A patriotic act that I have never seen anyone do with what my father did on 9/11. He looks at the morning news, as is his custom – although he is not able to see well, hear and understand English, the last of which he has developed with his great vision and extensive knowledge.
When he saw the first tower burning, he ran to the porch to find out. From the ground floor of our Queens home, he often stayed overnight in Manhattan. But instead of the two houses he was used to, he just found a lot of smoke. Ashen, Ashen, she started yelling at my mother in Persian – because nothing came of it unless she told him – “Helen, hit them! They hit the twin towers! God kill them!”
For a few minutes, he stared into the distance, his vision clouded over by tears in his eyes. Then, without saying a word, he grabbed his walking stick and walked down the street.
Since arriving in the United States in 1989, my father has been sitting on the same porch looking up at the same place, composing poetry, almost anything about Iran. The craving for the place he left seemed to grow stronger every year. Everything was fine then, everything. The food was delicious. The air was good. Even the most observant spot, he told me I was sorry, and hit Manhattan.
Once a month, he and his exiled friends gathered in their other house and read the poems he had written, especially the various ones on the same aspiring theme. They were not warriors. But in their insistence on their return to their homeland, they formed the wrong group of Odysseuses, who chose to forget that their Ithaca had rejected them. Even for a daughter, this was bad: Why not write poems about the places where they were hiding?
It took years for me to realize that I had not read to my father in all that time. Everyone fails to accurately read the visitor, including the visitor. It’s hard to comprehend the new depth – with a new era, a new language and an unfamiliar form of the new nature.
A recent immigrant told me about what happened in the first few months as a total fog. People understand that this newcomer may be a remnant. What they don’t know is that they are also low-key and low-key. He came, yes, but he is the only human mask with a spirit that still lives there.
Native Americans in particular do not correctly understand foreigners. Some expect to immediately be grateful and live in America, where they can feel nothing but the loss – the loved ones they left behind or the power they had in the past. If they do not say thank you or rejoice, it is not because they are not thankful or happy. It’s because he, himself, still didn’t know what he was.
In order to be happy, one must be open to seeing the benefits of the present. The incoming one, however, is usually already holding on or is being moved quickly in the meantime to detect anything. If a foreigner chooses to remain among his tribes or religions, he does not refuse to associate with them. It’s because the wall is the only place they know where they can try to go to a foreign land. Some natives are offended by the poor English of foreigners. But language, like the late Zake. John McCain to see clearly, it is not a sign of patriotism.
The worst part is that they follow the American ideals. But the problem is, they can believe in the culture but not in the same way they are born. Many nations do not take patriotic action for no apparent reason – a threat to their country, a disaster or a special celebration.
America is not unique in its use of flags. But such eager to spread flag display is almost exclusively American. In many other countries, especially those living under state control, flags are displayed in government buildings or in military bases. It took a while before he moved to America to have a romantic relationship with Old Glory.
I often experience a dangerous situation, more than anything else, that gives a visitor a reason to show love for his country beyond his expectations. For nearly half a century, the Native Americans became “non-partisan.” Then came the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, which gave them the edge service privileges, assurance to those who doubt their loyalty, as well as to themselves, the love of this country.
The 9/11 attack, too, helped many guests get the same. My father returned home that morning with a plastic bag. He moved to the balcony, where he unloaded the bag with the American flag – the largest one he had ever found in a corner store. He removed the geranium pots, the only items the co-op board allowed to display on the metal.
As a school principal and community leader all his life before coming to the US, he was always careful to set an example of obedience for everyone. But that day, he was not a man who always lived. They sewed a small piece of string through the holes in the end of the flag and fastened it to the frame.
I wondered how he knew this, or why a person who had not broken any rules found himself doing this. For the day, he sat on the porch, his eyes fixed on the sky. It was as if all poetry and ambition went up in that smoke. Or perhaps he was getting what he was feeling. Or maybe I’m just learning what he already knows in his heart.
His conviction proved that the poet was, first and foremost, a wise man, who knew that if he could live and write about his ambitions for another country, it was because of the security that this world had given him.
On the same day, Iran was a museum, while America – a favorite item. At the moment when his peace was lost, all words were stopped. The worst fire nearby was another fire in my father’s heart.
Roya Hakakian is an American Iranian writer. This article has been adapted from his book “A Beginner’s Guide to America: For the Immigrant and the Curious.”
The story first appeared Los Angeles Times.