Category: Uncategorized

I’ll admit to have not written to you in a while.

Saturdays were not the best days. We drank tepid water when we were thirsty.

The summer of 1992 was hot. Hotter than I had remembered it before and I had proof of it as Payless Shoes seemed to willingly melt and leave their marshmallow like residue at every interaction with the scalding black street tar.

Mama would take stock every week or so on the “sole level” of our shoes and she earned a few extra grays that summer as we three proved that the shoes budget would need to be expanded still. We were “shoe-conscious” of course after “The Pump” debacle of 1991 and we often regretted intimating to mom that we had grown a half inch shorter over a month due to black-court basketball practices or endless pacing sessions around Garfield High halls (my sister).

 That morning I awoke to a bright East Los Angeles day. Our neighbor next door was blaring the obnoxious “banda” music  already (7:30 am) and it’s heavy accordion and heart pounding pulse beckoned my lazy body to rise. Reluctantly of course since I knew then that I’d be missing out on watching the opening of “Batman Returns”  or at least checking out “Lethal Weapon 3” with a friend who had reluctantly invited me but knew me enough to know that I would not ever show.

Then something quite familiar happened. My father Silvio was shouting at the top of his lungs that Cafeson our dog had gone loose and quickly most of the family took up familiar positions to find the scoundrel.

My sisters took to the back yard because it was the most fun place in the house. Every terrace (2) that made up the hill like back yard was a jungle unto itself and it was the perfect spot to play hide and seek or to stare at morning activities of the houses on the hill east of Gage Ave where kids would sometimes wave at us.

I shot down Eastman Avenue on the western part of our house as I wanted to avoid the eyes of our across-the-street neighbor who had displayed a distant crush but had never acted upon it other than the occasional flashlight flash while I ate carne asada tacos and frijoles on the front porch of the house that year.

Dad was his usual flamboyant self. Calling on the neighbors and asking if they had seen his dog. Half flirting with the neighborhood women who answered the door and trading  remarks with the men already sipping on their morning beer . The spectacle was a monthly occurrence and it’s timeliness was a welcome distraction that all knew would be done soon.

That day though the search for Cafeson took longer than expected. Tired of walking without breakfast I returned home to find my sisters feasting on Corn Flakes and drying donuts from L.A.’s Farmers Market where my mom worked. Having had some the night earlier, before an episode of Full House I decided to pass on  them and tried to take advantage of my father’s absence to return to my bed and enjoy some time before my father returned with a well-ashamed dog.

As I laid my head down to rest I heard it. A shallow yelp.

At first I was annoyed by the sound. I considered it a rude auditory trick brought on by my guilt of not finding Cafeson again.

Then, I heard it again and in a thunderbolt-like flash I understood to be a sad and heartfelt cry for help.

I threw the single white sheet off myself and flew down to the last step of my fathers terraces and there in the corner I found Cafeson laying flat on the ground.

The formerly intrepid and The-Pump chewing dog was found by me laying like a hunk of meat on the ground at the north-west corner of my fathers lot. Cafeson lied there panting, without enough energy in his body to raise his head and lick a hand.

I came to him quietly and stared. His gasping hurtful breathes stunned me and I grew as protective of him in that moment as of anything I had known. I knelt close to him and then slowly shimmied myself to the point where I could pick up his heavy head and lay it on my muddied folded legs.

That dog I had known of was so youthful just 12 or so hours before, but the event of the last few left the vivid and stocky brown body of the dog I knew wasted away to a desperate respirator hoping to extract as much oxygen from the stock I so easily took.

He and I made eye contact a few times. I understood, he may or may have not. During one intense gaze I gave him a few comforting words. It wasn’t poignant and I know now that it never registered but I was glad I said it.

Our dog died in my hands that morning. An hour or so later my sisters found me with him. A few minutes after my father rushed down and took him from my arms.

Cafeson’s remains now lay in a back yard that I can hardly recognize as I have moved mentally as far as I can from Eastman Ave.

I saw you riding your bike the other day with confidence and gusto. You have grown tired of your “trikey” and needed something more.

I cringed the moment you crossed that invisible boundary where I couldn’t run to you and protect you. Your mother and I shouted to “turn around” and “get back here.”

There was that twinkle in your eye as you returned. You had felt the spirit of the road ahead of you and wanted more.

Not yet little one!

I flashed forward a dozen years into the future and felt my heart ache at the thought of handing you the keys to the family wheels.

If only we could keep you behind that line love.

Ces’t la vie!

I think one of the greatest gifts we have ever given you children is your imperfections.

Without them you’d be unable to know and understand what struggle is and that you’ll need to overcome challenges to succeed despite them.

Had it been up to me you’d be perfect. But that’s an impossibility I need to understand.

So now I must triumph over how I can turn these little details into lessons that’ll make you stronger.

I look north out my window and see the dark blue silhouette of the mountains in the near horizon. The first thin hint of daylight is coming to their slope and as it does it will begin to paint them in greens and scattered earthy browns. The ebb of flow of light coming and going has gone on for eons and it’s pace is slow. Too slow.

At 5:09 in the morning I find myself looking out the window and hoping the light would just come quicker. This night has been long.

I’ve been a parent for about 7 years now and I still haven’t grown accustomed to dealing with the worry of my children’s illnesses. Every struggling breath or creeping notch higher on the thermometer is agonizing.

The second guessing comes at what I call the “judgement hour.” It’s that time of the night when it has deeply overtaken the day and its heavy black cloak has thoroughly unfurled. At this hour the majority of human activity has slowed to a crawl and a family finds itself on its own and with very little options.

I try not to wake them as I check their struggling bodies. Under the light of my cell phone I look at the quickness of their heaving chest, gauge the color of their lips, listen for his struggled-wheezing breadths or touch their forehead/arms while I crudely measure temperature.

I pace some more. I second guess and worry further.

“Should we go to Urgent Care now?” “NO, You’re overreacting.” “Why didn’t we go when he started to cough?” “You can’t go for every small cough” “Is his breathing normal?” “Did we breastfeed long enough?” “Shit, I shouldn’t have told him to play outside so long.” “How long until day light?

Then I check on them again and the pattern repeats.

It’s 5:31 now. I don’t see green on the mountains but the night is now loosing it’s control to the daylight and the drape of darkness is being removed.

It’s an hour and a half until the local medical facility opens and I can take my child for attention. That’s a long time from now.

I should probably go check in on him….

Toned legs strode down the green carpet to the awaiting elevator car. As he caught up with her he looked back to check the closed door of their room and to maybe catch a glimpse of the Civil War soldier who allegedly haunted the hall ways of hotel Dauphine.

With no apparition in sight and a well lit path ahead, her cheeky scoff awaited him at the impatient steel doors who hurriedly tried to close.

She wore a green dress. A coquette number that slung off her left shoulder and framed a gentle triangle off her torso that brought her to the attention every other passerby. In a sea of flesh, her confident and unassuming demeanor served as mistletoe to men ans some women accustomed to blatant shows off careless sex.

As she walked through the uneven streets surrounding Bourbon Street, he watched her body sway. With every step her body bounced and the dress’ fabric struggled to catch up. Her curves bounced glently, swaying on synched rhythm with the waves crashing off the Mississipi river shores.

The full moon’s light bathed the red brick lined streets. On several occasions the roots of aged trees broke though the tries of earlier designers and cast odd shadows that seem to evade her as her commanding strides steamed on through. He watched and followed. He was only an observant, a note taker, a stenographer, a scribe trying to describe a muses’ path in modern New Orleans.

They toured and studied the posted menus on the doors of restaurants. He pondered at her face as she calculated taste from aged menus, gauged the crinkle at her soft German rugged nose when she studied smell, tried to catch the spark in her eye if a prospect taste struck her fancy.

She understood her food. Could imagine its taste and internalized its meaning as art. Certainly her recommendation would yield an experience. Yet, she demanded him to pick. To assert himself in this universe of flavor and create a scene for them to enjoy.

It was in this in this play of admiration that the watcher found them. The figure had recognized their fragrance and had taken a liking. Their smell tasted of deep love and the interplay intrigued the watcher to the point of magnetism.

Following them was necessary.

Slowly it took firm steps behind them. Savoring the wind that flirted with her dress and lifted its hem so as to show her taut thighs. In him, it saw the desire that drove a similar lusty motivation.

As the watcher followed, plans were made and the choice clear. Unfortunately another had already claimed the two and her plans were very different.

The week had not started off right but then again the 40 days before that Friday hadn’t been our best. I had arrived to the apartment on the second floor of the complex in Montebello and I knew as I slid the crooked key into the lock that I had inadvertently set off a chain of inevitable actions that had been waiting  to collapse like a  row of propped up dominoes.

As usual, upon entering our shared 800 square feet I made my way to the kitchen that sat immediately off the front door and to the right. Like instinct my hand grabbed the wooden handle to the yellowish colored refrigerator that had come with the space. With a jerk I opened the door and heard the soothing clanking of glass bottles that awaited within.

I reached in a pulled the beer from the lower shelf, opened it and took the first of many swallows. She would not arrive home for a couple hours and for now the empty and quiet space was mine. In less than twenty minutes, as I sat on the white chair we had recycled from her German grandparents home, the liquor had begun to warm the veins at my arms and was beginning to creep its way to my chest, throat, eyes and brain. The familiar daze kicked in and I forgot that time existed.

Eventually though, the jarring front door reminded me.

She came in with a half-smile on her face and that eroded when she noticed the four bottles sitting at the counter of our tiny kitchen. I chose not to acknowledge it. At the time it seemed prudent to let the usual take its course. Today though, I reminded myself, was not usual.

Who fired the first shot is unclear. She was tired. So was I.

The last few month had become a constant unwillingness from both of us to  meet in the middle. My constant drive to push limits without concern for her needs and her growing campaign towards a more adult life had become near irreconcilable forces. The arguments were constant. Feelings were hurt on a daily basis and as of late conversations had become mere efforts to pass on the most elementary bits of information.Who’s paying this bill? Do you have the late shift this week or next? Are you going out with them again?

The argument was long, exhausting and draining. Neither party had clear answers and ultimately it seemed that the lack of common ground led to only one conclusion.

We were not working as a pair. We had tried and enjoyed a great experiment together but we were different people and now it was time to seek opposite paths. My eyes ached by 11:38 that evening. I could continue to cry on but my body had no more tears. Worst of all, as I grabbed the keys from the counter I looked through the kitchen and viewed her flaccid body on the white chair.

I could see disappointment and a broken heart.

When we met, the young man she experienced had promising talents and virtues that over the years had leached to the world of frenzied mediocrity at the sands and bars of Venice Beach.. She had invested time and love. For her efforts she had received very little.

The cold of the evening hit my cheeks as I closed the door behind me. Perfectly sober I found the red Nissan Z sports car we had bought together in the parking lot. As I pushed the silver key into the ignition I felt the weight of the last few months land on my thighs.

I was leaving the best person I had ever met. We had drawn lines and we’d possibly never be together again.

My stories are not epic.

The imagery of my 30 years is mild compared to the exciment of those before me. There are so many who have faced truly cold winds, sharpened winds, cutting criticisms.

But my story is mine. Peril is real and so is fright.

I eugolized my father.

At the moment of truth I had the chance to speak my mind. To say it like it was(is).

But my father wasn’t a monster. He was a flawed man.

Not very different from me.

So I stood at the podium. Wrapped my hands around its wooden sides, looked at my mother and my sisters and channeled what he would have practiced to say.

It wasn’t poetic but the words resonated.