An American Son: A Memoir by Marco Rubio Page B

rice and boiled cassava, a traditional holiday feast in rural Cuba.
    That Christmas is my fondest childhood memory. It had been a long time since I had seen my parents so happy. My father had felt transported to his childhood in the years before his mother died. My mother was nearly overcome with emotion as she spent her first Christmas in five years with Barbara. And my grandfather was as close to our family’s rural Cuban heritage as he had been since his boyhood. Only Veronica has unpleasant memories of it. She had been appalled to see a pig killed and butchered, and terrified when Orlando chased her around the house with the pig’s head.
    Our Christmas in Miami reawakened my affection for the city and the Cuban culture so prevalent there. But I returned to the familiar, pleasurableroutines of my life in Las Vegas with little reason to wish I lived anywhere else.
    I became interested in girls that year and started to care about my appearance. I was popular at school, and had an increasingly active social life. My schoolwork suffered for it, of course, but I managed to get by making the minimum effort necessary. Life was great—and then it wasn’t.
    In April 1984, the Culinary Workers Union went on strike. I went with my father to the union hall, where several hundred workers rallied on the eve of the strike. The strike became my new obsession. The strikers set up camp in a desert field across the street from Sam’s Town and took turns walking shifts on the picket line. I helped make their signs. When the hotel management sent one of their security staff to videotape the picketers, I held a sign in front of his camera to block his view.
    I never grasped all the issues involved, but understood generally that the strikers were just asking to be treated fairly. They had worked hard to help make the hotels profitable, and were entitled to better compensation and benefits. I was excited to be part of the cause and join forces with striking workers from many hotels. At the height of the strike, it seemed all the kids at my school had a parent on the picket line. I became a committed union activist. I got to spend time with my father. I thought it was nothing but fun.
    Initially, the financial strain on my parents was modest. They had set aside a little money in anticipation of the strike, and the union paid the strikers small sums from a strike fund. But it wasn’t much, and we had to live frugally. We couldn’t go to the movies or restaurants or roller skating. I remember going to the union hall with my dad to pick up government surplus cheese and peanut butter. Everyone assumed the strike would last only a few days or weeks before management would come to their senses and settle. As the weeks wore on, I began to notice the worry etched on my father’s face. I remained, however, happily committed to the cause.
    My father was older than most of the strikers. I remember watching him ride in a jeep with a younger striker. Bouncing along over the hills near our desert camp with a serious look on his face, he seemed so old and out of place there. Eventually, our small savings were gone and the union checks stopped coming. My parents had to dip into the modest college fund they had started for us. Many of the hotels settled with their workers.But Sam’s Town wouldn’t. Every day, the camp became less crowded and the picket line thinner as more strikers gave up. We denounced them as “scabs” when they crossed our line on their way back to work.
    The excitement and euphoria of the strike’s early days gave way to anger and bitterness. One day, a confrontation between strikers and returning workers turned violent, and my father stopped taking me to the camp. Not long after, he informed me he was going back to work. I accused him of selling out and called him a scab. It hurt him, and I’m ashamed of it. He had had no choice.
    He returned to work for a smaller salary and fewer benefits. All the good bartending shifts had been