Another chapter and a new crossroad...

“Stand at the crossroads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way lies; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls….” Jeremiah 6:16

Manuel on a cold winter evening playing the harmonica 

In the beginning, we were a healthy and happy lot; our lives were just starting.  It was some time in the eighties our first crop of children had arrived and more were to follow, some still a figment of our imaginations. We were as together and happy as a visit to the Magic Kingdom.

Our travels home to Portugal were the highlight of our years (still are.) Visits were always loud, colorful, flavorful and replete with traditional food celebrations. Supper was a time of confusion and preparations.Our in-house chefs would serve a party of fifteen in a snap and an occasional visitor would always stop by to add another story to the book of life as seen from the mount.  We  were collectively young enough to live in the state of foolishly happy and old enough to visit the land of dreaming far into the future.  The road was wide open and all of us harnessed all of the octane necessary to be environmentally damaging.  We sported the swag that accompanied our laugh.

The years have lifted us up and also beaten us down; together, apart, departing from different starting gates; sometimes mounted on a mustang and other times on a nag.  We have always connected our families by way of a loving bridge between two continents, but have found ourselves sadly apart.  The miles of separation from family have been the most difficult aspect of our married adult lives.  I have been told that many, many suffer from the plight of the diaspora. I was once a refugee, but now  I add Portuguese to my immigrant status since I have always claimed to be Portuguese, by injection; it's time to add our story to the Book of Immigrant's : The Tale of Two Homelands.

This year, in what seams to have been a blink of an eye with an annoying eyelash smack in the middle of it and while still abrasively trying to close the yet fresh open wounds of recent bereavements, our hand has been forced to say goodbye to yet another loved one, my last brother in law still alive. The road has changed again and we no longer walk with the same companions.  The journey is different; no longer fuzzy, comfortable and routine. We now take  baby steps and learn to travel in new numbers and at a different pace, to different locations and with a heavy heart. Rest in peace to brother, father, husband: Manuel.

New chapters are opening and closing faster than I can ignite a Google search engine.  ...Today, what holds most true is that the reason we start things is rarely the reason we continue them.

'Lampara es a mis pies tu palabra, y lumbrera a mi camino." salmo 119:105

Buen Camino, Peregrino!