall blonde, good-looking man arrived. It was Mr Melton. He had come to take Gary to a nearby hospital.

While Mrs Risner, Mr Melton and Gary were at the hospital, I had a chance to talk to the boy. We leaned against the fence from which Gary fell. “Gary your best friend?” I asked.

“Ya. He’s my friend. Always seems to be in all sortsa trouble. Nothing bad…he just seems to be one of those kids….” I was taken aback by the maturity that flowed from his words. He seemed beyond his years, like he had the ability to step back, look at the world and know how everything worked. I guess losing loved ones makes you more aware. It changes you.

“Ya, I’m a kid. I know it. I still act like it don’t I? It’s just Pa, Granma and me now. I just have two people to look after now. That’s all”. He looked down at his ragged shoes. “They both miss Ma a lot.... and so do I”.

“I think almost two months…Ma and Pa say people from the outside don’ like us much. You seem nice…” I could hear the little boy inside of him again. I don’t know why, but it made me relieved to hear that 11 year old’s come out.

“No. No…not everyone feels that way. That’s why I’m here. So I can go home and tell everyone what it’s really like here…that what they think is wrong.” He nodded looking comforted by the thought. “So…I never got to know you’re name. I’m John”. I reached out to shake his hand.

He smiled that same warm and inviting smile from our first meeting and took my hand. “I’m Liam Melton”. Finally. The boy had a name.

“Oh…nice to meet you!…You’re…you’re Mr Melton’s son? The one who’s driving Gary to hospital”. He nodded. “By the way…I never got to thank you for the other morning! Thank you! Thanks for the tour”.

January 1985

These words. This story. It’s so familiar. It’s mother’s box. Yes…it is. It’s her box of memoires, her private recollection of the Arvin Federal Camp. No…no…what am I thinking? These can’t be. Mother wasn’t a reporter for the San Francisco News…these are recollections of a reporter. Maybe she met this reporter? Who is he? Why would mum keep this notebook… this box… if it was the reporter’s?…Why would she hide it from me…this box…all those years? Were the memories too painful for her to revisit?

Just by looking at Julie Risner, you can see a survivor. A fighter. Her broad jaw line and strong nose is reassuring against her soft, full face. She is meaty and has natural curves. Motherly curves. Her eyes look on with determination. Talking to her makes you feel at ease, yet I get the feeling that if you were unreasonable she’d remind you of what was important or if you showed her worry you’d be reminded by her unique sense of wisdom that ‘everything was going to be alright’. She is like the universal mother, the kind everyone wants.

A few days ago, her son Gary broke his arm. And like all mothers she was hysterical, but as soon as she sensed her son’s pain and worry, she knew not to upset him even more. “Don’t cry baby, it’s alright”, she repeated, a breath of reassurance like everyone expected of her.

Remember the first time I got here? I sensed something about the camp and its people. I could feel this ‘energy’ by being with them. I didn’t know what it was back then. But now, I think I do. It’s the way they all work together, depend on each other, and support each other. It’s the collective dynamism of the camp that burns inside and gives them hope there is a better tomorrow. Hope for the day when rain finally appears. Hope for the day when there won’t be any need for their labour.

The more and more I stay here, the more I forget there is a drought…the more I forget about the mass poverty our country is facing. These people are incredible. They continue to dance, sing…entertain! Not at all the weary people you would imagine. Yes there is the poverty, the starvation, and tension. But hope prospers here.

I witnessed this tonight at the dance hall. There were children singing folk songs, singing gospel songs, playing guitar and dancing. There was laughter. The energy was so vibrant. Couldn’t tell they lost their homes. A real community.

I see this ‘hope’ in Julie Risner more than anyone alone. And I’ve seen it on several occasions. The time when her son broke his arm, the way she looks after Liam as if he were her own, her support for Liam’s family, the conversations in the sewing room. She is the backbone of the community.

…On the opposite side of the page on which Alex was looking was a picture. Broad jaw line, strong nose, determined eyes. He figured it was Julie Risner. The woman in the photo had her hands clasped in a symbol of faith. Alex agreed; Mrs Risner was a survivor.

Alex couldn’t help but be reminded about his own strong mother. That’s how he had always known her. She was strong. It didn’t mean much to him back then, but after reading about the dispossessed farmers and their families in the 1930’s in this journal, he realised the extent of the hardship she endured…And all at once, he was proud and thankful.

To date, he had lived all 48 years of his life not knowing who his father was. His mother called him her little ‘gift’. Being brought up by her somehow didn’t make him feel the need to know the identity of his father. He trusted and accepted the circumstances. But mostly, he learnt to forget. He didn’t need a father. Alex had his mother and she was better than all the fathers in the world put together.

He neither felt angry or bitter about the absence of a father figure. His mother never uttered a single awful thing about his ‘father’…if there was one. Sometimes, it was like he never existed and the thought of Alex being a ‘gift’ sunk deeper and deeper into his mind, eventually overshadowing the question of who his father was. And then a ‘father’ just didn’t exist.

I lasted 48 years without breaking. From a young age, I taught myself to forget about the question of who my father was. I’m a ‘gift’, I’m a ‘gift’, I would repeat to myself. It was my way of coping. Until I broke in 1985. After so many years of forgetting, I was finally being forced to find answers to a question I had not asked myself in a long time. Because I opened that box.

I opened a wound. I acknowledged a void that lingered silently but painfully all those years. I awakened the dormant volcano inside me.

Don’t get me wrong…I’m glad I found that box. If it weren’t for the discovery of the box, I would probably still be in denial. I would still be allowing myself to live with a substantial part of my heart missing.

Alex noticed a crumpled piece of paper in the box. He put the notebook aside, took the crumpled paper and carefully began straightening it out so it could be read. It was a letter. Perhaps it was a first draft, again complete with several crossings and writing that ran way off the lines in some areas. It was addressed to the San Francisco News.

This letter is not a report. It’s simply to inform you on how I am doing at the Arvin Federal Camp. So far, it’s been a very worthwhile experience and I thank everyone for the opportunity to do this. I’m positive that when my time is finished here, I will return a different person.

Everything’s been great. The migrant workers are friendly enough. At first I was treated indifferently by some who had become embittered by the way locals shun them. On the other hand, there are several people who are glad to have me here. Eventually, everyone embraced my stay. It just took others a while to get my trust.

Society has a one sided view of migrant workers. We see the poverty, we see the filthiness, we see the underpayment, we see over crowded camps, we see disease. This is about a quarter of their story. One thing that characterises the migrant workers at Arvin Federal is their strength of character and the hope that they face the future with. The migrants have to endure on a daily basis, tension and nastiness from unappreciative locals (they don’t know how much the migrants are doing the country a favour) who want them to ‘take their diseases elsewhere’. They must put up with low wages, starvation and long hours of work in the labour camps. They are masters of human endurance.

I met a woman named Julie Risner. Mrs Risner, as everyone refers to her as, is not only a prominent figure in the camp, but is like a backbone to the society. She has become a great source of inspiration for me. She inspires me to write honestly about their stories.

...And that is what I will do. Tell the honest stories of migrant workers and their families, their hardships and the collective soul that permeates the camps....

A name. A name. No name. Alex looked at the clock. 1:58am. He had read this far into the night and still, no idea of who it was that these letters and entries from the Arvin Federal Camp belonged to and more importantly what the box had to do with his mother...could it have anything to do with him?

Just when Alex was close to succumbing to deep sleep, he spotted, right at the back of the box, a bunch of photos. Visuals. Suddenly his sleepiness disappeared.

He took out the photos. The first was of a boy. He looked familiar Alex thought. He turned the photo around to check for labels and there it was. A name.

“It’s Liam...the boy who befriended the reporter”, Alex whispered to himself. The reporter was right. His eyes were soulful. And his clothes were much more ragged than what he imagined.

The next picture had a more profound impact on Alex. He recognised the people on it. A young blonde woman holding a young child. The child’s eyes. It was him. It was Alex and the woman was his mother. Alex couldn’t help but think that it was unbelievable he experienced being in the camp. The photo was proof of it. He was staring right at it. Yet he could not remember it.

He must have looked around two years of age. How can he have no recollection of it? He hoped that a vague image of the camp would flash through his head. But it didn’t. He couldn’t have been two years old in the photo. His mother stayed at the camp from 1936- 1938. I was born in 1937...I would have been a year old at the most. Alex was perplexed by what he was thinking and seeing.

Alex and his mother had revisited the camp in 1940. He stared deeply into the picture of him and his mum. He could remember only a few other occasions where his mother showed him pictures of her life in America. His mother had only a limited amount of photos of her American life. But somehow, Alex got the sense that his mother also wanted to forget…something. This picture was special.

His eyes felt heavier and heavier. His blinks grew slower and slower...heavier....slower....heavier....slower....he stared at the photo.....he was asleep.

Alex lay on the couch in deep sleep. He had a slight smile on his face as he retained a firm grip of the photos.

A darkened room. Specks of soft light. A letter. It’s addressed to my mum. The writing is thick and cursive. Written with passion. It says:

The day of departure has sadly arrived. I’m not good at saying goodbyes, so I won’t say it. Over the past weeks, I have shared more with you than I can ever share with anyone in a lifetime. It’s been great and I feel like the luckiest man to have met such a sweet, intelligent and beautiful lady like you. I’m not just saying this. I mean it. You were great. You are great... we were great.

...I just want to say thanks. Thank you for sharing everything with me. Thank you for your time. I’d rather know someone for a brief period and enjoy every minute of it than be with someone for a long time and share a life of ups and downs. You are great. It was great. We were great. Thank you Diane. I’ll remember you forever....

“Remember you forever? Forever? F o r e v e r...” The words are echoing in my head. On and on and on…

Answers, images.... are forming. It’s making some sense.... the reporter...my mum knew the ‘reporter’.... they were in love. Could “John” be my father...my father... f a t h e r…

The words and images are beginning to splinter...piece by piece.... moving further away from each other....

“Alex...Love...I can’t believe you fell asleep here last night!” Grace. Alex slowly parted his eyes and stared at the blank ceiling. He felt relieved. It was a dream. The letter.... John.... it was all a dream.

“I hope you know you slept with your mouth opened all night!” Grace shouted from the kitchen behind the couch on which Alex lay. “You must have fell asleep looking through your mum’s box...”

Alex looked on the coffee table. The box was still there. Photos...letters....the notebook. The box’s soul was left scattered on the table all night as Alex dreamed.

“By the way. What’s you’re mother doing with this picture? Do you know who he is?”

Alex turned around, got up from the couch and walked to the breakfast bench where Grace was holding up a portrait. He wiped the sleep out of his eyes and squinted, focusing his eyes so as to identify whom Grace was referring to. It was the portrait. Deep, round eyes, staring. It was the portrait that lured him into reading the notebook and the letter.

“Yeah! That’s the one. Was your mother a big fan of him? Great writer that one....wrote about those farmers.....you know....during the dust storms. Movie was great too!”

Alex rushed to the coffee table and rummaged through the remaining items in the box. ‘There’s gotta be more in here. Something to confirm what I think.’ He dug deep and there at the very bottom of the box was a fading photo. It was a picture of his mother and the man in the portrait, the ‘reporter’.... John.

It was never a good idea to drive at that state. I was in shock. Who knows what could’ve happened to me? I didn’t even know where I was going or where I wanted to go. All I knew was that I wanted to get out of the house. I needed air. I needed to breathe, something I neglected to do when I found that photo. My world changed.

You know when you feel things in certain ways and have absolutely no idea why? That was what was happening to me. I felt sick. I felt disgusted. Nothing I assumed seemed right, yet there was nothing else for me to conclude. What else would it all mean? The photo. The dream.

Some say dreams say a lot about what we desire. I have asked myself a million times since the dream, if it was an attempt to answer my unanswered questions. Every time I ask myself the question, the answer is always the same. I wanted answers. And the dream was the answer. But it was a dream; real only in the world of desires and fantasies.

As strange as everything at that moment seemed, I was thankful.

Why? Why didn’t I figure it out? The portrait. The letters. 1936. The migrant camps. Arvin! Damn it! Why? It all makes sense. John, the ‘reporter’…he knew my mother. She was there…with him…at the camp…together. My mother loved him…he loved my mother. The car mirror. My reflection. My God. I’ve got his eyes. Of all people…it could be him. John Steinbeck, author of ‘Grapes of Wrath’…he could be…he could be my… f a t h e r. My mother hid her past to protect me, to protect him.

Father. It’s so hard for me to say it. I don’t even understand the concept of the word ‘father’. And now…all of a sudden…I could actually have one.

Where to go? Breathe. Calm down. Somewhere solemn. Somewhere comfortable. Space. Cronulla beach.

…Salt. Peaceful breeze. Silent noise of seagulls, waves crashing onto the shore, children playing. Silent in the blur of my emotions. The sand is warm on my thighs, tiny particles massaging the tension in my toes. Look at the photo. Mum and dad. It does matter that I know who it is, who my father is.

These heavy tears pour out of fear. But you’re facing something you have ignored your whole life Alex.

The heavy tears flow out of relief. They pour out of joy. The void inside me, the missing piece of my heart, it’s being filled with half answers. The wounds of not knowing…they are healing Alex.

Calm and relaxed. My thoughts are floating into the ocean, the words and images moving with the waves…in and out…toward the ginger coloured horizon. Let go; embrace the serenity and this curative change…

It took me 48 years to fill the void, to heal the wounds previously unknown to me.

I will never know the answers to my questions. My mother is the only person who will ever know and she took the answer with her 20 years ago when she passed away. What I know and what I believe today is not certain. Still, I keep it with me for my peace of mind. At least I know there is a ‘father’…my father. It doesn’t matter if it’s John Steinbeck, author and social commentator as many claim. To me, he’s my father.

I never told anyone about my discovery. I didn’t feel the need to. It’s for my own piece of mind. One day, when I join my mother in that world we reach after our time on earth is up, I will know the real answer. But until then, I will keep to myself this belief.

I didn’t go looking for the past…the past found me. It always does. I wasn’t meant to go into the attic. It was a quick check if anything was worth keeping…and I found the box. I wasn’t meant to go into the attic…but I did.