This is a story about a passport.
Once upon a time there was a passport….and although he was new, and blue and shiny, he never really thought much of himself. After all, there were almost 60 million just like him. Blue and shiny. He never felt special; sure maybe on the inside he had a few different stamps, a different picture than anyone else and maybe some numbers and letters that were unique to him, but as far as anyone else could tell, he was a boring old passport belonging to some random American.
More than that, this passport often felt very abused. So often he was just kept in a filing cabinet, or a secret drawer somewhere, and was only used once every couple years. And then when he WAS finally used, he was usually crammed into this thin pouch that people often wore UNDER their shirts or underneath their pants around their waist – “How disgusting…GOD it’s sweaty and gross here” he used to think to himself.
All in all, it was a very depressing life. Really.
And then…one day…he was taken out of the plastic filing cabinet, stuffed into a backpack (at least it wasn’t going to be sweaty there) and taken away…far, far away. To a new land, a land he had never been to before, a land that all of the security agents at the airport called I-S-R-A-E-L. “Wow, that sounds like a really, extra, super far away place,” the passport thought to himself; “this could be a real adventure.”
And an adventure it was. When he first arrived, he was brutally inspected, inspected again, and finally stamped. It was a little rough at first; the passport was handed around and handled by many people until he was finally authorized to enter the country. But then it felt like any other trip really. He was in the backpack…for long days. But then….he started to notice something. He was being used a lot more often. Whenever they would go on bus trips, or go walking somewhere, or take taxis, he would often get pulled out and checked. At first this was kind of annoying to him, but then he thought, “Wow, they must want to see me a lot – maybe I am special after all.” And then this became fun. It was almost a show to be able to be pulled out and have people look at him. He really began to enjoy this.
One of his favorite places to be pulled out was something called a “checkpoint.” He didn’t really know much about what this was, but he remembered seeing a lots of these flags, big guns and many people waiting to go through. But see, that was the beauty of it – he never had to wait. He just had to be flashed in front of the soldiers’ eyes, and that was it. He could pass. It was pretty fun. In fact, many times he didn’t even have to open himself up to the men with guns, as soon as they saw his pretty blue color and shiny insignia and letters, he could pass. This was so new to him, he found this to be so much fun. Secretly, when he wasn’t around all the other passports who looked like him, he began to call himself “The Magic Passport.” He was pretty proud of himself. He could get through any checkpoint…
But then one day, it became apparent to him that not all passports and ID were created equal. He saw some IDs in green sleeves that were being checked much more carefully than he was. In fact, it wasn’t just the ID card, they had to have other special “permission” papers. Not him. Just a simple passport.
It was then that he became much more aware of this, and he noticed that it happened quite often; at the checkpoints, on the bus, in a taxi, while people were walking through the checkpoint. Sometimes he even saw the men with guns take the green ID and not give it back and tell the person they had to turn the car around and go back to the town they came from, and once they turned around, they received their ID back. But not him…he was always allowed through. He even heard of stories of passports that were able to get into an area called Gaza. Passports just like him could get into Gaza, but not those green IDs. While he still liked to think that he was “The Magic Passport” – he began to feel very guilty whenever he showed himself to the men with guns and was allowed to pass so easily…just because of his outside appearance, his blue color and shiny text that said “United States of America.”
So he was glad that he was let through; he was glad that he could get through any checkpoint; he was glad that he didn’t get many problems. But at the same time, it made him sad that other passports and IDs were given such a hard time.
How would/will he live with these two emotions…..? Feeling both grateful and guilty?
