Chasing the Harvest by Gabriel Thompson

Author:Gabriel Thompson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Verso Books

SILVIA CORRERA

AGE: 47

OCCUPATION: Farmworker—wine grapes

BORN IN: Puebla, Mexico

INTERVIEWED IN: Stockton, San Joaquin County

AGRICULTURAL REGION: Napa Valley

Silvia Correra lives in a low-slung apartment complex near the shore of the San Joaquin River, which cuts through Stockton’s west side before reaching the San Francisco Bay. Aside from a brief trip to harvest crops in Oregon, since coming to the United States she has spent her entire life in this sprawling city, which is surrounded by rich farmland but filled with poor people—many of whom work that land.1

We meet on a crisp Sunday morning, the sole day off for most of the farmworkers in the complex. As the hours pass and the temperature rises, a crowd of Silvia’s friends and relatives gather on the front lawn to grill chicken, their laughter occasionally reaching us through the walls. Inside, seated at the kitchen table, Silvia tells her story in bursts. At times she pauses to gather herself. Other times we are interrupted by a pet iguana, which climbs up to the table and demands to be fed bits of iceberg lettuce.

Much of Silvia’s life has been defined by the deep trauma caused from a multi-generational cycle of domestic violence. It is likely that domestic violence among farmworkers is significantly underreported. Partly this is because of the fear of deportation: at least half of California farmworkers are estimated to be undocumented. Victims may also be economically dependent on partners when away from family and other support systems and worry about how they would survive on their own.

Silvia shared both of these concerns, but she was also one of the few to break the silence. She has begun to move away from the trauma, slowly. As we speak, her youngest daughter, twelve-year-old Jennifer, darts in and out of the kitchen, flashing a shy smile. A whiteboard hangs on the wall with a handwritten message: HAPPY BIRTHDAY ABUELITA—TE AMAMOS MUCHO. (Happy birthday Grandma—We love you.)

“I have arrived at a good place, finally,” she says. “But it wasn’t easy.”

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