MindWindow

I’ll get back to the retelling of the last few years’ doings at some point in the not too distant future. For now… there is no ordained rhyme or reason to an order in which to write, so I will follow none… There are moments when living in a somewhat disorderly state of mind helps get on with the day and the little surprises it brings on. Unannounced… as it is often wont to do. To what do I refer? Well… I said it was a disorderly state of mind, no? Who knows what will come out at times like these? It feels more like a purging of whatever leftovers there may be, ensconced in little dark corners and hoping that no thought process will wean them out. A mind is a precious thing to waste, or so goes one of the preferred sayings of all teachers… at least those who guided me along the long and narrow path of learning, academic style. This academic process ( long and often tedious as it was, but an important ingredient of that needed development ) is only a part of our learning… the o...

It could be said the above heading refers to the fact my hip would not allow me to take regular steps but no… it is not those physical steps I allude to… The tale of a road to recovery has been taken up... I am not sure if it is to the interest of any, just that I felt it had to be told and, perhaps, even reviewed by yours truly for the first time... as a whole, not in convenient little pieces which often leave the darker spots out....  so it continues... During the first few weeks of my stay with my brother and family, most of the time was taken up by getting to know the different members of the group and the country they represented. My country. The Cuba I remember is a country long gone. It had a defined culture, handed down –as it is most everywhere- through family, school and neighborhood lines. We were, for the most part, recipients of a long and simmering mix of Spain’s inadequacies and joy of life and African tribal mythology, mixed with a heavy dose...

“To become capable of dealing with a new situation or environment or feeling comfortable in it” A lifetime ago a then friend ( he was one of many personal “assets” lost to a messy divorce… ) told me that he thought I had a “rubber ass”. When questioned on this somewhat abnormal perception, he simply said… -“It seems every time you fall on it… you just bounce back up”. Thinking back over many years, there have indeed been many situations when  after having fallen right on my “arrears” yes… I had managed to come back up and rejoin the fight. The only thing is… as one gets older this becomes a more difficult accomplishment and it seems that each time it takes just a little longer to gather the energy for that bounce back, and that the aches also last a little longer. And not just the physical aches. I have to admit that in the 62 years prior to my coming to stay with my brother I had never felt so far out of the race… so far out of the possibilities. Let’s face it… untre...

I can’t say that coming to Charlotte was really a homecoming, for I had never been in this city. But, after a short while and for the first time in a long time, I felt "at home”. One evening, after another long day and feeling truly tired of all my surroundings  while fighting a surging sensation of depression I called my brother Pepe who, despite living in a relatively small apartment with his wife, 4 children and an added young man who is the son of a childhood friend, showed an absolute lack of hesitation in his voice when I told him of my situation… -“What are you waiting for brother… Get over here”… So, leaving my newly acquired friend Campeón behind, I pooled my modest earnings at the time and headed north on the Greyhound Bus Line. This overland trip was an experience for this weary “world traveler” who had lived in 4 or 5 different corners, worked at one time or another in more than 50 countries, flown well over a million miles over a few years, ridden th...

Often, in moments of trial… a friend shows up where least expected. And not always of the two legged kind… A semi lost soul can then get enough fuel to ready his (or her) wits and go on... Whenever I go mentally back to the period of time when my worldly possessions and space were ensconced into a Miami used car dealership, the image is not a totally pleasant one. Yet I remember that after everyone left and I closed the gates and retreated into the main office, my home for the night, there seemed to be peace and tranquility. My eventual companion in this place was a somewhat overrated guard dog named “Campeón”… Spanish for “Champion”. No doubt an attempt by the owner to give this poor animal a grander self image to compensate for an otherwise dreary existence. Campeon looked a bit like this fellow. Champ was a black and white mixed Collie breed, taller than average, gangly and with a loud growling bark. Different spots dotted his ( Yes, I know it was not a “he” but an “it”...

According to my friendly Thesaurus: “Pause… Break… Interruption… Gap… Space… Lull… Interval… Time Away… and finally, my favorite… A Separation Between Vowels” In other words… this entry is not about the continuance of my discovery and subsequent argument with the cancer which came uninvited into my life… Frankly, I am not sure about what this entry will be; it is one of those times when I am sitting down to write just for the sake of writing and to find anew the discipline of doing so. Like everything else in life, it is an easy step into disrupting an established routine… and a very hard journey to regain it. This logo means assistance to the Veterans Yesterday I went to the doctor at the VA Clinic here in town. This has been a life saver for me since, without them, I could have accomplished much less during these past years. This reflection, however, is not about me or my issues. It is more about those people whom I get to see every time I go there and whose life has be...

After the initial shock of finding about the presence of cancer, life somehow went on. Even if the way became a bit rough at times… I have to admit that when it was finally confirmed that I had cancer, the following events became a slow motion blur. I remember trying to find an anchor where to latch my, it seemed, rapidly sinking rowboat. Up until that moment there was the hope that indeed, the original projections had been a mistake… that all would be OK and that my day to day life would return to its somewhat “humdrum-ic” self. But this was not to be. There had been difficult moments in my life before those days; others which proved to be much more difficult to handle since then and, I am sure, there will be many more periods of stress in the years to come. But those days immediately following the confirmation of this disease are not easy to pinpoint and dissect. All I remember is that moments blended into one another and not much more than trying to deal with this issue was...