What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
Langston Hughes, “Harlem”
I am a child of the San Gabriel Valley, America’s greatest enclave of Asians in the 21st century. I remember well its ease, comfort, and sweetness. This place is unforgettable. Every time I return, the force of life here is impressive, always moving, and beautiful. As quiet and sleepy as suburban life here appears, the reality that these suburbs are not entirely alike to what the mind conjures when one thinks of America’s white picket fence, is animating to the mind, eye, and heart. Something is distinctive here, this is a world within a world.
Youth here prepared me to live, and to rejoice in the force of life as I grew up; memories here are pristine, and wild in the tamest sense. After SAT prep class, my best friends and I would carpool to Disneyland to ride a rollercoaster or two, grab a turkey leg for dinner. We would drive out to LA for ice cream and museums, or hop on the 57 and have cupcakes by the OC beaches. We were all visiting Rowland Heights, which neighbored Diamond Bar High School — our academy — constantly for the food. We queued at midnight for M&M’s hot blueberry donuts. We shopped and watched movies at Puente Hills and Brea Mall. We hung out playing GameCube and ate with each other’s families, in each other’s homes. My closest friends were Asian, many of us went on to get great educations, then graduated into prestigious, stable jobs. We were young together, and now we’ve grown up.
When I am here, I am looking for that sea of faces, their familiarity. Those faces — they could be me, they could be my brother; my parents. I love this place, and…
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