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Dear listener, we begin today in the fall of 2001.

We start with a precocious seven-year-old boy named Alejandro Eredia.

He's living with his grandparents in the Dominican Republic.

For years, Alejandro heard from the adults all around him

that one day his parents would return to take him with them to the United States, and that one day has arrived.

The very last day before I left, the thing that sticks in my mind is walking to the car, looking out the window, and seeing junior, my older brother,

Ricky, my grandmother, and my grandfather.

And I remember it like a photo.

I mean, that was my life.

They were standing in front of the house.

That moment sticks in my brain and I don't think I will ever forget it.

Even at the tender age of seven, Alejandro had a deep sense of knowing inside of him.

Or I felt in my heart, even if I didn't have the language for it as a seven-year-old,

that I would never return to that image of my grandparents and my siblings and this world.

...