Amigas

The words will come later.

Mañana veo a mi amiga!!!

Coleccionistas

Hay quienes estan hechos de canciones, quienes van por la vida cantando cuando cada cosa y cada persona les recuerda a una melodia que un dia de Dios escucharon sin poder sacarla de la linea de su memoria.

Otros se visten con pedazos de nombres o apellidos de gentes que marcaron la existencia suya con años o minutos de existencias compartidas. Nombres o sobrenombres, nombres sin pronunciar y otros mal pronunciados. Nombres sólos o completos. Letras delineando una vida. Y en la esquina opuesta, esta la gente que colecciona imagenes. Gente con mente llena de formas, de caras, de distintivos lunares o narices. Gente que guarda caras en la mente aunque los nombres se hayan borrado de la historia. Nombres sin caras, caras sin nombres.

Hay coleccionistas de colores, de fotografías, de estampillas y coleccionistas de amigos. Cada uno guardando, como puede, la historia de su vida.

También conocí a alguien que vivía de olores. El olor a jabón de ropa recordandole al amado quien llegaba y la abrazaba justo en medio del labar de faldas y blusas amarillas. Y cuando la tierra recibía a la lluvia despidiendo el olor a tormenta inadvertida, se acordaba la tal muchacha de su casa y de los niños que saltaban de charco en charco sin escuchar los regaños y sentencias de resfriados y palizas.

Y cómo dejar de sentir por aquella cuya alma está esparcida en direcciones diferentes. De ciudad en ciudad se pueden encontrar pedazos de su corazón; porque la pobre no se viste en nombres, ni vive de olores, ni esta hecha de canciones, sino que le ha tocado dejar su alma en ventanas viejas y vistas familiares, en colores de paredes ya despintadas y en árboles ya arrancados de su tierra. Ella no lleva lugares en el alma, sino el corazón suyo es llevado por lugares y arrastrado por escaleras que ya hace mucho no sostienen sus pasos. Pobre de ella que no tiene la vida en un solo lugar sino que se reparte entre paises, cuidades y colonias que la han tenido y la han dejado ir a través de sus años y sus historias. Pobre, porque ella no tiene letras de canciones que le traen sonrisas, porque sus pasos no la pueden llevar más a esos lugares apartados de ella por fronteras cerradas y lejanas.

Pero es dichosa, porque lleva en su mente cada hogar intácto por los años, los detalles no se acaban en sueños. Sabe con exactitud el color de cada hoja de cada árbol que la arruyaba por las noches desde afuera de sus ventanas. Sabe que tan anchos eran los pasillos y cuantos ladrillos adornaban el piso. Sabe cuantos azulejos faltaban en la cocina y donde está escondida la grieta que dejó un terremoto. Sabe encontrar el punto exácto de donde el ocaso brilla más fuerte y de donde se puede ver la luna cuando esta llena y alta. Es dichosa porque nunca deja el hogar, aunque esté lejos. Y porque puede llamar hogar a tantos lugares. Aunque el tiempo ha hecho que el corazón ya no le llore, sino que en vez le empuje cada paso... para ver si el siguiente kilometro recorrido la lleva al siguiente lugar donde ella ha de dejar un pedazo más de lo que aun le queda de su corazón. Ella sabe que siempre estará el lugar que la ha hace completa. Cada lugar distinto, cada caricia entre brisas con sabor a pastos y mares nuevos, es dichosa, de buscar el hogar sin esperar encontrarlo.

Ay Viene!!!!

After four years, three months, three weeks, and two days (approximately) I will see my best friend again! Pauli, I can't wait to see you... just one more week to go on the count down!!!

Thankful for this weekend

This weekend didn't quite end as I expected. I ended up losing some of the battles... fortunately, I feel like I won the most.

Friday was a great day. I worked and then in the afternoon my friend Anna and I went for a photo trip. We wanted fields... at least, that's what I told Anna I wanted... to take photos of fields. So we went on a road we hadn't driven through before and found great places. And I finally got to put the best of those photos on Flickr, so you can go see them (click).

I am ready to move on to painting something for my tia Miriam. She turned 50 last week, April 11. And she said she'd like a painting as a present. I am excited.... and about to start it, so I'll leave on the side my Cien Años de Soledad book and take the time to get the painting done before Tuesday.

Have a wonderful week.

Weekend exhaustion

It's been a weekend full of work and play.
This is a wonderful feeling.

Voices

Every time I read a book I get the tone of the voice of the narrator in my head. Sometimes that tone, that voice, sticks for a while in my head making me use different words or phrases foreign to my mentality. It happens every time. And every time I start a different book I hear a different voice and the previous one fades in my memory. College years got cold, textbook voices in my head and they linger still. So many textbooks memorized, analyzed and put back together, reviving when I pick them up for a reminder in procedures, laws, and logics. But lately, I've had fictional voices, voices of women, men, and even cats that might have existed in someone's life and have been reduced to voices in books bought on sale. Then I went to the voice of a boy in search for the beauty in the skies. His voices tangled my brains at first, he thinks too much about little things, but then he changed and his voice started to sound like my own, calming and happier than when he started his journey. And now, in the voice of one of the most important voices in literature in the last century, I have the beautiful voice of an unknown narrator. Objective, descriptive, and omniscient narrator who's taking me along lives and time in this town somewhere unknown.

And while I realized all this about foreign voices taking over the tone of my thoughts it came to mind the voice of God in my head. From the years when I read the Bible so much more than I do now. I do think the constant voice of God was in my head.

Thinking of life and death.

There comes times when an individual meditates of the meaning of life, and other times when one can come to meditate in the meaning of death. For no specific reason, I started thinking about death on my drive back from work today. What am I striving for in this life? I though about it and I though about funerals. When I die, I want my friends there and I want to know that in my lifetime I was able to impact the lives of people, just life God has impacted my life. Making one person's life better would be enough, helping many would be best. But I mostly thought of what my friends would say. And maybe it's because I'm almost done with my book and I've seen a couple of dialogues that have made me smile because remind me of things I've lived with my friends or stories that are so meaningful to me that make me smile (or laugh) when I'm reminded. I thought of friends sharing one memory of us. And I thought how much I wouldn't like someone who didn't know me well speaking at my funeral. I thought of that, because when April died I remember being disgusted by chancellor White speaking in front of us, her friends, and pretending to care.
These are random thoughts, but thinking of my friend and how she wouldn't be able to tell a story... brought a couple of tears to me.
Life has been good to me. I have so many friends that are just little miracles of God in my life and family that is so so precious. And I can't help but pray that God lets me see my dad again someday... it's been so long since I last hugged him. I talked to him last week, but he's not a phone person, like me he needs the visuals, so he gets tired of phone calls really quick. The $3 calling card still had a bit left. I pray a lot that death doesn't come before I can see my dad and Lidia and Mario again. And that maybe all the kids are once again together some time. These are strange ways that He has, because in my head it doesn't make sense how life and death work... but as I read (and this is one of the things I agree with Don Miller)
"God is good... what He has is good. If He made all this existence, you would think He would know what he's doing."
And you would have to read Through Painted Deserts to fully understand how he's come up to that realization.. But it makes sense doesn't it, why wouldn't you trust Him? Why wouldn't I trust Him? of course, as humans all we want to do is run on a different direction. And I think I've done that for too long. Running from definitions of life and death and religion. And running from protocol and routines and hypocrisy. Ay... how did I get to this point now? I need to get quiet and think in pictures now. This is much easier for me.
Now let me go. There are two very special painting I need to finish. And maybe I'll keep thinking then, along the brushstrokes, how life and death shouln't be so difficult.

Introducing...

I have to introduce you to my new camera. I bought it yesterday after a series of blessings and other events that got me to it. I am so thankful!!!
Here's one of the first selfportraits, there will be more and better ones:
This is the beginning of something beautiful.

Words, images, shapes. A story.

My mom told me two days ago to write a book. About my story, my life. I've been told that a few times before, but I guess things mean more to me when they come from my mom. It's always been like that. She gives me wings. She was the one that told me to go ahead and apply to the UA, that we'd figure out later how we'd do with the money. She was the one that told me to go ahead and buy the camera I'm about to go buy even when I was just half way in my savings to get it (there's a story here about good credit management and opportunity).
I'll start writing. And finding my voice. The right words. And the images that'll go with it.
I am blessed to have my mom.
I wouldn't want anyone else in that place.