Deben Morir

Walking again tonight, like most nights. To accrue weight watchers fitness points, partly, but I will save that for another blog. I went the other direction than the park and salt marsh this time, so I also accrued some city street juju. After my errands, I crossed a street corner which made me think of Susanna, and pushing her in a stroller to shop on a girls’ outing. This was the day we bought her navy blue dress with a sash and white swiss dots. This outing happened only once, but I sincerely remember every day that she was here (as I promised her I would in the hospital, on the day she had to leave). I do not, however, remember anything else we bought that day, other than a Beyblade for my son, who was elsewhere.

Summer is starting. The temperatures are lagging this year, but the heat is slowly setting in. This is the fourth summer without Susanna here. I realize, crossing this street, that three years is more than half of Susanna’s lifetime. In two more years, I will almost have  lived as much time after her as with her. And, I will have lived 47 of 53 years on earth without her here (I included en utero as her being here).

Thinking of this made me feel the continuum again. Our lifetime spans are not the whole story. When you love someone, you know they never leave you, and you know that you were born to be with them. Our birth and death events are like the markers for 4 and 5 on a ruler, not the edges before 1 or after 12. Our lives are Wednesday on the week’s calendar. No beginning and no end.

I walked by a corner bodega. Its awning was made of tin, and two pigeons were scuffling and chasing each other back and forth on it, making such delightful tittering sound that my heart leapt in joy. The loud clawed feet tapping the tin, the pigeon banter, together. I do not feel that way often. Sometimes, I think my girl jumps into my body so that she can enjoy something and make me laugh. I glanced in the window and saw a man with a pocked face, who looked somehow intelligent, putting his wallet back into his pocket. I saw a few frosted cakes and cupcakes sitting on a shelf near the window. This seemed a strange place for them, I doubted that they would be sold before they spoiled. I love my city.

When I arrived home, just past dark, S.O. was watching an old Mexican movie. He pressed the info button to show me the title, which had amused him because it contained his surname. I do not share his name but our children do. It was “Los Sanchez Deben Morir”. Those named Sanchez Must Die. We all must die someday, but so what.