my cup is now full
once more i enjoy palm trees
their path leads to peace
It was a year ago, at the Día de los Reyes fiesta, that I swallowed three glasses of wine, pulled out the plastic baby Jesus from the Roscón de Reyes cake, and made my announcement to ears who would never be ready to hear such a thing.
So tumbled down the following months of my life, steps leading to a new view of the world, first from their eyes, a new set implanted in my own silly head, and now from a small apartment in Spain, where I have pulled out, year two, the King of all Kings.
He stands godlike amidst the Catholic words, his luck ready to carry my family on my back into a new year of discovery.
Yes, I said it like that. How I carry them, how you know I do, yet despise me for it in the same downtrodden tone that is washed away by the admiring and adoring words of those who know me best.
This is MY king. There is no chance, even in the small circle for which this cake is cut in this year now passed, that anyone else was meant to carry it like a charm of fruition at the bottom of purse number four. It was in my reluctant-to-indulge piece, la crema spilling out the sides and pushing his beauty into my lips, wish and resolution now granted, for another year that I know will change my life.
You couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to stand in front of duck-pond-soaked daughter for Life Moment Number 23 in Week Two of National Lampoon’s European Vacation, cousin in tow to witness it all, and not be able to say all that you need to say to the man who means more to you than anything fathomable in this or any life.
There was no Plaza de España. There was no beauty of a park unlike any other park. No romance amongst horse-drawn carriages. No tiles that could capture the intensity of my life upside down backwards and incomplete if for one moment he is angry with me.
The reason you can’t understand it is because you don’t have it. You don’t have him day to day, the most amazing human being placed upon this Earth. You couldn’t possibly understand the weight of his anger, so uncommon that the sky could fill with dark rainclouds in the same moment that you stare at the fishermen leisurely filling their nets in the sparkling sunlit river with color-coded stone houses mocking European beauty into your blood.
It was a year ago, at the Día de los Reyes fiesta, when that Fear of Losing Him broke me down to the core for the first time in fourteen years.
He is all mine now, standing like a perfect statue on top of Spanish words. He returned, peppermint bark, Spaniards, Heidetoes, and Spain, into my arms, into the warmth that I could only receive after our heated argument in that freezing cold Sevilla apartment. He is mine, this King of all Kings, and I will carry his luck on my back as we make our way into a new year, a new life like you’ve never imagined.
Here I am again. Nit picking away. Is this a sign of the times, a symbol of my year in Spain, or just another hassle like everything else?
I still haven’t been paid of course. It’s been three months. Not to mention the six months of hell and paperwork and thousands of dollars spent prior to that.
I just need to vent tonight. Bruce and I have spent ten hours today combing through all three girls’ hair, and my own, and finding more lice and nits than you could ever imagine. Add that to the laundry that we’re barely catching up on due to winter weather conditions, no dryer, and a north facing apartment. In fact, we can’t even run our washer and another appliance at the same time without the power going out. Truth is, we cannot run ANY two appliances without the power going out. Who came up with this back-asswards system, where the electric bill costs 150€ a month yet doesn’t consistently PROVIDE ELECTRICITY? I know I’m not the only one with this problem. I’ve heard others discuss similar problems, and on our travels we also ran into electrical snafus.
Add that to the serious lack of WiFi on the Iberian Peninsula, and I’m about done. The Internet rarely works well anywhere. We pay an exorbitant amount of money for ADSL and a phone with a data plan, and it’s designed for someone who doesn’t seem to actually USE it. Bruce tried to PAY for more megabytes today, and the web site locked him out!
The schools… I’ve complained a bit, but let me add on. My middle child has a gift. Not all of us are born with it, but out of my entire household, she is the one who truly has the gift of language. She has picked up more Castellano than the rest of us combined. Yet, the day before Christmas break, she came home with a report card with a failing grade in science, the equivalent to a D in Lengua Castellano, and a D in art (have I mentioned that she’s an artist and actually plans to make a career out of this?)? Her report card came with a note stating that she was pulled out for support for science and lengua. Upon further review (her interpretation), she is pulled out of class for those subjects, then put back in the classes (that she has then missed!) to take the exams, which are of course all rote memorization of facts. Not only that, but I didn’t receive any communication from the school, prior to the report card at the end of the term, either about the support classes or her FAILING.
I could pinpoint many reasons why this country is failing. But I think I’ll stick with lack of lice checks/healthcare, high bills that cover nothing, and schools that overlook gifts for rote memorization of facts, leading to a country filled with people who cannot provide basic services such as electricity, WiFi, or a paycheck.
early morning dark
we part with unanswered moon
new day hope awaits
history beckons
brighter than a ship’s home flag
Españalution
the wallet declines
what Señor Pérez offered
why some tell us no
words cannot define
Barcelona’s blue sky view
man made God-loved art
stitched by hand,
zippers and buckles,
this item is unique
no matter its origin–
a camel’s back (as you insist)
or the skin of a goat
as the market vendor declared,
it is a thing of beauty,
both in price and worth
i have told you the story
(how it burdens our hearts)
our money laid down for dreams,
some set aside for a moment of gratitude,
of generosity and love
how it hurts to hear
the reality of that purse,
as ungratefully carried
as her coat on that cold, cold night,
where i walked her to the car,
put her purse on her shoulder,
and made warmth where there was none
i cannot bear to think
how precious those dollars were,
the special trip with my mother,
all lost on another drunken night,
washed away with every token
of friendship tucked inside
the zippers and buckles of soft leather
you cannot tell me now
that this deal i have come across
is of no value
it is worth more to me than
the skin off a camel’s back
as soft as Morocco can provide,
lightweight and useful,
my first new purse in fifteen years,
it is my dream materialized,
lost friends forgiven for a new day,
zippers and buckles for every last
desire i have yet to fulfill
The view from my window is not quite the beauty I imagined, years ago. It didn’t come with a famous creative writing disclaimer: “This isn’t good enough!” It is streaked with bits of cloud and greasy rain that clings to the single panes in a mockery of winter.
Red tile roofs? Can I have me some Spanish red tile roofs? If I squint, and look several blocks down from my level three piso, I can see a few, scattered just as intermittently as the palm trees in this on-the-fringe, immigrant-ridden neighborhood.
Instead? Run-down row homes, cracked walls along a courtyard aching for maintenance, its sad sprouts of wishing-to-flower plants drooping like withered beans in the midst of a seasonal downpour that they were not prepared to encounter. The street bleeds with life from the early hours of the morning, first with traffic on this central artery leading to downtown, and then earlier in the morning with partyers who linger like plaque along the corner capillaries, trying to sober up after visiting the nightclub down the block. Painted-white aluminum Persian blinds block out most of the windows in my view, their attempt to trap in warmth and keep out the evils of a steady rain as pathetic as a surrender flag held up by a villain still holding a knife, ready to strike.
The inner courtyard speaks a slightly different story. Yes, the rain has reached here too, but with a different set of fingertips. It drips from the metal clothes racks, the nylon lines, and soaks through freshly-washed laundry, its pungent smell, aching of wet sidewalks and age, present on t-shirts and pants when, hours later, we will lay them out in front of the tiny space heater, homemade dryer number two, to force them wearable. But the courtyard itself? It sings with craving-for-rain plants from our neighbors below, with the chirping of caged birds who share stories with our whistles, with the clinking of plates from the sacred three-p.m. meal.
The view from my window in this small city in Spain is not what I thought it would be. There are no waves, no clear vistas of mountain peaks, no perfectly clipped palms to remind me that I live in paradise. So it is when we imagine our dreams, too perfect for their reality upon accomplishment. But as I rise this morning to rewash our rain-soaked sheets, to sit under layers of blankets with my hoodie on, my hot Macbook keeping my legs warm, my youngest popping out of her bedroom to share my covers, the clouds retreat, a quilt of gray tinged with the pink perfection of a late-morning sunrise, and I know, despite the tainted view, that this is still my home.
I’m old. That is pretty much my realization at this point of my year in Spain. I was thinking about my horrific schedule, and reading about all the employees who had to work on Black Friday, and even Thanksgiving this year (GAG!!), and then I started chiming in about my movie theatre days, when I never knew my schedule from week to week, always had to work holidays, and had no benefits. Thinking about this brought my mind around to college in general, where my schedule obviously changed from one semester to the next, with classes on varying days and hours with irritating middle-of-the-day breaks.
Only then, those breaks weren’t irritating. I used them to catch up on homework, chat with friends, or go home to see Bruce on his days off.
I rode home today during my intermittently-interrupted “three-hour” break (with a tutoring session scheduled smack dab in the middle), and of course I had to work during my free time on my University of Phoenix class, part-time job number three.
But it occurred to me, when I was telling the students in Spain about Black Friday, when I was reminiscing those glorious movie theatre days when I got “promoted” to assistant manager and all the employees called in on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, leaving us three managers standing with lines out the door because everyone in America had to see The Green Mile rather than having a conversation with their family members on a sacred holiday, that I have done this before.
And I can do it again.
Sure, stack on the responsibility of caring for three children… but I can do this. I can piece together three part-time jobs to somewhat fill in the gaps of a severely minimal salary. I did it before, worked my way through college, not a penny of debt trailing behind me, and I can damn well do it again.
However, when I was trying to say to Bruce tonight, “That wasn’t that long ago… I mean, I just did that!” I realized that it was thirteen-fifteen years ago… man I’m old. This is why all the other auxiliares are twenty, why they don’t blink for a moment when they pile on extra tutoring sessions or weave their way between parties and bars. They are young, with raw desire for what the world can still offer them, the inconvenience of an erratic schedule just that… an inconvenience.
But as I sat at home this afternoon, thinking, Wow, if my school actually had functioning Internet, I could just stay there and do this Phoenix work, I cut myself short. I came home to Bruce who fixed tea for my aching throat, piled high scrambled eggs with sour cream and salsa, Spanish bread on the side, just exactly how I like them, and my legs were still burning from my quick uphill ride, a few extra miles of back-and-forth commuting tucked under my belt, and I knew, I just knew, I had reached a turning point.
I’ve done it before, and even if I am as old as a bat, I damn well know I can do it again!
For the month of November, I have been watching as many of my Facebook friends have posted daily things in their life that they are grateful for (their family, their memories, their ability to communicate with people from all over the world), all leading up to my favorite holiday, Thanksgiving. Why is this my favorite holiday? The most obvious reasons, of course: I love homemade meals, baked goods, and the idea of a celebration being based on gratitude. But most importantly, despite the dark ghost of Black Friday that hovers over this holiday like an evil villain of consumerism, I love the fact that Thanksgiving, in my opinion, is the only holiday in America that is NOT influenced by capitalism. Unlike Halloween (I learned this year, upon making a Halloween PowerPoint for my students in Spain, that the average American spends $72.50 on Halloween items, totaling $5 billion!), Fourth of July, or just about any other holiday where special decorations, clothing, or fireworks flood the stores, Thanksgiving is happily neglected by consumerism due to the impending need for stores to stock up on Christmas hopes (yes, if you thought Halloween was bad, we spend $704, or $50 billion, on Christmas!!!).
But I digress. I, like most of my friends, do see the true importance of Thanksgiving, the root of the word. Regardless of the shady, inaccurate history of this first American holiday, the ability to express the gratitude that we often forget in our day-to-day lives is not lost on me as Thanksgiving approaches.
This year, living abroad, I am more grateful than ever for what I have in my life. Coming to Spain meant sacrificing more than I ever imagined when, one year ago at about this time, I made the decision for us to take this journey. Giving up our home, the most perfect job I’d ever (and probably will ever) have, having to say goodbye to friends who we may not see much of ever again (as our return to the US will depend on where I find work), and being away from our family has been much more difficult than I could have fathomed as I dreamed of learning Spanish, traveling through Europe, and finally fulfilling a lifelong dream.
I woke early this morning, well before my alarm, before the busy street that runs along our apartment filled with the sounds of weekday traffic. I came into the hallway and started to work on the computer while I ate my breakfast, and soon I heard my two youngest daughters rise and quietly begin playing an imaginary game with the 6€ set of cars they bought with their Ratoncito Pérez (the Spanish version of the Tooth Fairy) money at the Chinese store. The sound of their voices creating characters, witnessing love and abandonment, Riona’s small chirps of laughter and Mythili’s authoritative recommendations about car placement and car-jargon dialogue, filled me with warmth.
Coming to Spain, for my girls, meant giving up nearly every toy they owned, nearly all of their books, and making do with what we could fit into their suitcases or afford to purchase upon arrival, which hasn’t been much. Just like I have learned a new perspective about everything related to culture, education, and language, they have learned a new perspective about how to play.
So this Thanksgiving, which is just a regular working day for me where I present my Thanksgiving PowerPoint to Spanish students who know little about the holiday, where I will spend my evening pedaling across town from house to house earning every euro I will need to buy food to put on our table, I am grateful for perspective. The perspective that would be the same had I stayed home, and which has changed exponentially with this experience. The perspective that allows me to be ever so grateful for what my country provides to its citizens while at the same time taking pleasure in the simplicity and family orientation of the Spanish culture. The perspective that gratitude, whether read in faraway posts or spread through heartstrings on a quiet Cartagenian morning, can follow me wherever I go, can be a part of who I am, and can make giving thanks on this day that much more meaningful.
view from uphill ride
my city backed by mountains
night ends in laughter
You can’t predict this. That your day will begin before dawn and end later than most people in America would consider working. Hell, in Spain, too, though they sure as hell don’t mind hiring me to work that late!
There was no way of knowing, before I came here, how much homework my daughters would have. How intimidating and complex it could be, while I sit with my translate app ready to look up the English version of words like slither, spinal, and homonym. How much time this would take out of the exceedingly brief time I have with them each day. How I could lose sleep over how early I need to set the alarm, because what if Mythili fails her science test or Riona doesn’t have a chance to read aloud to me or Isabella can’t retell the story of Jesus saving all and bringing his followers to the kingdom of heaven when she’s never heard these stories in English to compare them to??
This isn’t my singular problem. I have come up with a new theory (yet again) about Spain. Since I spend most of my day not with my family but with Spaniards, I hear all kinds of stories and details about their culture. Students commonly spend 4-5 hours a night completing homework, and parents often take classes themselves, for professional development, French, English, you name it. Not because they’re looking forward to a salary increase, mind you. Because they want to learn. Week nights are essential to their incremental increase of knowledge.
Studying and working so intensely, especially between the days of Monday through Thursday, are as much a part of this culture as sacred meal times, siesta, and family-only weekends. Yes, they may live for vacations, but they work their asses off in between times so that they can enjoy them!
So when I had a few clients tonight mention to me that next Thursday is (yet another) fiesta, and “will you be working?” I almost answered no. But I’m just too damn American. I want to say, “You do realize that if I don’t work, I don’t get paid, right? And that I have a family?” But I just tell them, “Yes, I’m working,” to which they respond with, “OK… well it is a holiday, so we’ll call you next Wednesday to let you know if we’re taking a trip or not.”
It’s almost laughable! I can’t imagine planning a trip the day before I take it! Just like I can’t imagine allowing Isabella to put off her religion homework till Sunday night, or letting Mythili get by with just a 7 on her lengua exam (that will never happen again!), or allowing Riona to skip out on circling all the letters her teacher wants her to focus on enunciating this week (though this is not required).
I couldn’t have predicted how complicated our lives would be here. The impossibility of presumptions that I could have made, most of which would have been untrue, would have made a long tail that followed me across the sea and would have been chopped slowly away with each new day. Fortunately, I was too busy giving up my previous life one heartbreak at a time before boarding that plane, so I didn’t have any time to predict anything at all. And that is why I am still able to set my alarm for the exact right minute and suck the marrow out of every brief moment of life that does not involve a frenzied cycle across town, trying to explain an overly-litigate society to Spaniards whose schools don’t have proper fire alarms, or translating food wheels for a seven-year-old. Instead, I can look forward to next week’s fiesta in Benidorm, a trip I planned weeks ago, have already booked and paid for, and beats out all predictions–impossible to make–about how intensely I would love my vacations!!
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