Alter-Ego

Now, here's a story I've always wanted to tell. I've just been putting it off. The summer after my senior year, I worked in a plastic factory in Hialeah. For those of you who aren't familiar with greater Miami-Dade County, Hialeah is a labyrinth of churro stands, Cuban cafes with perfect ropa vieja, and industrial facilities due west of the city, adjacent to Everglades. It is the border of the South Floridian frontier, US-27, where people end and animals begin; far away from Mansion Nightclub and the American Airlines Arena. Miles and miles away, but still within city limits.

I wake up in Broward, due north. My eyes flick about to Little League trophies and baseball caps, a map of the United States, and an old Mike Piazza bobblehead. My bathroom is nautical-themed, with whitewashed plywood on the walls. My toothpaste lies in a little rowboat that my mommy both from Ross. A cup of French Roast coffee waits for me in a kitchen with faux-cherry cabinets, and faux-granite countertops. I shake off the eeriness and slip into an abused pair of sneakers, tying the laces in a double knot.

When I’m quite convinced that I’m far enough south to be past the exits where my any family friends or neighbors might be making their commute, I light a Newport. The language on the billboards begins a slow shift. “Se habla Español… llama ahora.” I exit onto Okeechobee Road and can see the fringes of factory rooftops before a swamp on the horizon.

This part of my typical morning was the tipping point, between my Atonist life and a Jes Grew, latinocentric, alter ego. I turned into a different person, an Alice entering into the fog of heavy industry. Plastic fumes, smoke inhalation, grease dripping off of “dos McChickens.”

(Mumbo Jumbo, with undertones of Heart of Darkness)

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