and Words
Esa flor que está naciendo
Ese Sol que brilla más
Todo eso se parecen
Se parecen a mi mamá
Ese pájaro que canta
Ese río que se va
Todo eso se parecen
Se parecen a mi mamá
Lyric excerpts from Musixmatch.
On a dark day in 1977, my father passed away. I was only nine years old and that seemingly simple event changed the trajectory of my life. Within a year we moved from Puerto Rico to Florida, transitioned from a Catholic school to public school, and switched from speaking mostly Spanish to predominantly English. Everything in life changed. I stood in quicksand or during an earthquake. We lived without an anchor.
Save one. The lot of us, my two sisters and I, had one source of stability: my mom. She spoke little Spanish and practically no English. She had less than a high school education. Subsequently, we moved to Florida at the end of that school year and abandoned everything we knew. My mom, less than five feet in stature, spearheaded a new life, in a foreign land, without knowing the language, with three children in tow. We had a handful of friends and no family.
She carried on, simply because she knew that she had to. She was our only stability, our safety net. While I never told her as much, she was indeed my hero.
My mom learned enough English to pass the exam for naturalization. She bribed me to help her study. I eyed a Battlestar Galactical “Space Alert” handheld game. It simply had little red blips on a tiny screen and ran on a 9V battery. For months, I grilled my mom with a series of questions asked on that exam. They included typical topics that we may find in a civics class. I had committed them to memory while I continued to ask her these questions, in English. We spent many afternoons this way while she conducted her work on her sewing machine. To this day, I remember the two senators from Florida at the time (Lawton Chiles and Richard Stone), as this was one question that she may be asked.
Upon her passing her exam, I got my prize. I don’t know what happened to that toy, though I don’t imagine I would’ve intentionally thrown it out. Little did I know at the time that I too would benefit from her naturalization, since I, as a minor, had the option of becoming naturalized with her. And I did; I took the oath. Of course, I knew the answer to all those questions, but I didn’t personally need to go through that process.
Decades later, I watch in horror as Tommy Tuberville, a natively born American, college-educated, and now a sitting senator, was unable to identify the three branches of government while working in one. I proudly remember that my mom could easily answer that question. She would respond, in broken English, “Legislative, Executive, and Judicial.” And yes, she absolutely knew what it meant.
During the holidays in 2005, my mom endured extreme pain in her knee and could barely stand. I visit her shortly before my return trip to the Seattle area. As I prepare to leave, she wants to see me to the door. I instruct her to stay seated; the few additional minutes spent watching me drive away is not worth the pain she would endure. Instead, I walk to her on the couch, plant a kiss upon her forehead, and wave goodbye.
Her knee replacement surgery would alleviate the pain that she endured for months. On a Monday night in early 2006, I chat with my mom and wish her a speedy recovery from that surgery tomorrow. We all looked forward to her walking around pain-free, that her nagging ailment would finally end. My final words to her on that phone call (in English), “I love you, mom.” The following night she went into respiratory arrest in the recovery room.
The three of us, spent the next days by her bedside as she continued in life support. The idea that she may wake to an unfamiliar face, unable to speak to them in any meaningful way, filled us with sadness, so we made sure that would not happen. We coordinated with our extended family to guarantee that someone she knew would be at her side the moment she’d wake, but she never did.
Eventually, we eventually decide to pull the plug and remove her from life support. We were all there in that moment; it shattered us.
Brené Brown teaches us that we can’t have courage without vulnerability. My mom spent her entire live in vulnerability. She carried on every day, one foot in front of the other. The fear was palpable, but she persevered, not oblivious to it, but in spite of it. This tiny woman battled through the language barrier, the lack of education, the poverty, and death of her husband. Therefore, she’s easily the bravest person I know.
As I learned to speak English as a child, I adopted idioms of the language. I understood the meaning of certain phrases, and subsequently used them to express the same ideas. Now, decades later, I reflect upon many of those phrases:
- “…has the balls to do that.”
- ”Stop being such a p*ssy.”
- “Be a man.”
- “Boys don’t cry.”
- “Throw like a girl.”
All these common phrases with the tacit implication that courage is predominantly a masculine trait, and therefore lack of courage is a feminine trait. I’d like you to take a moment and reflect on the amazing women and girls in your life, to think about your mothers, wives, and daughters. Do they not exhibit courage? Are we okay with their lady parts being synonymous with ‘cowardice’ in the English language?
My life is filled with amazing women. Like my mom, they all carry on, choosing to face that fear and adversity… every single day. They embody courage without thinking whether it is gender appropriate. I am in awe of them, one and all.
While I understand that you personally may not believe that women implicitly lack courage, you may continue to use phrases like this to express an idea. Or at very least, you’ll quietly acknowledge them in conversation when you hear them. To perpetuate them betrays my mom’s memory. To continue to use them insults all these amazing women in my life. It needs to stop. As such, I stopped using these phrases or even acknowledging them.
While I understand that I can’t stop the entire English-speaking world from using these phrases, I can affect my corner of the world. I don’t have to clean the garbage in the entire world, I’m simply looking to keep my yard clean. If I can inspire more people to clean their yard, so much the better. The more people we inspire, the cleaner the world will be.
Should you happen to use a phrase like, “… had the balls to do that.” I may simply respond with, “Have there been studies that demonstrate courage is scoped to those with testicles?” And anyone who knows me personally knows that I would absolutely do precisely that.
As I flash back to our life in Puerto Rico, I remember a bittersweet movie from 1972 called, “La Sonrisa de Mamá”, which translates to “Mom’s smile”. It’s a story about a woman and her son. Doctors diagnose her with a terminal illness, and the story develops as they find a way to say goodbye. I was very young when I watched this film, and it was decades ago and have forgotten much of the details.
I still remember the song, in the film as the movie title, but in its musical release as “Se Parece a Mi Mamá” (it resembles my mom). We played that song in our playlist during her funeral. It still reminds me of this woman, diminutive in stature, but a giant in character. I miss her.