Santiago's journey is told through three sequential memoirs: When I Was Puerto Rican (1993), Almost a Woman (1998), and a memoir in progress, "El hombre que yo amo" (Fall, 2000). She expands her experiences in her short works and her novel América's Dream (1996). In Las Christmas (1998) and Las Mamis (2000), co-authored with Joie Davidow, she provides an even greater perspective of the Latino culture and relationships. With trust, Santiago shares her world, her life, and her dreams.

The first memoir, When I Was Puerto Rican, tells of Santiago's early life in Puerto Rico. She poignantly builds the events that forced her mother to abruptly take her children away from tropical rural Macún in search of a better life in New York City. Her novel, América's Dream, explores escape from an intense perspective of abusive relationships. Like so many Puerto Ricans, América tries to find work in New York, while her daughter remains behind--a theme of separation further explored in Santiago's short story "When Mami Left, I Didn't."

Themes of adjustment, insecurity, and impressionability continue in Santiago's second and third memoirs.

"Who said you could go out to the sidewalk?" This isn't Puerto Rico. 'Algo te puede suceder.' Something could happen to you…
Mami Ramona, Almost a Woman, 5

"You must not believe when people are too nice, Chiquita, " he said. "Usually they want something else."
Ulvi Dogan , "El hombre que yo amo," 6

From vulnerability under peer pressure in her short story "Eyewitness" to Luisito's death--"The streets have rules." (7)--to the anticipation of children at Christmas in "A Baby Doll Like My Cousin Jenny's" in Las Christmas(8), Santiago weaves fiction and memoir, and that is where her story begins. 

"…don't dwell in the past or you will drown in sorrow"
Mami's advice, "First Born," Las Mamis, 9

In a Puerto Rican Barrio

It was her earliest memory, the detailed kind filled with tropical scents that etched Macún forever in Esmeralda Santiago's mind. They had moved from a one-room house on stilts above the muddy waters of Santruce where her mother often worked in her uncle's pastry shop. "In Santruce Mami smiled more." Las Mamis, 10

Esmeralda Santiago was four years old when her parents moved to the small Macún farm near Toa Baja. The floor of this one-room house was only red clay. Esmeralda liked to talk with her father as he lay boards on the clay for Mami's sewing machine and the parent's bed. Her mother hummed softly as she made pungent soups from meager choices.

Centuries of poverty had been imposed on the island of Borinquén, later renamed San Juan Bautista, and then finally Puerto Rico for its rich accessible ports. The island was colonized by the Spanish, placing the native Taíno in servitude. In América's Dream, Santiago would name Rosalinda's young lover Taíno.

For two centuries African slaves increased the wealth of the sugar cane, tobacco, and coffee merchants. But the small farmers continued to live in poverty, exacerbated by a precarious climate of droughts and intermittent hurricanes. Dark skinned like her father's ancestors, Esmeralda Santiago was affectionately called "Negi," their small "negrita" child, while her sister was "la colora" with rosy skin. And like her father, Esmeralda ignored the poverty, relishing in nature under the vast Puerto Rican sky. 11

For young Esmeralda, the farm was enchanting. Hens hid in the bushes, daring her to find their small brown eggs. She and her sister played among the Avocado, Mango, and Annatto bushes. They didn't see the scummy pond near the house. And in the soft night the children rocked in their hammocks to the rising song of the tiny Coquis tree frog, blocking their frustrated parents' arguments over poverty—a poverty that would one day take Esmeralda from the happiness and contentment of the farm.

Esmeralda was the eldest child and responsible for caring for her Mami's growing family, but she preferred to be with her Papi while he worked. He listened when she questioned the meaning of her soul and why it felt more than "regular people's souls." She felt it when she walked. "It was my soul wandering." She could feel herself "rise to the corner of the room." This early ability to detach and observe would become a unique strength for Esmeralda Santiago the actor and writer.

Her father understood his daughter; he was a poet. Her Mango tree understood, too. It was the place where she could escape to and confide her deepest secrets. When she was ten, the tree bore one succulent fruit. (12) When she was thirteen she was transplanted to "a better life" in New York City, where tenements cast sunless shadows on a treeless life below.

"In writing the book [When I Was Puerto Rican], I wanted to get back to that feeling of Puertoricannes I had before I came here. Its title reflects who I was then, and asks, who am I today?" (13) Macún lives in my head the place that nurtured the child I still am." (14)

Transplanted in New York

Gone were the sensual curves of rural Puerto Rico, my eyes had to adjust to the regular, aggressive two dimensionality of Brooklyn. (condensed from Almost a Woman, 15)

When Mami Santiago escaped from Puerto Rico, she was not prepared for the urban realities. It was not a "quick fix" for her problems. It was difficult for her to find work in the garment industry and humiliating to be on Welfare when she again became pregnant. And there was the constant moving from one crowded apartment to another, even to "the projects."

Esmeralda was curious about the projects. She had read about them in the Spanish newspaper, "El Dario." A man had thrown a nine-year old girl off a roof, falling twenty-one stories to her death. Esmeralda had to find "the spot" where the girl fell. She tried to imagine what it felt like to fall like that. Would she die instantly? Would she even know? (16) She imagined what it would be like to live in the projects. She already knew what school "turfs" meant.

The girl gangs at school had physically hurt her. Intimidated, Esmeralda hid the bruises from her family. She felt isolated; she was losing her dream of belonging.

"I'm not afraid . . . I'm not afraid . . .Every day I walked home from school repeating those words." When I Was Puerto Rican, 17

Santiago juxtaposes the image of the projects over the confrontations of the gangs at school in her short story "Eyewitness." Gangs set the rules. Young Luisito's choices were narrowed. He conformed, even to the kind of sneakers he wore.

"Luisito sat and dangled his legs over the edge, then he took off his Adidas. It's sort of our trademark. Luisito stood up again, balancing on one foot. He didn't speak a lot of English, and sometimes we teased him. But that's no reason to go jumping off a roof." (condensed from "Eyewitness," 18)

"It was on these tense walks home from school that I decided I had to get out of Brooklyn." It was Mami's choice to be there; Esmeralda had "no choice." She was desperate to feel grass under her feet; she was suffocated by too many people living in too-small-a-space. It was hard for her to make friends and then move again and again. Not enough jobs for Mami to support her children. Family crowded into small apartments, sometimes sleeping four in a bed. Not enough chairs at the table. Too much family in too little space in urban, noisy Brooklyn. Cold apartments where families huddled in front of the TV warmed only by fantasy and dreams. Didn't anyone understand how unhappy she was? Mami's response was: "Do you want to go back to Macún, to live like savages, with no electricity, no toilets…." 19

The first winter is always the worst . . . because your blood is still thin from living in Puerto Rico." 20

Brooklyn wasn't like Puerto Rico where Indians, Africans, and Spanish were one: Puerto Ricans. In Brooklyn people were designated as Jews, Italians, and Blacks. Esmeralda would be labeled, too.

"I'd always been Puerto Rican, and it hadn't occurred to me that in Brooklyn I'd be someone else." Spanish speaking Esmeralda was profiled "Hispanic." Almost a Woman, 21

Santiago utilized her experiences and the challenges facing emigrating cultures in her novel América's Dream.

"I've never been anywhere, América thinks, but here I am, on an airplane over the ocean on my way to a foreign country where they speak a language I barely comprehend. . . 'Ay, Dios mío,' she asks herself again, what have I done? What am I doing here?"
América's Dream, 22

Being Puerto Rican was an asset for América. She was held in high regard by the other Latino maids. She was an American citizen! She didn't need a green card. Because she wasn't an illegal alien "working under the table," she attracted wealthy employers. Although she sorely missed her daughter, Rosalinda, she was proud to be successfully working in New York. It was when Rosalinda's father found her and tried to destroy her new life that she knew she could never return to her old life in Puerto Rico. She had changed. She bravely saved herself. América was finally a woman of courage.

Fiction imitating life
Fiction imitating fiction

While abusive relationships are portrayed in some of Santiago's works and "machismo" is a strong antagonist. Most of her male characterizations dominate with romantic love and promises. Her women, succumb to traditional roles, accepting and forgiving. And when they have lost all hope, they escape.

Escape as the only choice is a recurring theme for Santiago's women both in fiction and in reality. Conflicts sculpting choices. Choices relinquished for promises. Dreams blinded to reality. Escape and struggle. All are unsettled reflections drawn from Santiago's life. Her understanding of relationships goes beyond her memoirs and novels. She is a dedicated advocate of abused women, writing grants for shelters and developing documentaries. 23

"'She escaped,' Mami said, which meant that Gloria had eloped. No girl ever ran away by herself, although boys disappeared for weeks the minute they thought of themselves as men." When I Was Puerto Rican, 24

Santiago recalls scenes from her own life in the elopement of Gloria and recalls it as fourteen-year-old Rosalinda runs away with her boyfriend, just as América had at fourteen and her mother before her.

When teenage América ran away, her mother stuffed her daughter's belongings into a pillowcase. It is a memory of Santiago's own struggle as a six-year old child, carrying the heavy pillowcase down the red-clay road to the public bus to Santruce where the Santiago children would have a better life. Esmeralda's mother would be coaxed to return again and again by her father's warm embrace, just as América would be lured back by the deceptive whispers of Rosalinda's father.

When Mami Ramona finally realized Esmeralda's father would never marry her, she joined her mother's family in New York. América, too, found safety and security working as a maid in the same Westchester, New York where Esmeralda Santiago now lives. It was watching the nannies in the park where Santiago took her children that inspired the park scenes of América talking with the other nannies. 25

In "When Mami Left, I Didn't," Ana Ortiz remembers, "Then one day, Mami told Papi that she wanted a divorce. For that, he beat her up." Ana's mother leaves her husband, but Ana chooses to stay with her father thinking she could be the caregiver. Having established a new life and gaining self-esteem, her mother returns for her. Ana knows that she, too, must leave. Santiago parallels and expands the sequence of events in her novel América's Dream when Rosalinda screams, "Stop it, Papi, stop!" as her father stands over her mother's bruised body (26). América also escapes and without her daughter. They are reunited only after América emerges as the victor over abuse.

"Everyone's talking about how you left…Not saying goodbye to anyone."
América's Dream, 27

Mothers and daughters—all children themselves when they became mothers, their adolescent choices forever imprinted on their lives. It was a struggle that would entangle Esmeralda, too.

"I hate my life!"
"Then do something about it." 28

Esmeralda dreamed of making her own decisions and creating her own identity, yet fulfillment was always beyond her reach. Santiago's frank perspective of teenage adolescence is unmatched.

"I fantasized about being rescued by a good-looking man in uniform atop a horse . . .I seized the image of a policeman and his horse as if it were a gift and ignored Mami's litany of the 'algos'." Almost a Woman, 29

She was not allowed to wear make-up and short skirts like the girls in Brooklyn. Mami Ramona's fear of the bad "algos" perpetuated the old ways—chaperoned dates or a promise of marriage.

"Mami grabbed my hair. 'Who do you think you are?'…Don't think because we are here you can act like those fast American girls."  Almost a Woman, 30

She would be an American girl. She mastered English by reading children's books in the library. When the family moved again, she found an advocate in her school counselor who persisted in helping her understand that she was intelligent, she was talented, and she had options. She was ready.

When she enrolled in Manhattan's Performing Arts High School, Negi disappeared and Esmeralda Santiago emerged. The shy child from the Puerto Rican barrio was now a New York performing artist and being paid! She made her first close friends. She was beginning to understand what the world expected of her. But what could she expect? The dichotomy between Negi and Esmeralda was insistent and growing.

Struggling with "who I was" and "who I am," inexperienced and socially unsophisticated, she fell into relationships that dominated her. She clung obediently to the double standard of "do as Mami says, but not as Mami does," until her bubble of confusion burst. She could no longer be Negi and she didn't know if there was a dream for Esmeralda. It was then she met Ulvi and he created "Chiquita."

 "He needed a disciple; I needed to be led. He never mentioned "love."
Almost a Woman, 31

Make Me Special

Mami's relationships taught Esmeralda that reciprocation was not necessarily a part of the love equation, yet she went with Ulvi. Or maybe because love was not the catalyst in their relationship, she could go with Ulvi.

"The night before I left my mother, I wrote a letter . . . I didn't know why I was running away from home with a man older than my mother. Mami understood love, so I used the words and hoped that they were true. "El Hombre que yo amo." Amo, which in Spanish also means master. I didn't notice the irony.
"El hombre que yo amo," 32

He was sophisticated and patient with her as she learned to eat properly at the table. She soon conversed intelligently and gracefully in the presence of his friends and business acquaintances. He was a successful filmmaker and she absorbed his environment quickly. He took her naiveté and began to sculpt a sophisticated woman. But he was artistic, possessive, and temperamental.

Her mother found where Ulvi had taken Esmeralda in Florida. She would bring her daughter home! But Esmeralda knew that she could never return to her family in Brooklyn, just as she could never be the small brown child chasing hens in the Macún barrio.

"It's exhausting to be her child. Through the years, her life has served as both an example of what we should avoid and what we should aspire to. It is her generous spirit, courage, creativity, and dignity that I, her firstborn, try to emulate, her lessons written on every page of my life. . . If Ulvi left, there would be another man, but there would never, ever be another Mami. Las Mamis, 33

Esmeralda's dream did burst—into rapid successions of education, changing careers, and finally the reciprocal love of her husband and children.

". . .I also want to love myself. It's hard. Puerto Rican women are supposed to be so selfless. Mami says you have to respect yourself first, and then your relationships will be richer and fuller. "When Mami Left, I Didn't," 34

The hardships endured by Negi and young Esmeralda were now strengths for Esmeralda Santiago the author. Poverty is a masterful muse.

The author
The advocate

Hardship and poverty, love of homeland and family, intense relationships--these are the passions expressed by Latino authors. Too long they were untranslated and unknown. Today the Latino population has a strong presence: old voices receive translation and new voices excite the pages with vibrant imagination. Esmeralda Santiago has created an extraordinary presence, not only for her prodigious output of publications in just ten years, but also because she is an advocate for the new voices in Latino literature.

In two collaborative editions, Santiago with Joie Davidow provide poignant Latino perspectives of motherhood in Las Mamis and rekindle the holiday memories in Las Christmas. The collections present not only the memories of Caribbean authors, but also Mexican, South and Central American, and Latino authors living in the United States.

Family feasts at "Nochebuena" and the sharing of gifts on Three Kings Day and Hanukkah are scented with tropical images and unbreakable family ties. Even more compelling is the candid presentation of mothers —vignettes of praise, confusion and intensity. "First Born" by Santiago is the connection between mother and child, from the separation at birth to the realization that Mami can have her own life, too. The editions are a testimony to the advocacy and diversity of Santiago and Davidow's work.

"Puerto Ricans are a generous people 'united in their deep love for their island homeland.'" Teddy Roosevelt, Appointed Governor of Puerto Rico. 35

There is a generosity among us: Esmeralda Santiago