Misael
Portrait with Sara Stathas
Description: A young man in business attire sits at a drafting desk with a pencil in his hand and construction hat and boxer gloves in front of him. The background of the portrait is the blueprint of a space transitioning into a physical boxing gym.
Portrait with Zachary Maxwell Stertz
“The most memorable childhood experience was when I think I was six. My mom had a day off for the first time in the longest time. And we were able to spend a whole day together. I remember that day we ended up buying an Xbox 360, and I remember I was really happy and excited. We went to the movies. And after that we went home, and we hooked up the Xbox. That’s when I started playing it with my mom. I just remember the next day waking up extremely happy just knowing that I was able to hang out with my mom for at least a day.
She came here to the United States with the mindset of working hard to provide for us and give us a better future that she wished she would have had. And that’s something that I take as a motivation to do my best and just make her proud and show her that her sacrifice of leaving her country to come here and leaving her family behind - leaving her sister, her brother, her mom, her dad, who passed away recently and she never got the chance to see him anymore or be able to visit him, or him visit us.
Now that I’ve gotten older, and now that I’ve started working, she’s been able to have way more time to spend with us at home. And especially on our birthdays is days where we really don’t care about anything else other than just family time. And we will go to the movies, or we’ll go eat at a restaurant. But when I was little, I never had chances like that. I never really spent time with my mom when I was little because she was a really busy person. She’s been working hard for as long as I can remember.
That is something that I constantly think about, and I really appreciate that I’m here and have the tools to make a better future for myself - a future that I know my mom would wish she would have had, a future that she wants me to have. I’ve been taking school serious, and I was an honor student for two years in a row. This is my third year being an honor student. I’m hoping to at least graduate as Valedictorian. That’s like my main goal right now. I want to prove my mom’s sacrifices weren’t for nothing. My sister and my mom are the most important people that I have in my life. And I would do anything to protect them. I want to set an example for my sister, but I also want to make my mom proud and see that everything she’s done for us is paying off.
When I think of community, I think of Mexico. I went there when I was seven. It was the first time I ever experienced something different, compared to what I experience here every day, just having a neighbor who you have a connection to, compared to here where I don’t even know who my neighbors are. They don’t know who I am. To them, I could be somebody dangerous. When I think of community, I wish I would’ve experienced it somewhere where I call home and not a place where my bloodline is from. This is something that trips me up sometimes. Even to this day, I’ll walk around my neighborhood, and nobody really likes you. If America supposed to be the home of the immigrants, because that’s what the foundation of this country is, immigrants... Immigrants aren’t treated right. They’re just like, ‘oh, they’re lesser people.’
I’m hoping to become a civil engineer, because it’s a really interesting job that I really want to take on. I mean, civil engineers are something that everyone needs everywhere in the world, so it’s not like I’m never going to have a job. I told my mom I’m going to design the house that she always wanted and she always just laughs, but deep down, I know that she believes me. She knows I’m being serious and I could do it.
I have many goals that, slowly but surely, I’ll be able to accomplish and move on to the next because knowing how hardworking my mom is, I want to top the same work ethic that she has.
I’m in the position that I want to be in, and I’m happy with where I’m at at the moment.”
Milwaukee, 2019