Family
I grew up in the heart of a family that has always believed in staying close together. Every time something new or exciting happened everyone in the family knew about it, for every event everyone was there. At times I would think that was boring. I didn’t want to spend all the holidays, or special days with family, I wanted to share that with friends too. I wanted to feel what it was like to be away from the family on a special day and do things the way other families did them.
The day my father decided to come live to the United States I thought it was a wonderful idea; I saw it like a long vacation from my family. I was not going to have to go my grandmother’s house every weekend, or spend the afternoons with my cousins at their house. At last I was going to be able to have different friends, and get to explore what it was like to share other traditions.
What seemed like a good experience has now turned into a sad reality. At times I find myself here wanting to talk to someone about personal things, but I find it hard to trust someone. There’s no one like my cousin Ivan to talk to. He is the oldest of all my cousins, and the one I spent most of my childhood with. We would always do desserts together during gatherings, and the one thing I enjoyed the most was decorating my grandma’s house for different occasions.
Although I have a big family living here everything is different. They all grew up very distant from each other, and without a real relationship. We hardly call one another to see what’s going on, or even to say hi. To be honest, I don’t even know what things they enjoy doing or how they spend the holydays.
I wish I would have never had that silly thought of being away from my family. Now that I am older I want it to be like before. I know that that’s impossible. The only thing I can do is to teach my future kids to appreciate their family, and to always stay together for as long as they can.