Tag: amor

Sitting in the morning sun

Photo by freestocks on Unsplash

My last post was written on our dining room table, staring into a crowded living room, a bustling avenue right outside our balcony. In a couple of hours I had to get ready for the ten-minute drive to work. I was tired, homesick, future uncertain.

This post began on that same table, but now it overlooks a backyard next to a dried up pond. Leia, into her fifth day of spaydomhood, snores on the matress we set up in the living room so she won’t go upstairs, where I hear Y. walking around and getting ready to leave. I type as I get ready to join her, to a destination I’ve forgotten, but I know we’re taking my car. My car. As in, I am paying for it with my money, and I use it almost exclusively. In fact, I’m writing this post at the dealership, giving Ozzie (that’s how I named the car) his first service.

Life has a way of changing.

Did I mention that all this happened –the new house, the new car, Leia’s spaying– in less than three months?

I’m not gonna lie, but this made me feel pretty darn overwhelmed for a minute. Where we live is called Davenport, a city some 20 miles away from where we lived. It reminds me of the so-called “satellite cities” near Caracas, mostly residential areas where people would commute to their jobs in the main city (think the relationship between New York and New Jersey, to a point). My trip to work went from ten minutes to between forty-eight and fifty-two. And sometimes I leave at midnight to come back the next morning. And in the worst twist of all, I’ve grown to hate Saturdays (I open, so I have to wake up at five so I can leave at seven) and love Mondays (my ONE day off).

But it’s my commute in my car, to our house. It is scary to have such a responsibility, but it is also something I am incredibly proud of. I got here with $200 in my pocket and we started life living in a single room with party-prone hosts. I felt so scared, so homesick, but I turned to inspiration from a very large source to get through.

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson had seven dollars to his name when he was released by the Canadian Football League and before wrestling supra-stardom came calling. So yeah, I had started out better than the most electrifying man in sports entertainment, but I doubt I have even half his discipline. That’s where I credit Y. It is because she saved and toiled and starved for so long that we’re here. It is because she sees the man I sometimes doubt I am and makes him do things.

And even on days when I feel I’m not giving enough, she reminds me that we got here together.

Life has a way of changing, indeed… so far, for the better.

“I don’t forget the old year…”

Janus, the Roman god of doors.

The opening line is from a 1963 record by Mexican singer Tony Camargo, now turned into a staple of Latin American New Year celebrations. It’s a fun, upbeat song, where Camargo thanks the old year that’s ready to leave, like “a goat, a black donkey, a white mare, and good mother-in-law”. (Hey, I said upbeat, not logical.)

And last night, it was the first time I had to sing it with a stranger –a fun stranger, no doubt; that’s what people from Zulia are by default– and not with my family. To be honest, the moment I became part of the serving world, especially in the “happiest city in the world”, I should have expected it. Didn’t make it especially easy, though.

But the first few minutes of New Year’s Day, 2020, did make me see many things I am growing to appreciate more and more as my 50th birthday approaches (and we won’t mention that again till 2021, mmmkay?). I hope they will help me focus more on what I want to achieve.

Upon learning I would not be home at midnight, I raged. Not as I used to when younger –not that I’d like to go back to those days, mind you– but many people I work with heard me curse for the first time. Lauren, my manager, offered me a festive hat to wear and I think she was shocked when I declined to wear it, since she has only seen my fun-loving side. But as I got into my duties, I reflected on the Stoics, a philosophy I had very much embraced in 2019 (check out Daily Stoic if you’re interested). We have no control over the things around us; we can only control how we react to them. So I shuffled over to the gloom corner, the part of the restaurant where the servers mope their destiny, and shared this wisdom. Once the troops were rallied, I donned my “Happy 2020” hat and got on with it.

As midnight approached and guests became more and more pumped up, a funny thing happened: my countrymen began to appear. First it was a whole family: eleven year old son, seventeen year old daughter, mom and dad. Not that much English, but a whole lot of Caracas. Then it was a large, rowdy group: two sisters from Zulia, one married to a Puertorrican, another to an American. (“They have triumphed!”, according to one of our comedians.) They had a twenty-something daughter that very drunkenly said “You shouldn’t be working tonight!” (Yes, but hey, it is what it is.) And finally, a man, his brother, his wife and one-year-old daughter. Six months in the country, and obviously feeling homesick, all of them. I consoled them as best I could. Mostly because I didn’t feel that lonely, having a few of my people close by. Lucky indeed.

And finally… At around 12:45, I walked by the door. We had closed at ten past midnight. I saw two figures walking up to the door, and I was ready to call them off, perhaps more harshly than I expected. And that’s when I saw Y. and D., D. with tears in her eyes. They had come to say “Happy New Year”. I opened the door, stepped out and embraced them long and hard. D. asked tearfully, “Why didn’t you come?” I explained that I was really busy, and I still was, but I was overjoyed that she would come and see her Bird Daddy with Mommy. And I truly was, because I knew how big this moment was: back home, along with Y.’s best friend, her wife, son, dog and kitten, D.’s father, his new wife and ten-month old baby were also home. And yet, here she was, hugging me and saying Happy New Year.

This is how I expect to embrace the coming year, and hopefully the coming life I have in me. Don’t lose sight of the big things, no matter how small the package they come in. Don’t let anger guide your steps. Don’t settle for anything less than what you deserve. And always know that you are being a good man, with a lovely woman and child, however difficult she may be, that love you unconditionally.

Happy New Year, everyone, Here’s to twelve more months of reflections.