The Homeland

I know it's going to happen. I can feel it. My nervous system is on fire with anticipation 11 days before it's going to happen. Insomnia has come to pay me a visit the past few nights, such a rare and pesky fairy she is. Haven't met her much the past few years but I must have left my window open because she flew in last night, sat herself on my pillow and started screaming things in my ears which crawled up into my brain, down my nerves and into my heart. The Law of Attraction to try to counteract this imminent occurrence might be my only refuge, but I don't have much hope for that.

You see, my sister and I are planning on flying to the States over easter break to visit our parents for a relaxed week of sunshine and sand. Well-needed after 8 months of nearly constant studies and work. I'm drained emotionally and physically, at my very end. I've been tackling one problem after the next for so long and if I don't find some peace soon I'm not going to have much ork (energy) left to do all the nice living I want to do. On top of it I'm utterly broke, with about 5 dollars left to my name. While fighting to establish eligibility for financial aid I've been working my ass off to make ends meet, all the while studying full-time in another language, trying hard and succeeding in passing all my classes. I need and deserve this vacation more than ever before. Then why the despair, you might ask?

Ah, you see, my distress comes as a result of my nationality, the stamp of my place-of-birth, the passport which I hold and the one which I don't. Despite living in the US for over 17 years I am not and have never been a citizen. I don't have a passport, nor the right to vote, nor the right to student grants, not even the right to give blood. I am however a legal permanent resident or green-card holder, meaning I'm allowed to live and work and go to school there permanently. Permanently but one is not allowed to be out of the country for an extended time. The extent of that extended time seems to be a bit ambiguous as I've read that one may be outside the borders of the Land of the Free for 6 or 12 months. Conflicting information, already a sign that the country has some loose screws.

I wasn't aware of this when I left for Sweden and was enlightened November 2014 when I visited "home" for the last time. I was seized at customs/ border control in New York, broke down inte tears while being led into a small room guarded by twelve armed male officers and being told that I've been away too long and that I'm not allowed back in without a reentry permit (which one needs to apply for and be granted right to before one plans to leave the country for their extended period of time). The reentry permit must be applied for from within the states before departure and is granted upon a biometrics meeting 5 weeks later, where fingerprints are documented and a whole lot of information is noted. They probably inject spyware into the bloodstream of those who, like me, travel to countries too close to Communist Russia. In short, I didn't have time for such an application and am well aware that I might just be taken again at customs. This time I'm planning to apply for a travel visa, like the kind real tourists apply for so that I can spend one week in my childhood home with my mom and dad.

This is where my terribly fairy-friend Insomnia comes in. If I've been out of the United States too long and don't have a reentry permit (which I don't) a customs officer has the right to declare my permanent residence status inactive. They have the right to, with a snap of their fingers take away my green-card. Officer having a bad day might do just that. It's not that I am in love with my green-card or any sort of national tie to the godforsaken United States. It's not that I need to apply for a visa to go home, ridiculous as that is. It's that somebody on the other side of the world who doesn't know me or give a fuck about who I am has the power to rip away from me a stamp in my records, a stamp that gives me the right to reside on the piece of land that I grew up on. The stamp that allows me to return home and not feel like a tourist with a 90-day expiration date. And that's what I feel rushing through me, the fear and loathing that this will happen. I will lose my green-card, if not good karma and positive thinking are on my side, I see it vanishing before my eyes, and the yelling at me, just like last time, by an asshole officer until I break into tears. "You don't live here ANYMORE, Julia!"

Welcome to America, the land of the free, let's just yell at you and take away your last rights, compliments of Homeland Security! *Cue to start music* Home, home on the Range where the deer and the antelope are extinct, where always is heard a racist word and the skies get more polluted each day. 

The worst part is, there's no way around it. Even traveling in on a tourist visa, my fingerprints and passport are stored in their database, and as soon as I go through the control, they will see the duration of my absence. I will get caught. It's a trap and I will get caught and I will lose my rights. There you have it, ladies and gentlemen, your sweat, blood and tears and dedication to a country is meaningless because someone might just take it all away from you one day, and you'll realize that the society we live in is rotton. There is nothing protecting you but your own skills of survival. This promise of community of a country of one nation under god is an utter lie and you are being tricked. Their god is money and power and destruction and control. And the fucked up thing is I can't do a goddamn thing about it. That's her sneaky little message, miss Insomnia, "You're powerless, Julia. They are going to destroy your rights and there's nothing you can do about it, because you are a pathetic little illegal alien in the eyes of the great Uncle Sam. Get off our soil despite how well you took care of it. You are worthless and have no business here..."

I am not a citizen of your bullshit establishment and thank heavens for that. I'm a citizen of Gaia and she doesn't issue passports. She doesn't check fingerprints or do religious background checks. She doesn't build walls or hang barbed-wire. She doesn't point guns or start wars for this made up thing called economy. Why am I even still here in this stupid world of bureaucracy and money and facades? Why am I still here? I don't belong here. I clearly don't belong anywhere but to the soil. I want to crawl on the floor of the forest, roll in the moss and dig myself a cozy hole in the fragrant sour soil and hug her, embrace her, our great mother. Because she accepts everyone. She is home.