#sponataneous

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│spontaneous│

(March 28, 2015) —-

This week you are being asked to write and share the personal immigration story of someone you know. This may be the story of yourself, a family member, a friend, etc.

I’d like to hear some feedback, it’s been months since I’ve written a narrative been reading a lot of Kerouac, and I just wrote this spontaneously,  with that in mind how is it?

The story of Immigration is one of hopes and dreams, hardships and disasters. In a country such as Canada, we are the destination for countless immigrants seeking refuge or greater socio-economic freedoms or to connect with family. Whatever the reason may be, the triumphs and trials faced by immigrants is what makes their stories so compelling. One of these is the story of Robert Johnson.

  Robert Johnson was born during the 1950’s to a family of seven. They lived stricken in the golden age of American opportunism, faced with the post-war boom. Just after Robert was born his family fled the city and moved away to the suburbs. Raised among white picket fences and large new automobiles.

  Throughout his childhood Robert recalls it being uneventful except for the television, his window to the world. He recalls the space race and the cold war, as vividly as the saturday morning cartoons. Space was something that always fascinated Robert, so in university he decided to study astrophysics. Robert was in his second year of university at the University of Chicago, sitting in his dorm doing his astrology 217 class when he heard his phone ring. In a distanced and spaced trance Robert picked up the phone, what he heard would change his life. He heard his parents’ tears over the phone with news that he had been drafted to go to Vietnam.

  Robert knew what was next, hastily packing his sparse dorm room into the back seat of his jalopy and hit the road out of the city. He was headed north, to Canada, the forgotten landmass that lingered above America. There in the shadow of America he would live.

  Bob as everyone called him now, had settled in to life in the great white north. The wannabe astrophysicist had now settled on being a carpenter during the day and taking math classes at night, because none of his scholarships were applicable he had to work on the side just get by. He couldn’t ask for help from just anyone because he didn’t have the right visa but seeked help from the Canadian Union of Students.