They both crossed the border, separate lives, no knowledge of each others existence, seeking better lives, jobs, a source of income, escaping poverty stricken families. They both came here illegally, and stayed illegally until finally getting citizenship to a country foreign to them. He did it others feared but resorted to out of desperation, hiring a coyote to get him across, but with a twist, a way not many knew of or thought to consider, through the sewage pipes. All he remembers is crawling in the dark for hours then finally seeing a light, brightening his path out. She would choose the safer path across. She got a visitors visa and stayed even after it expired.
They would meet more than five years after living here, introduced by a mutual friend. They, as many couples did, fell in love, unlike other couples a mistake, a grand mistake occurred. She got pregnant with her first child. Unplanned, unexpected. A quick marriage happened and their lives officially together would begin.
Three years and less than two months later after their first son, Jesus, is born their first and only daughter would arrive. September 27, 1994, midday. Another accident, but not their last. The Creation of Me.
He starts his day with the same dead end routine. Wakes up, gets out of bed, takes a shower, gets dressed, brushes teeth, has breakfast, then leaves his apartment for work. A groove in his life, never shaken, never interrupted. As he walks to the office, his head stays low always staring at the ground below him. If someone greets him he raises his hand for a quick “hello” before continuing on his path.
Upon entering the skyscraper of a building, his coworkers turn around at the thud of the door smacking into place. They all smile at him greeting him, knowing he would respond with the same half-hearted gesture. He walks into his box like cubicle, remaining quiet. Headphones in staring lifelessly into the brightly lit screen, beginning to type, working as he did the days, months, years before. Almost never interrupted, he would go through the day alone, not interacting with others, keeping to himself in his own little cubicle.
If you asked him why he never went to office parties or hung out with his coworkers, his answer would be sweet, short and simple, “I’m comfortable being alone, the company of others isn’t needed.” His boss never questioned him; he did excellent in his job and never missed a deadline. “Why would I want to interfere and disrupt a perfectly good worker? He doesn’t bother anyone else, he stays independent”
I look outside my window and stare unleash their liquid cleansers onto the world. Leaving every object soaking with droplets falling in rhythm with each other. I glance around my room, I'm alone. I walk over to my bed, lay down and gaze at my ceiling.
Plain. White. Texture less.
Why is it so interesting to look at? My eyelids begin to come together, hiding the light keeping me awake.
Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nada.
The gap in my day I get to relax. To take the time and empty my mind from my overwrought life.
Peace. Tranquility. Quiet. Still.
The time of day when nothing engulfs you to steadiness. When you can clear your thoughts and get rid of that mind crushing headache that has followed you the entire day. Nothing has become my everything, the thing I rely on it to get through the day. The moment nothing comes my body and mind relax and remain carefree until the next task appears. Zen.
My door opens. “What you doing Mony?” my younger brother asks, hesitating before coming in. “Nothing”, I reply, as I get up. Bored with my answer he walks away. I hear him stop and turn around his shoes rubbing against the cold tile floors. “Wanna watch a movie with me?” he asks. “Sure”, the ideal “nothing” to do during this time of year and weather. I walk with him down the hall toward the living room, changing to another perfect category of nothing.
While the warmth of the fireplace filled the living room, my dad and I begin to prepare the perfect dinner. I set the rice to turn golden brown, the ingredients for the sauce smashed and thrown in to the blender. My dad mixes and pounds the powders together to set the base for the tamales.
The table set with the traditional colors of red and green, tablecloth decorated with holly leaves and berries, porcelain plates set for five.
I sit on the counter next to my dad occasionally asking, “You sure you don’t need help?” “No”, he responds before focusing back on the task at hand. Kicking my legs impatiently, I leave him and pick up the remote clicking each individual button until I find an adequate Christmas movie to pass the time.
A few minutes pass by and I decide to go back to the kitchen. Empty. “Where is he?” I walk toward his bedroom and stick my head in door way. A massive lump on the bed, moving up and down with every breath taken, a motor like sound coming from the unconscious body.
I wonder what it will be like after high school. Will I stay close by or move away? What college am I going to choose? I already got one acceptance letter, am I going to choose that college? What will it be like? Where would I be living? Am I still going to be shy and quiet? Or will I finally speak up and be more out going? Will I keep in touch with all my friend from high school or will it be like everyone says and I never talk to them? How much will I miss my family? Will it be so unbearable ill end up moving back? I have always wanted to move out, but when the day comes will I still want to?
I remember freshman year, dreading coming to the same school as my older brother. Not knowing where to go, what to do, or who to talk to. I remember coming into AVID and feeling out of place. “Everyone’s so loud and talkative and I'm not. Where do I fit?” I remember walking through the halls and everyone looking so much older than me, so much taller. Four teachers, four classes and hundreds of new faces. I remember having to stand in a giant circle in AVID for an icebreaker activity, “Get in order from the first letter of your last name”, the teacher instructed, enthusiastically like the cheerleader she once was. I remember walking by a short blonde girl wearing pink, and the look she gave made me want to walk away and never go near her again, I thought she hated me. I remember the year going by so slow I thought it would never end. And I remember going to my brother’s graduation and thinking, “wow, Zeus is going to really do something with his life.” I remember wondering what I'm going to do when I graduate and here I am now less than 8 months from graduation.
What will it be like in 4 years when I graduate from college? What will I have accomplished? What will my life be like? Who will I remember from high school? Will my worries be the same? What will I do after college?
I hope I decide to go to Humboldt State University. I hope I will be living in their dorms on campus, walking through the streets of the town, with the ocean near by. I hope I get to experience what its like to be away from home, living there surrounded by the hundreds of brilliant skyscraper like redwoods. I hope I'm happy with what I’m doing, a smile always on my face. I hope I still have hour-long conversations about anything and everything with my friends from here. Talking over the phone, texting, IMing or talking on Skype about what’s new and how lifes been going. I hope my family visits me and I visit them so we never seem too far apart. I hope I’m happy with the decisions I’ve made and never regret the future I chose.
I began to write my personal statement for college applications for the second time (second time’s a charm, right?). Stuck on what I should write about, I decide to take a break. I think and try to come up with some idea that will make me stand out among the thousands of other applicants, I look to the only photo album that hasn’t been taken from me. Flipping through the pages I try to look for something to light a spark in my head so I can start writing. I came across a picture I usually try to avoid, but for some reason it stands out. I stop to study it. My mother and I standing next to Minnie Mouse at Disneyland around Christmas time, the first and only time I’d been there. The three of us are standing in front of a dark teal souvenir shop. The window filled with Santa Claus hats with eeyore spelt in cursive along their rims and a lit chandelier in the background. My mother has a short pixie haircut that makes her look like a boy, she’s looking straight into the camera smiling, ignoring the phobia she knew I had. No worries about what’s going through my mind.
I stand between her and Minnie looking off to the side, my arms dead at my side, my feet pointed inward in that position you know someone is uncomfortable. Trying to hold in a look of terror, panic, in attempt to not let anyone know what I was really feeling. That moment in time was not the first my mother forced me in front of one of my phobias. But back then I didn’t understand why my mom was like that, why she would make me do something she knew I was terrified and uncomfortable with. She always said her kids were her life; she’d never live the life her mother lived. From the stories she told me, my grandma and her were like two identical roses, except my mother was a rose loosing its petals. My grandma was in an abusive relationship. She devoted her life to raising her kids even after having 5 miscarriages. Her husband, hitting and verbally assaulting her, had another family, the one he’d later abandon my grandma for. My mother would watch this all unfold, while being taken care of by her older brother, who would go on and have a successful career as a principal, die at a young age and have a school named after him. This brother is the only one out of the 6 siblings, to push my mother and convince her to go after a better life. He’s the one that paid for to come to the US, where she would meet my dad and the chaos of their lives would begin. She would get pregnant, forcing my dad to marry her. They stay together even though my dad’s family doesn’t approve, and have 3 kids, my older brother, my younger brother and me. My mother mental instability makes her believe that she should live for free with no responsibilities or work. She holds a stable job for a few years, then gets injured and never works again. The surgery she has on her shoulder will be the excuse she uses to not work for the next 8 years. She manipulated and tangled mine and my brothers minds against our own dad, until it drive us away and ends in a cycle of filing for divorce, backing out then filing again until my dad realized enough is enough and we deserve better.
I look back at the photograph and the smirk my mother has on her face makes me cringe. It’s the same look she has when she accomplishes something in her benefit. I glance at the empty word document that will become my personal statement. And I realize I just found the perfect topic. “Thanks mom you finally helped me. took you long enough.”
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Its just one of those days i wish i didn't have to remember, remember the horrible things you did and how you only though of yourself. You never cared about us, and you still don't even though you try your hardest to make others believe you do. Your the reason I'm not going to give up, I'm going to prove you wrong, because i want to see the look on your face when you finally realize I did succeed and left you behind.
Seriously? Can you squeeze me any tighter? Your sweaty finger wrapped around me all day. I wonder if i can get athletes pencil?
Ow! That hurts! What would you do if I spent all day grinding your tip against a hard surface? Huh?!? How would that make you feel!?!?
I pause the movie i'm watching, “Wait what did she say?” I walk up closer, rest my ear against the door. It was Regina, my older brothers girlfriend, talking with my dad.
“She doesn’t help around the house, she doesn’t do what I tell her. All she does is stay in her room all day.” Regina says.
“Are you serious? Did she really just say that?” I thought as I listened closely. “She’s the one hat never comes out of her cave, only to criticize what we’re doing.”
You’re not their mother, Regina” my dad responds, “you’re not supposed to be raising them, telling them what they can and can’t do.”
“I’m not trying to raise them, Alex listens to me when I tell him to do something and he does it right away.”
“He might listen to you, but he doesn’t listen to me and I’m his dad. He should be listening to me not you.”
“Ha! He’s finally confronting her!” I thought, a jumped back on my bed. I continued to watch the movie. My eyes started to get heavy, it was hard to keep them open, my head was falling back and I started to fall asleep. All of a sudden I heard it get quiet, “Are they really whispering?”
“Why are you whispering? I don’t want to hide anything from Monica”
“Awwe!” I smiled when I heard him, “My daddy’s defending me.[:” it got quiet for a little bit and then the conversation started again.
“The second she gets mad she locks herself in her room and no one can talk to her. And your exactly the same when you’re mad no one can say a word to you or else you’ll go off on them.”
“Well you treat Monica and Alex differently.”
“What?”
“Yeah, Monica gets away with everything and Alex gets yelled at. You don’t punish them and that’s why they don’t change.”
“Regina, I used to ground them but it doesn’t work, it doesn’t effect them. But they get things done their good kids and you can never treat kids the same. No matter how hard you try, its always going to be different and I don’t talk to Monica when she doesn’t do something and she listens to me.”
When my dad finished talking I could imagine Regina with her face tensed up, lips scrunched up and her arms crossed like a little angry kid.
“When you have your own kids someday you’ll know what its really like.”
“I don’t want kids”
“What a B****!” I thought, “How could she ever say that to my dad, she’s dating his son for Christ sakes!”
“Well then I don’t know.”
“I take care of my nephews, I’ve been with them since they were born.”
“Its not the same, IF you ever have kids you find out what being a parent is really like.”
I hear a chair grind against the floor as someone gets up and leaves. Its silent from then on. “Well that must have been an intense conversation.” I sit on my bed and wait. Nothing happens. Everyone goes to their own rooms and no one comes out for the rest of the day.
I wish I could say I’m one of those people with excellent memories, that remember each and every detail of everything they’ve seen or done. My memories are small, some insignificant, others important.
Like the day I felt my cheeks burn up, my arms go behind my back and I lowered my head, when I called my kindergarten teacher mom. I remember my stomach twist and twirl, my head spin and a burning thick liquid come up my throat. I remember walking into a 6th graders classroom feeling uncomfortable and out of place when I was sent there to finish homework from the night before. I remember the confusion that crossed my face when I saw a puppy in my house, and the moment my godmother said he was for me, I jumped up and down with a huge smile across my face.
The day my world fell apart, like there was a hole in my chest burning through to the other side, but no tears would come the day my grandma died. The first day of high school seeing all new faces, just as confused and scared as me, walking past each other but ignoring the fact we’re all there. The moment of knowing you someone to talk to someone to trust someone to trust and the awkwardness of knowing you met them in a smelly sweaty locker room.
Or my favorite, the day I felt nothing could be better, nothing could go wrong again, the day I got the one thing that changed my family and the way I viewed the world, the day in walked into a strangers house and a young jolly little thing came up to me. And the moment the woman said do you want her? The day I got my Chiquita. Then the next year the most devastating, horrifying thing could happen. The moment I walked to the car after school got in and saw everyone crying. No one said a thing until we were far from school. I felt my heart stop, my world crash, my brain collapse. She was gone.
These are all my memories, my memories of the past, of what once was.
When you first look around you see the obvious, people writing because that was the assignment. What you dont see is the effort they put into it, if it really means something. Maybe the hot sun reminded someone of one the best days they've ever spent with family. It might take them back to a day they wished they could erase from their head. The grass, trees and warm breeze of a day they went to the lake with friends, camping or just sitting outside on the driveway. The silence of their surrounding calm and reasure them their in a safe place. Look past the obvious and into the depth.
Why I write, that’s a question that never came up in my mind. I never question myself when I wrote. But I really just wrote to remember. To write down my memories, the things from my childhood I didn’t want to forget and what I can’t get out of my mind. The wonderful things that used to be and those memories that come back as nightmares. To never forget those brilliant people who have perished.
