1. Claire Main..............................................................................Page 3
Jeffrey Main............................................................................Page 5
Melvin Mason..........................................................................Page 7
Angeli Cabal............................................................................Page 9
ZuzanBarwari............................................................................Page11
Michele Scheuerman...............................................................Page13
Ramón Cádenas.......................................................................Page15
Finding Freedom:
Stories from the Community
Interviewees:
Special thanks to all those that participated. Thank you for sharing
your stories with me, I could not have done this without you.

2. Freedom. Freedom has been fought over for hundreds of years; it has been at the center of
revolutions, strikes, wars, death and even love. Through all these years people have fought over
something that there is no real definition to, according to Webster’s dictionary freedom is “the
power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.” This is the
front of freedom; the freedom people talk and think about when the subject comes up. But as
Lincoln said in 1864 at the Sanitary Fair in Maryland, “We all declare for liberty, but in using the
same word we do not all mean the same thing”. This is what my project is about, to show that
everyone has a different idea as to what freedom is. Ethnicity, age, culture, and experiences
people have lived through are just a few of what determine how people view freedom. I
wanted people to understand what is important, because it may be something that we have
never thought of because we have never lived without it.
Seventy-two years ago we had a leader that believed in freedom, who spoke to a country that
was questioning their freedom. Seventy-Two Years ago Franklin D. Roosevelt rose the hopes of
the people of the United States with his Four Freedoms speech.
In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world
founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech
and expression -- everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every
person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world. The third
is freedom from want -- which, translated into world terms, means economic
understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life
Introduction

3. for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear -- which,
translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a
point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit
an act of physical aggression against any neighbor-- anywhere in the world. Since the
beginning of our American history, we have been engaged in change -- in a perpetual
peaceful revolution -- a revolution which goes on steadily, quietly adjusting itself to
changing conditions -- without the concentration camp or the quicklime in the ditch.
The world order which we seek is the cooperation of free countries, working together
in a friendly, civilized society.
I chose a project about freedom because it is one of our most basic rights. It is a fundamental ideal of
this country. Defined and upheld by one of the most sacred documents of this country, the Declaration of
Independence. Individual freedom is everyone’s right, it is something that is built into our lives, yet every
person has their own idea of freedom. This project gives people in the community the voice to tell their
own story of what freedom is for them. In the pages of this book are people who have lived through obsta-
cles that life has given them and come out knowing what is important to them. Although this is my project
I wanted the people in the pages to be the center of attention. I wanted their voice to come through the
writing, which is why I asked them to write their own profile. A short summary of who they are and how
they got to be the person they are today. I could have interviewed them for months and still I would not
understand their life and who they are as well as they know themselves. The story of their freedom and
how they came to realize that is what freedom means to them is the part I wrote. Taking the interview and
trying though my skills as a journalist to catch their story and help you as readers to understand them. I
included photographs of the interviewees because a photograph is worth a thousand words. A photo will
put a face to the story, I feel like we get a better idea of who a person is with a photograph.

4. I grew up in a place where you knew who your neighbors were and
you left the doors unlocked at night. I grew up where the hills turned
colors with the changing of the seasons and the flowers bloomed in the
spring. I grew up in a family that knew who they were and what they
wanted to do with their life. I never did, I was like the other kids who
went through wanting to be a lawyer, a veterinarian, an FBI agent and a
professional basketball player all in the span of a week. I started writing
poems when I felt like no one understood me, and began writing national
best sellers at least once a week. My grandfather always encouraged me
to write, telling me that I was talented, something my parents continued
to tell me long after he passed away.
Whether I believed it or not I decided that it was as good a career as
any and in the spring of 2009 I chose Journalism and Media Studies as the
one thing I was going to do for the rest of my life. It may not have been
the right choice, but at that moment when I had to choose I didn’t know
who I wanted to be in the future, I was too busy trying to figure out who I wanted to be in the
present.
My family has always been the most important thing in my life, we have our issues
like most families, but we are close. We count on each other and know that no matter what
we will always be able to count on each other. But I always felt like I was living in their
shadow, which can happen when you belong to a family like mine who are talented, passion-
ate, hardworking, and know what they want in life.
When I was younger I was very self-conscious, I was scared to spend the night away
from home, and when I did I was made fun of for something I couldn’t control. I felt like I
wasn’t as pretty as the kids around me and I felt ashamed because if it. I didn’t like who I was,
I always wanted to be the pretty girl from my class, my sister, or some star on TV. Growing
up, traveling, and some kind words have helped me become closer to the person I want to
be, and closer to figuring out what I want to do.
Claire Main

5. “Freedom is the Right to be Yourself”
Short Story
After two years of college, making friends and living and away from home for the first time, I decided that I needed
a change. By chance I decided to take a year and study abroad in Uppsala, Sweden. In that year I figured out more
about myself than I had in the previous twenty years.
I always felt like I was not the person I wanted to be, I got angry when I didn’t want to, I cried when I didn’t
need to, I hurt when I had no reason to. I knew I wasn’t the person I wanted to be, but I couldn’t figure out who
I was. I felt like I was always trying to live up to everything my family was and who my friends wanted me to be. I
kept trying to find that one thing in my life that I was good at, like my sister with art, trying to be as dedicated as
my parents or as outgoing as my brother. I felt like compared to my family, I never measured up. I felt like I was in
the background of life, never being who I wanted to be. I wanted to be someone that my family could be proud of,
someone who lived up to the Main family name.
When I went to Sweden no one knew me. I was able to start over, not have people know who my family was
and what they had accomplished in their lives. I was able to finally be me without the worry of disappointing the
people around me. They had no expectations of me, I no longer needed to be good at art, outgoing or ready to
commit myself to a cause. I was able to realize that I wanted to travel, to help people abroad, perhaps not be a
journalist. I figured out that I have a lot to offer my friends, and a true friend wouldn’t make me feel like I wasn’t
good enough for them. I realized that I was being pulled in many different directions inside, feeling like I had to be
different versions of myself around different people. I was losing sight of myself.
It was because of this trip that I figured out I should not have to change who I am to please the people around
me. I know we have been told this our entire lives, but I never realized I was doing it until then. The trip to Sweden
provided me with the freedom to get rid of all the people that I thought others wanted me to be. Without having
to perform for anyone, I began to discover my own qualities, to discover the person I wanted to be.

6. “Freedom is the Right to be Free From Fear”
Short Story
In my life there have been a lot of things that I thought were important, but I learned that the less I focused on worrying about money,
relationships, or about my own image, the more personal freedom I gained. I realized that it wasn’t people taking away things from me as
much as it was me being afraid that they could. I believe personal freedom is about knowing that I can deal with what happens to me, not
that I can keep it from happening, but that I can reduce the impact it has on me.
ThethingthathappenedinmylifethatreallyaffectedmeandhowIviewedpersonalfreedomwaswhenIrealizedwhatIhaddonewhen
I held my daughter while she was being anesthetized before an operation. In order for them to complete the operation they had to give her
so much anesthetics that all her bodily functions ceased. Those machines were all that was keeping her alive. I essentially held her while she
died. That moment was the first inkling I had that something more was going on than I could fathom. I was unaware that I was part of the
managed death of my daughter. When I realized my part in that I had to accept my role as a decision maker and that I was not necessarily
going to make a correct decision, but that I needed to take the responsibility to make one. I was the facilitator, the person that created the
experience for me and for her, she got through the surgery and everything turned out to be fine, but she and I had to live and deal with the
consequences and I had to let go of the notion that I was responsible for the outcome of my uneducated decision.
I think I am lucky. I have always had the tools and the support to deal with the small traumas in my life. Because I never experienced
any major traumas, I have never had the fear of losing my own personal freedom. Because of that I have been able to not worry about what
might happen to me. I know I have the ability to deal with the consequences of what does happen. I believe freedom is allowing yourself
that choice. The choice to say “I will deal with this later”. So instead of anticipating of how terrible things are going to be if it happens, I say
‘this is happening, I can’t deal with it now, but I will be able to take care of it later.” I think the important thing is that I continue to be here,
and to not to give up.
All this has helped prevent fear in my life. The fear of being afraid is a major factor preventing personal freedom. Fear prevents the abil-
ity to participate in my own life. Part of keeping my personal freedom and not being afraid is saying “yes it may lead to a terrible outcome,
but it’s here and I have to let go of the outcome and not retreat from the process.” The more I learn that the better I can handle life, death,
personal failure and success. I have learned how to not be afraid of participation.
Those are the kind of moments when there is a reduction in fear, a reduction in the desire to flee. My whole life has been about perse-
verance, no matter what happens I will continue to be here. I will persevere, until I can’t anymore.
Written by Claire Main. Based on interview, February 24th, 2013

7. I have lived 62 years in California. I’ve filled my life,
stuffed it full of doing, and if a guy lives long enough
and does enough, lessons are learned.
I’ve always been a good athlete, not like my Dad who
probably could have won the Olympic Decathlon if the
Second World War hadn’t come along. The best thing
about athletics is that there is always the chance to
make yourself better. I was always in competition with myself to be the best I could be. That’s when I
learned a big lesson; as long as I was better than I was yesterday it didn’t matter if someone out there
was better than me. It’s about getting better, and being able to do something I couldn’t do yesterday.
That’s something I learned; if there are things I can’t do today, tomorrow maybe I can. I was into
my third hour picking squash one summer morning, and suddenly it flashed through my mind why the
full moon always rose just as the sun went down. That may seem trivial to others, but I never forgot, because I had
never figured it out before. I decided that my mind just wasn’t ready for it before, and then it was. Sometimes, when
things are hard and it seems like there is no way out, I still have hope for tomorrow because I finally figured out why
a full moon always rises at sunset.
I was farming vegetables for a living then, 35 years ago. I am still farming vegetables, and anything else that is good
for people, good for the earth. There is one reason I still do that, because I can get up every morning, and look in the
mirror at the face of someone who does something good. When I started farming I just wanted to work, hard and
continuous, to test my limits. I once stayed awake nearly three days to find my limit. I found a limit rotating canta-
loupe at four in the morning. I found a limit in a blazing blackberry patch, cutting canes until dark with no water. I
found a limit under a 1962 Ford pickup with a transmission on my chest. These limits were as far as I could go. I keep
testing myself, because who knows what might change. I live life to test new limits and to know that I am doing something good.
There is another part of me, too. The entire time I’m testing my limits and farming, I’m creating. My life is a piece of art that I have been
creating. The farm where I hope to live as an old man is part of my art. My three children and my wife, their lives with me are part of my art.
The Farmer’s Market, the Davis Food Co-op and the local food system are all part of the piece of living art that I have helped to create.
These days I’m trying to get used to the way this piece of art lives on its own, to the idea that it will continue to live after I have moved
on. I would still like to have an effect on the way it goes. But there is no way to know whether there are more large pieces for me to fill in, or
whether my job is to fill in a few more small bits. Either way I am looking forward to finding out.
Jeffrey Main

8. Tosome I was considered one of the greatest basketball players in
this area. At Monterey Peninsula College I was All-American and still
hold the school’s scoring and rebound records. I was inducted into the
California Community College Athletic Association’s Hall Of Fame.
When I graduated MPC I was recruited by most of the major
universities in the country, but chose Oregon State University where I
ended up taking a stand against the racist treatment of Black athletes
and students. Because of this I lost my scholarship and was barred from
playing basketball at any university in the country. Later I realized the
ending of my basketball career opened doors for me that gave my life
more meaning, such as a 45 year involvement as an activist for civil and human rights.
My activism led me to become a member of the Black Panther Party, and a member of the Black Panther
Party Speakers Bureau which educates people on the history and legacy of that organization. Over the years, I have
remained involved in campaigns to free former Panthers who were framed and imprisoned as a result of the FBI’s
Counterintelligence Program.
After years of activism I was elected to the Seaside City Council amid death threats and acts of attempted
intimidation. I remember my first council meeting was canceled as a result of a bomb threat by someone who said
he wanted to “blow up that n-----!”
Throughout my career, I have spoken in many parts of the world on behalf of human rights issues. I have
run for Governor of California as well as for President of the United States. I was a friend of Maurice Bish-
op, Prime Minister of the country of Grenada. I was a guest of then President Daniel Ortega’s government in Nicaragua where I met an
|activist from Brazil named Inacio Lula Da Silva who would become President of Brazil years later. I co-founded and helped lead many
organizations including A Black United Farm Workers Union support committee during the Great Lettuce Strike of 1970, a number of
anti-police brutality campaigns, and the Regional Alliance for Progressive Policy which took on the local Border Patrol over violations com-
mitted against immigrants. During my first of three terms as local NAACP Branch President I co-founded and chaired the Civil Rights Coalition
of Monterey County which consisted of all the civil rights organizations in Monterey County. I have always placed the relationship between
the NAACP Branch, the Ministerial Alliance and the churches as a matter of historic necessity and importance in the ongoing struggle for civil
and human rights in the area.
I am now married to the love of my life Regina Mason with whom I co-founded a now five year old African American Family Resource
Center called The Village Project. I serve as both Executive Director and Clinical Director for this agency that
provides counseling and therapy. I have two sons Melvin and Hasani. Melvin Mason

9. “Freedom is the Right to Have Control Over yourself”
Short Story
I was born in Kentucky during the Jim Crow era, when segregation was legal. When I was young I would hear stories from my great-
grandmother about being a rebellious slave, and fighting for herself. So I knew freedom was an issue; but it didn’t really sink in until later in
my life, after I moved to California.
In high school I played basketball, which gave me a false sense of security about racism. Sure incidents happened, I was arrested for
breaking curfew while my white teammates were let go, I was told I looked suspicious and to leave the white neighborhood. In spite of those
incidents I looked at the “broader” picture: I was accepted, I was a basketball player, and people liked me, which offset the racist incidents.
I knew I was going to play professional basketball one day, and nobody was going to stop me. I was on my way too. I went to Monterey
Peninsula College and set records that are still unbroken today. I graduated with one of the greatest basketball classes in history accord-
ing to Dales Sports Magazine, and I got 104 scholarships. I chose Oregon State University and became their third black student. The coach
welcomed me, I signed the contract and he locked it away. He then told me I had to be aware that “white people in Corvallis aren’t used to
colored people” and I had to govern myself accordingly. He gave me a list of restrictions; I couldn’t leave campus after hours, I couldn’t be
involved with white women, the list went on. I said I was there to play ball and that’s all he had to concern himself with. I signed up for sum-
mer classes so that in four years when I was done playing basketball I would also have an education. But my coach lectured me on how I was
going to flunk the classes, ruin my chances of playing basketball and have wasted their scholarship. He told me I wasn’t a student; I was “just
a colored boy who knew how to play basketball”. Our relationship continured to get worse.
Because of my ‘attitude’ that coach took away my scholarship, and when I realized I wouldn’t be playing basketball at OSU I left and got
a job at Western Electric in San Jose. I tried to play basketball again, I petitioned the NCAA to play in a different division for another school
so there would be no conflict. But they sided with the coach. One racist man who thought black people were inferior in every way ended my
basketball career. Having a list of limitations began to drive home how important it was to be in control of myself really mattered. When I was
a kid I didn’t realize how bad it was, but when people kept telling me as an adult what I could and couldn’t do I knew it was wrong.
We started the Black Workers Organization and they asked me to be their spokesperson. That was the start of my activist career.
It wasn’t long afterwards that Bobby Seale himself, the chairman of the Blank Panthers, asked me to join them. What happened to me
at OSU was a blessing. In a way I was self-motivated, self-interested, everything was about me. I didn’t have a social consciousness. The
incident opened my eyes to the things that were going on and all the things that were wrong. Once I saw that, I realized I had a responsibility
to change it. What I found gave more meaning to my life than if I had stayed with basketball. Basketball played a role in my bigger life, it got
me from one place to the next and ultimately it got me to where I found a bigger purpose in my life.
Written by Claire Main. Based on interview, March 27th, 2013

10. “Freedom is the Right to Opportunity”
Short Story
When I was first asked to do this interview I thought about how being a Filipino immigrant affected my view of freedom. I decided it all came
down to opportunity. We weren’t doing badly in the Philippines, in fact we were pretty well off. But because poverty was so wide spread, I
think my parents believed that getting an American education was the best way you could make something of yourself. If you had the right
education you would have options. That’s rare in Philippines, to have options.
When I first told my parents that I wanted to become a writer, they were less than thrilled. It was then that I realized how the American
way of living as an individual had truly influenced me . That being free, to me meant having the opportunity to pursue my own happiness. My
parents were still traditionalists in their views of what freedom meant , that freedom was earned, and that happiness could only be achieved
through financial stability. So when I decided to pursue writing and thought it was my right, my mother looked me and said, “So you want to
be poor.” They saw writing as a luxury, not a career, much less a stable one. Being a writer meant a future that would be vague and uncer-
tain, and because of that I would never know where my future would go.
But just having the option to follow my dream is freedom. There are so many people that can’t go to college, that can’t follow their
dream. My parents did not have the option to follow their dreams. They lived in extreme poverty when they were younger. They did what
they had to do in order to gain financial stability and provide security for their family. Opportunity is thrown around so loosely here in Amer-
ica. My parents didn’t have shoes, they had to walk three miles to school every day, and they never had much to eat.
My mother used to tell me how she wanted to be a doctor or a flight attendant, but that it possible because of her obligations to her
family. They didn’t have the opportunity I do here. They went to college because failing wasn’t an option; failing meant their family would
starve. In the end they got good paying careers that led to my having a comfortable life. But in the process they had to give up their passions.
They didn’t want me to write because it wasn’t rational or stable. But having the ability to follow my dreams, even if I don’t reach them,
is the greatest freedom. If I had stayed in the Philippines I wouldn’t have had the freedom to say that becoming a writer is why I am going
to college.
I’m glad I came to America, but one of my issues is that Americans who are born here don’t see the value of the opportunity that is
given to them. Being an immigrant, I question whether we can get that freedom, because in order to fully get the opportunities that Amer-
ica has to offer we have to assimilate into the society. That means giving up a part of who we are, and because of that I am unable to speak
my native language. So a question I have to ask myself is whether or not being able to have the opportunity to follow my passions is worth
giving up a part of who I am.
Written by Claire Main. Based on interview, March 3rd, 2013

11. My name is Angeli Cabal. I am a graduating senior at CSUMB,
majoring in Human Communications with a concentration in Social Action
and Creative Writing. I moved to the United States from the Philippines with
myfamilywhenIwassixyearsoldin1991. Wewereafamilyofsix;myparents,
meandmythreebrothersandsisters.Mystatusasanimmigrant(andnowan
American citizen), once something that I was ashamed of, has now become
a huge facet and influence in my writing. Although we were not poor in the
Philippines, my parents eagerly made the move for the sake of our future,
emphasizing education and the opportunities we could have in the United
States. Because I was so young when we moved, I was not yet aware of the
concessions we had to make, both as a family and individuals, in order to “fit
in” to American society and have access to these “opportunities.”
To me, the word “freedom” evokes the mental image of my parents,
young and poverty stricken, having to make decisions based purely on
economical reasoning in order for them and their family to survive. They
went to school for careers they did not necessarily like, but did so because it
held that elusive promise of steady income and means of feeding, clothing,
and sending the rest of their brothers and sisters to school. Survival was the
most important thing on the agenda. Everything else came after.
Having been raised in America since the age of six, I have had the
luxury of not having to make decisions because loved ones’ lives depended
on it. I have had the luxury of indulging my own personal desires, especially
the luxury to be able to declare a major I love in order to pursue a career I
love. In painstakingly giving us America, my parents had given me and my
brothers and sister freedom to be able to find what we loved and go after it.
They gave us freedom of opportunity. They gave us freedom to live a life we
may have never known we ever wanted.
Angeli Cabal

12. I am a Kurdish-American who works in the field of Applied Linguistics. Although I have earned my
graduate education and have worked with several major Universities and educational institutions, as
a child growing up in Kurdistan, I never even dreamed of finishing elementary school before coming
to United States.
I was born and raised in Kurdistan, a nation that has been occupied and divided by neighboring
countries since World War I against their own will. I was born on the Iraqi occupied Kurdistan side,
where as a young girl along with my family and thousands of other Kurds escaped from chemical
weapons Saddam used on Kurds in 1988. With my family we settled in Turkish occupied Kurdistan,
where we lived in a refugee camp in very harsh and inhumane conditions, under tents for four and half
years. While in refugee camps in Turkey, I witnessed family members, friends, and neighbors being
poisoned and mistreated by Turkish government, only because they were Kurds. On many occasions,
they poisoned bread and distributed it among the inhabitant of the camps, in order to deliberately
harm and kill them. Due to this poisoned bread, many children and innocent human beings either died
or became paralyzed; and those who lived- experienced a lifetime experience of trauma.
In 1992, my family and I along with thousands of other Kurds came to U.S. as refugees. I was
offered a chance to attended school as an 8th grader, an idea beyond my dreams. As a daughter of a free-
dom fighter, I never had a chance to attend school in Iraq nor in Turkey. In Iraq, the Baath regime did not
accept freedom fighters’ children in schools (usually freedom fighters’ children and family members were
arrested and put in prisons by the government). In Turkey, Kurdish language and identity were completely
banned. One could not even say “I am Kurdish” it was illegal to say such a thing even though Kurds are not
Turks and do not speak Turkish.
Instead of fearing someone would arrest me or my family members for being Kurds, I was finally
free, in USA, and able to freely say “I am Kurdish” or “I speak Kurdish”. I successfully earned an education
all the way to graduate school. I was recently invited to two universities in Kurdistan to serve as an expert
in developing curriculum for the Kurdish Graduate Programs at those universities.
I believe hard work pays off and is grateful for the opportunities I have had in my life to become the
person I am today. I strive to help disadvantaged children and students.
Zuzan Barwari

13. “Freedom is the Right to Freely Express Your Identity”
Short Story
I’m Kurdish. When I was growing up, we weren’t able to say that. We had to hide our identity because someone was always there to punish
us if we didn’t. We always dreamed of the freedom to be able to say “We are Kurdish, this is our land”. But instead, we struggled for our most
basic human rights.
Kurdistan is split between Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria, and all our lives we faced oppression and prejudice. We were unable to go to
school because we had Kurdish names, we would have to change our names in order to register, we were unable to freely speak of our
parents, our history, our literature, we couldn’t even speak our own language.
My family life was good, I grew up in a loving family, and a good home environment. We grew up around people fighting for their
freedom. Freedom was in the stories my aunt, mother and grandmother told us, my father was also a freedom fighter. Even if we didn’t
understand “freedom” as kids, we heard it. Freedom was in our surroundings; it’s all we would hear: “We are working for our freedom, we
are fighting for it, one day we will be free and the struggle will have been worth it”.
In1988weleftIraqiKurdistanwhenSaddamHusseinusedchemicalweaponsagainstus.Hismenflewoverourtownpouringmustardgas
overeverything.Thousandsofpeopledied,thereweresome,likemyfamily,whowereabletoescape.Werandayandnightwithonlytheclothes
on our backs, no food or water for days, until we reached the Turkish border. We thought we would be safe, but instread we were faced with
guns. We didn’t know what to do, on one end we were escaping chemical weapons and on the other Turkish soldiers were pointing guns at us,
tellingustoturnback.Whatdowedoatthatmoment?Doweturnbacktowherethechemicalswillkillus,ordowestaythereandtakeachance.A
bullet will kill ten people, maybe a hundred, but not thousands. So we took our chance and stayed. Turkey was forced to accept us as
refugees. But for us it got worse. We lived in camps with only tents as shelter, no heat, no showers for weeks, no food or water for days;
we lived like this for four and a half years. Sometimes the Turkish Government cut off our food and water, and even poisoned our bread. My
grandfather died from that poison, and my grandmother was paralyzed for twenty-three years.
In 1992 the United States brought us to America as refugees. At first it was hard to believe, so many times reporters had done stories
on us and the camps, but in the end they would always leave us there in the camps. When we finally got to the U.S., it was shocking, I could
freely say I was Kurdish without being afraid, I didn’t have to worry about being tortured or jailed because of who I was. I grew up in an
environment where fear was a part of my daily life. When I came here I realized not only could I be myself, but I had the right to be myself.
I’m proud to be American, but I’m also proud to say that I am Kurdish. There are no longer any restrictions on who I am. We knew how we
were treated was wrong, but we didn’t know anything else. It wasn’t until after we experienced the freedom we were fighting for did we
understand what it was we were fighting for. It is a feeling that is hard to explain in words, but now I value the ability to freely say I am myself.
Written by Claire Main. Based on interview, April 9th, 2013

14. “Freedom is the Right to Decide for Yourself”
Short Story
I have been to jail nine times in my life, and each time I was told what to eat, when to get up, when to go to bed, and what to wear. When-
ever there was an argument we were told to sit, and if we didn’t, we got hit with pellets. I like my life as it is now, if I don’t want to sit I don’t
have to. It’s the little teeny tiny things in my life every day that are up to me to decide. I don’t have anyone else making those decisions
for me and that feels so good.
I used to be an alcoholic, I was addicted to smoking and I was arrested for possession of drugs multiple times. My entire life used to
consist of going to jail, getting clean, gaining weight, getting out, and losing weight.
I remember the moment when I realized I wanted to change, It was the last time I went to jail in April of 2006 I was almost fifty, and
they wanted to put me away for six years because of twenty dollars’ worth of cocaine in my possession. That’s when I asked myself why
I was putting myself through this; I had family and grandchildren to get to know. Because I was adopted, family means a little bit more to
me than it may to others. My mom had died two years before I went to prison and my family threatened to kick my butt if I showed up to
the funeral. It was because of that and seeing my daughter in the prison yard that made me want to change. Seeing her there on the other
side of the fence nearly killed me. I looked at her and asked what the hell she was doing there. Her simple answer; “drugs”. That’s when
I realized that I wasn’t setting a good example for the people around me. I guess that’s the moment I really started changing. I changed
enough that the guards let me talk to her the night before I was released, and the first thing I said to her when I sat down was that I loved
her, I was going to miss her and that I would write.
After I left prison I got myself into a program to clean up; I was in there for six months. I have now been clean for six years and two
years ago I quit smoking. I quit smoking around the same time my youngest daughter, the same one I saw in prison, found my son who I
had never known. His father had kicked me out of the house and kept my son from me. So when I got a call from my daughter telling me
that she had found him; it was one of the greatest moments of my life. It must have been only five minutes later when my son called me,
and before I was able to tell him how sorry I was. He said “‘Momma, I don’t care what the hell happened, I love you.”’
Today I am just about living in freedom; I’m going to school at California State Monterey Bay because I got tired of people saying no
to me when I would apply for a job. I hope to graduate in 2015 with bachelors in Collaborative Health and Human Services and a minor
in Human Communication. For anyone that feels a bit overwhelmed just let them know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, they
may not be able to see it because there is a curve, but it’s there. I’m through my curve, at least for the moment, until someone throws me
another
Written by Claire Main. Based on interview, February 27th, 2013

15. I was born on Saturday November 24, 1956 in Karl-
sruhe Germany, My adoptive mom married my dad
when I was 6, and he adopted me a year later. He was
a very strict man; he was a serviceman and had only
one way of thinking. Things were supposed to go his
way or not at all. He could carry a grudge for years. He
is also a racist. If you don’t look and act like him, he
doesn’t want anything to do with you. He even stated
that we were not to speak German ever again in the
house. We were Americans.
I still think that he is the main reason I grew
up more independent in my thoughts about race and
holding grudges. I don’t care about the color of your
skin; it is the attitude that you show me that helps me
to decide if you’re a friend or foe. I have a long fuse on my temper and once it goes off, it will quickly
burn itself out.
Between the ages of 11 and 16 I ran away from home 27 times, I was incarcerated in a girl’s
home in West Covina for 11 months and 9 days. The judge thought that I must have been crazy
because I kept running away from a perfectly good home. The last time I ran away, I went with my 34
year old boyfriend that my father said that I could not be with. I guess parents know a lot more than
we give them credit for. My life with him was miserable except for having 2 beautiful children and
taking me to New Orleans. I left him and went with another boyfriend to California, losing both of
my children to San Antonio, Texas Child Protective Services. I became pregnant with his child, but six
months after I had the baby, he kicked me out of the house, keeping my new son from me.
After 20 years and a marriage with two more children, I left home and proceeded to get into
the drug scene. I was arrested for possession of illegal substance and the courts tried to get me to
straighten up. About two years later I was arrested for disappearing off the probation radar. The
judge sent me to prison. I spent all of my spare time in my books and the Bible, going to church and
staying alone in my room. I found that it was helping me get through the hard times. I got myself into
a program for people who really wanted to get away from drugs to get off parole early.
When I finished the program and I put in applications all over to try and find a job, but the only answers that I was received were, “I am sorry, you
don’t have the qualifications that we need.” Or “I am sorry you are overqualified because of your license for Cosmetology.” I couldn’t find a job and I refused
to go back to my old life that had made me miserable for so long. I decided to go back to school. I needed to help
people and teaching seemed like a perfect way. Since then I have found that Social Work may need to be it for
now. No matter what, I have the freedom to do what I want.
Michele Scheuermann

16. I was born in Guadalajara Mexico in 1934; I was the youngest of five kids. I never knew my father,
he died in an accident before I was born, and my mother followed when I was two. It was all on my
brother’sshoulderstoraiseus,hewasfifteen.Istartedworkingatageseven,choppingoaktreestomake
charcoal,gatheringJohnsongrasstofeeddonkeys,andpickingcoffeebeansfor1centperliter;mysister
andIcouldpicktenlitersofbeansinoneday.IlearnedhowtofarmfromaJapanesemanatelevenyears
old who taught me how to bud fruit trees, tend a 1000 chickens, milk cows at 3am and carry the milk to
townanddeliverithousetohouse.IsawnofutureinwhatIwasdoingsoatthirteenIbecameanappren-
ticeplumberandelectrician,butstillthebossdidn’tpaymemyduewages.Isawmenaroundmegetting
married, but they didn’t have anything to offer their wives, they just got married and lived in poverty.
When I met Lucy at age twelve I knew she was who I wanted to marry, but I saw no future for my wife
and I in Mexico.
Not knowing when I was born, I had no identification and joined the Mexican Military for one
year. One day after I was discharged I left for the United States. But because I never went to school,
I did not know how to write in Spanish, so when I came to the U.S. I was determine to learn English. I
took the correspondence course yet after one and a half years in the U.S. I still didn’t feel comfortable
around people so I took night classes to learn English.
I worked in the lumber yard for eleven years until it closed, and started working for a farmer. In
the mid 1990’s I was in an accident, where a backhoe knocked me over; I wasn’t afraid of death, and saw my-
self walking towards the light, but woke up in the Sacramento Trauma center. It took me almost eight years to
recuperate, and when they wanted to put me on disability I wouldn’t let them, I wanted to work, and did until
another car accident, and that was the end of working for others. At that point still with medical debts I knew
I had to continue bringing in money. I took inventory of my life, and asked myself when I was happiest, and
that was when I sold produce at the farmers markets in Mexico. So my son and I started selling at the Davis
Farmers Market. It took us almost ten years to get out of debt.
I was determine to make a better life for my wife and I, to be able
to send my three children to college, and what kept me going was that I
always had faith and believed in miracles. Lucy said “it is a hard life, every-
day there is something, but we are still here.” I dreamed of this little farm
all my life, and we are here, and we are happy.
Ramón Cádenas

17. “Freedom is the Right to Live Life Your Own Way”
Short Story
It wasn’t until I met my wife when I was twelve that I knew I wanted to provide her with a better life than the one I could give her in Mexico.
Although I would have been able to have a good job selling at the farmers market I didn’t want her to have to be around the people, they
were rough and I never liked their behavior. I joined the military as was law at that time and spent a year serving on the weekends until I
finally got my discharge papers in February of 1954. When I tried to get to California that same year I was captured by the border patrol three
times in one week. When they captured me I was put in jail until they caught enough people to fill a bus then they would ship us back to the
border. But I never gave up trying to find a better life for my future wife.
After four failed attempts in one month to get to the U.S. I joined the Bracero program. I stayed at the border with a number they
gave me waiting for them to call it so I was able to come to California. Finally I was contracted to pick citrus in Ventura County. The only
image of the U.S. I had was from the movies I watched, and Ventura County was not what I had dreamed about. My countrymen lived in
camps, they paid rent and because they could not speak English they were unable to get other jobs. I knew I was not going to be happy there
with my future wife. So I prayed to the Virgin Mary that when I returned with the Bracero program the following year that she would send me
to a place where no one spoke English. In 1955, on August 9th I was sent to Northern California to a small town called Rumsey, population 40.
I was contracted to knock almonds for two months, but the farmer asked me to stay after to help with the pruning. I was the only Span-
ish speaking person left; I walked around the empty worker camps looking for something to read. I took a walk to town and found a book of
matches with Uncle Sam pointing at you that said ‘learn English the easy way by correspondence’. I always believe in following the signs that
come to you. It cost me $48 but I sent a letter to North Hollywood, and that’s when I started to learn English in 1957. I knew I wanted to have
a home for my wife and future family so after working for a year I asked my boss to sell me a small piece of land to build an adobe house for
my future wife. He sold it to me for $1.00 and for one year I hauled gravel and rocks out of a nearby creek and built a house out of adobe. I
had saved $11,000 from the previous year, knowing that I would not be able to work and build a house. In 1962 after I had been a resident in
California for five years I applied for citizenship and got it, I went back to Mexico married my wife Lucy, and brought her to our new house in
Rumsey.
When I first came to this country, I was illegal and all I wanted was to be left alone. I wanted to be able to work a job to get money and
be able to provide a good life for my future family. I never asked for a hand out, I wanted to live my dream of living with my family in a good
place and working how and where I wanted. Now I am living in my freedom, I am living the dream I have had since I was a child. I am able to
do whatever I want, and no matter what I will always have my garden.
Written by Claire Main. Based on interview, April 13th, 2013

18. This book had the purpose to show its readers that everyone may have a different idea of freedom. My most important
freedom may not be the same as others, but to me the ability to be yourself is freedom. Like the others in this book I
have come to this conclusion through life experience and my own personal reasons. No one personal freedom is more
important than another, because we cannot know how important it truly is unless we have been without that freedom.
Some take for granted certain freedoms because we have never had the fear of living without it.
I wanted this project to inform its readers of freedoms they may not have thought of because they have always
had it. For them to think about their own freedom and remember every day how fortunate they are to have it. Because
somewhere in the world there may be someone who is living without that freedom.
I want to end this project with something I learned, I never could have imagined learning as much as I did. I learned
about the lives of six amazing individuals who have lived through so much. They opened up to me and trusted me with
their stories and the ability to bring them to life. I only hope that I succeeded in telling their story and you can learn as
much as I did from their lives and their stories.
“This nation has placed its destiny in the hands and heads and hearts of its millions of free men
and women; and its faith in freedom under the guidance of God. Freedom means the supremacy
of human rights everywhere. Our support goes to those who struggle to gain those rights or keep
them. Our strength is our unity of purpose. To that high concept there can be no end save victory”.
-Franklin D. Roosevelt
Sources
* Lincoln, Abraham. Address at Sanitary Fair, Baltimore, Maryland. April 18, 1864. The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Roy P.
Basler, vol. 7, pp. 3012
* Roosevelt, Franklin. Message to Congress. Congressional Record, 1941, Vol. 87, Pt. I. 1941.
Photography
Provided by interviewees or taken by Claire Main
Conclusion