Thomai Dunn

The scent of wet soil after soaking rainfall, the distant hum of church hymns thumping on a neighbor’s radio, the warmth of her mother’s embrace—these were the essentials my mother, Eunice Dominguez, carried with her when she stepped onto an airplane to America in the year 2000. Born and raised in Santa Rosa Guachipilín, she had known the soothing rhythms of rural life. But at thirteen, she traveled to Metapán to begin middle school, a transition that was her first taste of freedom. Years later, another transition—one far deeper—would utterly displace her life. With her three-year-old son, Andres, in tow, she packed only a suitcase, a tourist visa, and a heart full of hope and terror.

Back in El Salvador, she had been comfortable, even prosperous, but security was an empty concept when MS-13 and other surrounding gangs roamed the streets, preying on the young and vulnerable. It was not poverty that had driven her from her home, but fear—the sort that penetrated a mother’s bones at the threat of her child being torn from her and swallowed up in a world of violence and brutality. She had witnessed it happen to other mothers, their eyes vacant with loss, their throats hoarse from crying out her child’s name into the abyss—only to be met with nothing but the hollow echo of their own grief. My mother would not be one of them.

She recalls the morning she made up her mind to leave. It was on the news as she was getting ready for work. A bus had been ambushed right in front of the El Salvador International Airport, its headlights flashing like a final plea for mercy. MS-13 had swooped in like vultures. They plundered everyone in the bus first, necklaces torn from throats, wallets extracted at gunpoint.

Then, as abruptly as they came, they doused the seats and aisle with gasoline. Somebody screamed, a raw, guttural sound. A match was struck, and in seconds the bus was ablaze, flames licking at the humid afternoon air, bodies inside melting into silhouettes in the fire. The acrid scent of burning flesh clung to the air, thick and suffocating for weeks.

That was when she knew, if she stayed, if she waited, her son could be in one of those buses. Or worse, he could be the one to set it on fire.

Her first destination was California, where my tío Andres lived. The Golden State had seemed like a beacon of promise, but reality was unkind. Without papers, without the right to work, she found herself trapped in a limbo of uncertainty. Every door she knocked on slammed shut. No job, no insurance, no security for her son. But what filled her with the most desperation was Andres’ cleft lip. She needed a doctor, he needed surgeries—multiple—but time and time again, bureaucracy turned its back on them. “Mira, se lo ruego, mi hijo necesita un médico.” She had been reduced to begging, her voice cracking as she fought for his right to healthcare. Yet, with no legal status and no health insurance, the response was always the same: denial. The fear of not being able to get him the medical attention he needed consumed her, and California no longer felt like a viable option.

New York became her second chance, not because it was easy, but because Andres’ father was there and offered temporary shelter. And so, my mother, who had once walked the sunlit streets of Metapán with confidence, now walked the cold indifferent avenues of a foreign land. She felt completely invisible, just a walking statistic. The first few years were defined by instability: bouncing between countless apartments, from cramped attics to dimly lit basements, each space not feeling like a home and more like a reminder of how far she had yet to go. Some nights, the walls would tremble with the sounds of the city, and she would close her eyes, imagining herself back in the quiet of Santa Rosa, where only the cicadas sang at night.

Every morning, she left before the sun had fully risen, her hands already aching from the scrubbing and polishing that awaited her. Andres, too young to understand, clung to her sleeve, crying as she tried to slip out of bed in the morning. She’d whisper the same promise to him: “Cuando regrese, jugamos.” But by the time she returned, the stars had already taken the sun’s place, and all she could do was kiss his forehead and collapse onto the thin mattress they shared.

Unlike many other immigrants, though, she never struggled with English. Back in El Salvador, she had worked as a secretary, where learning English had been a necessity. It was one of the few advantages she carried with her, a small but powerful tool that allowed her to navigate a system designed to alienate her. But language alone could not shield her from the indignities of being undocumented, from the cold stares of those who saw her only as an outsider, from the fear that at any moment, everything she had fought for could be stripped away.

It was only when President George W. Bush re-designated Temporary Protected Status (TPS) to Salvadorans that the world cracked open for her. With a calloused hand, she held the piece of paper that granted her a work permit, a social security number—a legal existence. The weight of the past few years lifted, and for the first time, she could breathe. Through New York’s public healthcare programs, she finally secured Medicaid for Andres, and the long-awaited cleft lip surgeries that had once seemed impossible became a reality. She became a cashier, earned her driver’s license, and carved out a semblance of stability in a country that had once seemed determined to swallow her whole.

Still, the cost of survival was steep. The years stretched on, and she lost more than just her homeland. When my grandmother fell ill, my mother could do nothing but listen over the phone, the static between them a cruel reminder of the distance. She heard her mother’s voice grow weaker, heard the pain woven into every word, and when the day came that silence replaced that voice, she was thousands of miles away. There was no last embrace, no final goodbye. She grieved alone in a country that did not mourn with her, in a world that demanded she keep moving, keep working, keep surviving. “No estuve allí. Se me fue, y no estuve allí,” she whispered once, her voice breaking under the weight of those words. I saw it in her eyes, the way regret clung to her, the way it became an unshakable part of who she was.

Yet, even now, she wonders if it was all worth it. The price of safety came at a cost: missing her mother’s last breath, enduring the gnawing loneliness of a land that still felt foreign even after decades. Though she built a home here, raised her children among the towering buildings and restless energy of New York, her heart never stopped beating for El Salvador. She dreamed of the day she would return, not as a visitor, but as someone coming home.

Last December, after twenty-five years, she finally stepped onto Salvadoran soil once more. The air smelled the same, the streets murmured with the same familiar voices, but something had changed. She had changed. New York had shaped her, hardened her, given her children a future, yet it could never replace the country that made her.

My mother is a woman of two worlds: one that offered her safety, another that gave her identity. And as she turns fifty this summer, she stands at the crossroads of both, knowing that while her body may remain in one, her soul will always belong to another. “Nada se puede comparar a lo que se siente para tu propio país,” she tells me. Nothing can amount to the emotional connection one has with their home country. But I know that in the quiet moments, when she closes her eyes, she is walking through the streets of Santa Rosa Guachipilín, walking in the rain, breathing in home.

 

Andrea Dominguez is a freshman at Fordham University, where she is pursuing a major in psychology and a minor in English. A recent graduate of New Rochelle High School, she enjoys writing personal and cultural essays that explore Latinx identity, immigration, and politics. Her work often reflects her connection to her Salvadoran roots and her interest in amplifying underrepresented voices. She turns eighteen this October and hopes to continue using writing as a way to bridge personal experience with broader social issues.