I AM THANKFUL FOR ALL THE SACRIFICES MY FATHER MADE

Before writing this, I reached out to my older siblings to encourage them to share their memories of when Dad was in the Bracero Program. I talked first to my only sister, Esperanza, then to Jesse (a former Vista High School teacher of the year and author of “Jesús Comes to America”), Pancho (an author and retired UC Santa Barbara professor) and Refugio (a retired counselor at Mira Costa Junior College). Our eldest brother, Eddie (a retired U.S. Air Force sergeant who was a loadmaster), knew our dad the longest. Eddie is no longer with us, but he did share many of his memories during our monthly Lomeli family breakfasts at Cocina Del Charro in Escondido since 1995.

World wars and pandemics cause tremendous changes. So many deaths! So many that the U.S. began to fill jobs with women and with foreign guest workers in both world wars. As early as 1914, the labor shortage made the U.S. rely on Mexican agriculture workers. Years later, beginning on Aug. 4, 1942, the Bracero Program issued temporary U.S. work permits to millions of Mexicans to ease labor shortages.

After World War I and World War II were over, some of the returning soldiers displaced some of the female factory workers. But the U.S. kept its Bracero Program until Dec. 31, 1964. There was a brief effort by our federal government to entice American teens to work in the fields during the summer, but that program was a disaster. The American teens were not used to the working conditions and the shabby housing. Many quit after one or two days and did not return. They couldn’t handle what the braceros had to deal with.

Some men signed up for adventure, some to get away from pesky girlfriends bent on matrimony. Others signed up with plans to abandon their families in Mexico and live the single life in el norte. For the majority, the reasons were far more basic and pressing.

If you’ve already lost four children from malnutrition and sickness, and can barely write your name, how many career choices do you have? That’s right — you do the honorable thing and sign on the dotted line. Let them send you to a foreign land where there are big cities and they speak a strange language and eat disgusting things like “hot dogs.” Let them make you work in a land that has ice and snow falling from the sky. Let them make you sleep in rooms with no insulation! Trust in God that your little children will remember your face when you are able to come home, whenever that might be. Trust that your wife won’t cry herself to sleep at night, worrying about you.

I was born in Tijuana shortly after we moved from central Mexico. When Dad was sent to Chicago to work on the railroads for months at a time, Mom had to manage five kids and one baby (me). I weighed 11 pounds when I was born (sorry, Mom!). Mom was an orphan at 5 and had only finished second grade. She taught Dad how to

In the Bracero Program, you went where they sent you. In Chicago, a city famous for its wind and for its slaughterhouses, Dad went to work on the railroad.

read and write. When her husband was gone for months at a time, she had to manage everything. My brothers learned to hustle: selling newspapers, cutting hair, shining shoes and selling Chiclets gum at the border. Every centavo was handed over to Mom.

We lived in Tijuana in a one-room cinderblock house, with one light bulb hanging from the ceiling. When I needed to use the toilet, my sister would take me to the outhouse a few steps away. It was a double seater, which I thought was fancy and nice because my sister would sit with me.

In the Bracero Program, you went where they sent you. In Chicago, a city famous for its wind and for its slaughterhouses, Dad went to work on the railroad. He met paisanos (fellow countrymen) from all over Mexico, and most of them had very little formal education. One day, the boss told one of the braceros to dig a hole a foot deep. So the bracero dug a shallow hole and put his foot in it. “This good, yeah?” he asked. That bracero did not understand that “foot” was also a term for measuring depth.

The more worldly braceros would play mean tricks on the newcomers. Dad once told my brother, Pancho, that on a very cold Chicago morning, while they waited to be picked up for work, Dad saw his first snowfall. He said it was beautiful. It was also very, very cold. The other guys nudged Dad.

“Jesús, we will give you a dollar if you touch your tongue to that metal pole over there,” one man said.

I imagine my dad adjusting his sombrero and fiddling with his mustache, and thinking, “Well, one more dollar for my family. OK. I’m in.” He was shocked that his tongue got stuck! He came from Jalisco, famous for mariachis and mild climate. But the men from Jalisco are tough ... even when others are cruel. When the other guys finished laughing, one got some water to pour over his tongue to get it loose.

Lomelí