The Tradeoff

 

My sweetest girls, 

 Yesterday was a hard and sad day. My great aunt Lolis passed away. It didn't hit me right away. I was having an out-of-body experience as my father was explaining over the phone that she had passed, and that she was tired and had wanted to die for a while now. I thought, "This is where you are supposed to cry, you should feel more upset, why aren't you more upset? What is wrong with you?" When I hung up the phone, you came to see me. You knew something was wrong, and when I tried to tell you, that is where my heart caught up with my body, and I started sobbing. I am sorry if I scared you. Amaia was curious. I don't think she remembers my aunt at all. She was too little; the interactions were so short —a couple of hours here and there. As the hours passed last night and I got talking to other family members, all the memories kept flooding into my mind; cherished moments of my aunt Lolis and my aunt Blanca, who passed away more than 20 years ago, my God! How has it been so long? I remembered her funeral like it was yesterday, the loss so strong, so raw, I couldn't believe so much has happened since those awful days.

My aunt Lolis meeting Julieta

I close my eyes and am immediately transported to their house —the patterns of that white floor that witnessed us grow, that witnessed my girls grow too, the Christmas mornings at their home, their embrace, their words. It is hard to bottle up all that they meant to me over the years. They were such a loving, constant presence in my life and my sister's. They heard us, they cared for us, they showed up for us.  My aunt Lolis never married. She lived an unconventional life; by Mexican women's standards, she was independent, she worked until she couldn't, and she loved her family fiercely. She was happy, irreverent, easy-going, and beautiful. I wish you had known her like I did; you would have loved her so much.

I am overwhelmed with a wave of regret for depriving you of your extended family and all the love and richness that comes with it. Most of the time, it is easy for me to justify the distance; it is safer here, Canada is a country where you can grow up to be whatever you want, where the law and society's rules are fairer to women, and I can see you growing up and having fulfilling lives. I would be kidding myself to think that the tradeoff and guilt of living so far away is sometimes too much to bear. It hurts me to see you grow up without roots, without the love and care of so many people that were such an important part of my life, and that, with time, I have come to live without it. Because if I thought about it every day, it would be too much to handle. I would live in a continuous state of homesickness, thinking of all the people I left behind. My mind and my soul buried all those memories as a defense mechanism, so I could keep living without aching. It is easy to live in a different city. In this different country, nothing reminds you of them, of your childhood, of your family; it is easy to bury the memories, bury the love, or momentarily forget. 

Family is such a big part of our lives in Mexico. We live in an endless loop of birthday celebrations, first communions, weddings, baptisms, funerals, graduations, etc. It is messy, it is loud, and it is lovely. If I have to go back to it in my mind, there is a strong sense of belonging, understanding, support, and, above all, love that came from having a big family like mine. The tradeoff, I am painfully aware, weighs heavily when I am faced with loss like this, and I let everything resurface, and I let myself feel it. 

As Mexicans, we believe that our loved ones remain connected to us through our memories and by sharing stories with younger generations, so they are never forgotten. We believe that even after death, they communicate with us, with a song, in our dreams. I like to think of them as guardian angels keeping me safe, wrapping myself in a blanket full of childhood nostalgia, Christmas mornings, tight hugs, good food and laughter all around. 

I hope you get to feel it when we go back, when I tell you stories, when you see the pictures. I hope you understand that even though you don't remember them, they loved you, too.