Happy Three Kings Day. For my fellow Latinos this day has a lot of cultural significance. It was personally never celebrated in my home growing up . We were too busy celebrating something else….my maternal grandmother Ofelia’s, birthday. Just to set the record straight…January 6th was not my grandmothers real birthday. She was born in Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico sometime in the 1920’s and record keeping was not a very high priority. I didn’t find out until after she died that was actually born sometime in April. She liked the January 6th date because it would be easy to remember.
My mother was not raised by my grandmother. Her father died of Tuberculosis when she was two years old. My grandmother was young and alone and had no means to raise a child on her own. So she left my mother with relatives in Puerto Rico while she came to New York City to make her own life here. My mother would come and visit her during the summer and during semester breaks when she was in college. It was during one of these visits that my mother met my father. Although she spoke no English..she and my dad managed to communicate and well the rest is history.
Ofelia treated me like a princess. There really is no other way to describe it. She was my second mother. From the time I was born..I was always at her house. She was more than my grandmother...she was the best teacher a girl could have.
It was at her home that I learned how to speak Spanish which is what I spoke first. My parents were thrilled that their daughter was learning how to speak Spanish. However that thrill turned to frustration because my African-American father did not and still does not how to "spica the Spanish”. So off to the bilingual kindergarten I went.
It was in my grandmothers living room that I learned how to drink coffee. She made it with a special brewer and it was hot and sweet and foamy and always served with a warm piece of pan con mantequila and it was Heaven! My grandmother was making me lattes long before Starbucks was even thought of.
My grandmother had milky white skin and her hair was the same exact shade of red of comic strip heroine Brenda Starr (store bought and home applied). People would look at me holding hands with my grandmother me with my dark bronze complexion and then at her as we walked down the Grand Concourse to the A&P Grocery. At first I found those stares curious then I found them humorous and it felt like she and I shared a special secret.
Mostly though..it was through my grandmothers cooking that I realized one of the advantages of being Puerto Rican. I always joke that one of the reasons my father married my mother was because my grandmother was such an amazing cook. I always imagined that for my father, being the bachelor that he was, finding out that his beautiful girlfriend had a mother who could cook anything..must have been an added bonus. When I say she could cook anything I mean she could cook anything. Pasteles…check…tortillas..check…thick cut french fries made from potatoes..check….meatloaf…check and if you were lucky you ‘d get the piece that had the whole boiled egg. My grandmother never taught me how to cook boricua style..but she did teach me the element of love as the most important ingredient and how preparing someone's favorite dish is just as much an act of love as a hug or a kiss.
I miss her. My parents miss her. Her husband Felix misses her. My son misses what should have been. When he was born she didn't want to be called Bisabuela which means Great Grandmother in Spanish..oh no! So it was shortened to "Bisa" and it stuck. He was very little when we had to put her in the nursing home. But I have the clearest memory of my then 6 year old little boy helping her out of the car the day we had to drop her off. He would never be able to fully experience the woman that we all knew and loved.
So even though today is not her "real" birthday it will always be for me. Just as the magi looked to the stars for guidance, my grandmother will always be one of my most important connections to my Puerto Rican heritage and culture.
Besitos, Ofelia!
Paz
Myrna
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