The Next Big Story: My Journey Through the Land of Possibilities
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The years that went by cost her dearly. She was in a homeless shelter for ten months one year. The housing she finally found was in an environment totally foreign to her solid, working-class family roots. She was an only child to hardworking American parents, family-loving Puerto Ricans who stuck together and swept their little patch of Oakdale, Long Island, no matter what was going on outside. She lived in three different apartment complexes that were overrun by drug dealers.
“I was in a ghetto, surrounded by danger and noise. You can have the poorest people on earth but they can have self-respect,” she said. “These were not those people. I was scared. My daughter can only walk five to eight steps and all I wanted was to be able to take her out the door to do that. And I couldn’t even take her out to play catch.” There was a fire once. She was moved in and out; a single mother with a completely disabled child had to pack and move a household of furniture.
She remembers the day she got the letter from Smithtown so vividly, like reading the numbers on a lotto ticket and thinking you’ve got the winning number. She had walked into the town office that day wondering about the possibilities for her child in Smithtown, about the great pool at the Y and the proximity of the beach. The day they wrote “INELIGIBLE” and circled that word, she felt herself deflate.
There is something about places like Smithtown that is more than just about good schools and low crime. There is a psychic peace that grows in a child’s mind when they can walk out the back door and just stare up at the treetops to watch the sunshine sparkle through the leaves. The emotional anguish of being a shut-in, of fearing the world outside your door, of not even knowing that help is on the way, is immeasurable. For Corinne and her little girl, there was no Bill Huntington, the man who sold my parents the land to build their house. She didn’t even have the chance to find her way in a place where she wasn’t wanted. She might have been a great addition to Smithtown, someone whose talents and good spirit enriched the community around her. We will never know. Her American story is of a person whose opportunity was denied, a lesson in why that is not what this country should be about.
“I am very proud to be Corinne Vargas versus Smithtown,” Corinne says of her case. “If I can change one person’s life then this was a victory. This was never about money This was about saying you cannot do this for another decade—you cannot do this to another mother. I am just one person, but one person can open a door. The town had all these opportunities, all these possibilities, but there were no possibilities for me.”
Corinne eventually did find a home in Bohemia, a nice area not far away that is slightly more diverse. Her daughter can spend the entire day outside in the sunshine now. Corinne put up a mini six-hole golf course and a plastic pool. “I know that my kids won’t go through what they would have gone through in Smithtown, so it’s okay,” she says. “Sometimes what looks like perfection on the outside is not the same inside.” She has few neighbors because she lives along a commercial strip. But at night it’s very quiet. She loves the silence. She has a two-year-old child now, too. She has her justice and she has her own Smithtown. She has a shot at seeing her new baby grow up and get what she couldn’t have.
I was given all the opportunities Corinne never got. I pledge to live my life aware of that truth, to refuse to rush by trouble, to stop and at least bear witness to what is happening to people like Corinne. I was fortunate enough to enjoy a childhood in Smithtown that gave me every resource possible to succeed in life. That means I have a responsibility to give back. That sounds obvious and simple, but not everyone does it. I can’t change the entire world, but I can work on my little piece of it. I can at least give voice to people whose plight goes unnoticed, to make sure they are heard in the middle of the shouting matches that sometimes pass as debate. I can scrape below the surface of a pretty town and unearth what’s going on inside. I can help in my own small way That is the least any of us can do.
I don’t have to go far to see how lucky I was. My old house in Smithtown looks exactly as it did the last time I lived there when I went off to college. None of us has thought about moving back there, but my parents never get it together to sell. The land is so vast and green and the trees shelter the property from the world around it. The smell of wild grasses blows through the air. The Quaker meetinghouse and the horse stalls remain close by and the connecting streets are quiet enough for a bike ride. The beach at the inlet beckons the horseshoe crabs, and I make a mental note to bring the kids. I have come a distance since my little tribe came here to seize the promise of America. Life is sometimes about what’s possible.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book captures a lifetime of memories, lessons learned and experiences beyond my wildest imagination. I am thankful for the people who’ve helped me recall them accurately and given me my own world of opportunities.
It is hard to write about yourself without the advice and guidance of friends and mentors. I would like to thank Kim Bondy, Jeanne Blake, and Bob Bazell for being brilliant mentors and even more valuable friends.
I thank my wonderful agent, Lisa Queen, my insightful editor, Ian Jackman, and publisher Ray Garcia for believing in this project and working around my frenetic reporting schedule. There aren’t enough thanks to give to my coauthor, Rose Arce, who’s not only become a wonderful writing partner, but who also vowed to wake me up during the aftershock of an earthquake in Haiti, should I sleep through it. Her partner, Mafe, and daughter, Luna, deserve my gratitude for giving up their time with her.
I thank Jon Klein and Bart Feder for understanding the importance of this project. They are the reason for my success at CNN. They’ve given me a great opportunity to report on stories that often go uncovered. My new boss, Geraldine Moriba, is also my new friend. I see a long future ahead of us making documentaries that tell the stories of Americans whose voices need to be heard. Marianna Spicer Joslyn, Barbara Levin, David Bohrman, and Justin Dial were immensely helpful to me in making this book good. My reporting would never come to fruition without the efforts of CNN’s photojournalists, especially those that accompanied me to hot spots like Haiti, Thailand, Chile, and through the storms of New Orleans. My stories come to life because of editors like Carl Graf andAl DiSanti and the production staff of my In America team, particularly my invaluable assistant Robert Farfan, senior producer Michelle Rozsa, and producer Kimberly Arp Babbit, who were invaluable to Black and Latino in America. I thank my young interns Sara Mahmood and Anddy Matos for their help on this book. I also owe plenty to my CNN colleagues from the national and international desks who take our reporting teams effortlessly and safely through terrible storms and scary earthquakes. I thank my reporting colleagues Anderson Cooper, Sanjay Gupta, Thelma Gutierrez, Roland Martin, Susan Candiotti, Miles O’Brien, Katie Couric, and so many others who see the challenges of good and honest reporting as our collective effort.
I am thankful also to Shevoy Onley for the memories restored and for being there from the beginning. Corinne Vargas shared a painful story that is a life lesson to all of us. So did the people in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, Cindy Garcia of East LA, “Marta” of Miami, Michael Eric Dyson, Tina Smith and her family, Kenneth Talley, Susette and Bill Manassero, Cendy Jeune, Mark Kenson Olibris and so many others who open up their lives to me. I am a better reporter and a better person because I had a chance to listen in.
The most important contribution to this book was made by my parents. By recalling the stories of my childhood, they made me want to explore the history of Long Island and civil rights. It is a privilege to be able to finally tell the story of their journey as well and credit them with all the possibilities they gave me in life. I thank my siblings, who share my history and always have my back: Maria, Cecilia, Tony, Estela and Orestes. I am also grateful to my in-laws, nieces and nephews, for their support.
My deepest thanks to my husband, Brad, and my children: Sofia, Cecilia, Jackson and Charlie. They make great sacrifices so I can do my work. I do this for them and their future
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