Don't look for me.

How can I tell you about the person I am? I’ve reinvented myself so many times that I’ve actually lost track. If we are the sum of all that surrounds us, the sum of all the accessories that inhabit our space and expose in color what we are, than my life is filled with gaping holes of mementos that have been left behind time and again. My past is only a mild reflection in my memory. 

Those magic shoe boxes that home your frozen memories photographed, captured in words, colors and textures that instantly spiral your senses into times of yore. Those books that told all the stories that watched you grow; stories that resided in your head for days, even weeks, and introduced you to people, places, dreams and sensations of different dimensions. A life made of collectable treasures that we display majestically; these things, the objects of our affections. Every object, big and small, that would otherwise be trite becomes a fundamental part of our own composition. This is precisely what dissolves insipidly in my life with the tired hand of a ticking clock, with the seeds of absence that stem from my footsteps.

My home has never been a continuous specific geographic location; there is no room in this world filled with my scent awaiting my return. My history, all of its accessories and scenes are mere ghosts. Perhaps I am a ghost as well, one that feeds off your memory, one that with a touch infiltrated your being to move you if only a little. An impermanent image that at night rests inside your eyelids before the world rolls to the back of your head and during the daytime lingers on the whispering wind, the vibration of an instrument. 

It is impossible to tell you about the person I am when I’ve become unsure of where I came from. It is probable that the people and the streets that have seen me through have begun to doubt my very existence. In the spirit of tradition, once again it’s time to change the pace. To kiss these cold walls which have echoed my laughter and my cries goodbye, to undress these shelves of my memories and stuff them in my pockets. I am a traveler without keys, returning to basics. I can dispense everything because when it comes down to the bone, all that I truly own travels with me.

In the end I may be able to tell you a bit about the person I have been, but it’s nonsense to speculate about the person that I am or where I will be. One thing is for sure: I won’t be here so don’t look for me because you won’t find me.

Words

Words caught your attention, brought two to one

Words chased with rum

Words done and undone

Words promised and whispered between breaths in bed
Words pounding away in my head
Words you wrote, words you said
Words that built bridges to a new life but found death instead

Words heavy like bricks in your pockets
Words wrapped in tears, stomping feet, shakings heads, and how can we stop this

Words tugging and ripping at the sleeves of images of what could've been
Words puzzles, missing pieces of things we’ve seen

Words so right until they're wrong, make you wrong, made me wrong, it's all wrong
Words so sad and still on paper

Words in books you grip to, knuckles white, because you can’t say so

Words slipping carelessly out of your mouth, crashing down everything we stocked high

Words in your ears, hands down your thighs

Words hanging impatient between lines

Words creeping in my thoughts between my sheets

Words rhyming and bubbling up in my sleep

Words so wrong until they’re right

Words words words just let me rest tonight

Unshuffle my head

Random memories seem so few in between. Memories are difficult for me.

Since I can remember, they've been telling me that my brother wanted a little brother and got me instead. But I remember him running through a parking lot waving a pink box in his hand while I watched him from above, my little hands gripped to the metal bars of a small city balcony. He could've bought himself anything else yet that pink box I remember as my first Barbie. I grew in tune with just how much he loved me.

My dad once told me he would believe anything I said, anything, even if it wasn’t true. He would believe it because he loved me profoundly and there was just no other way for him to love me. I grew in awe of words and my father.

I met my best friend at age 12. She was impossibly intelligent and beautiful and had these long perfect fingers that danced over a black piano, playing songs that sounded like poetry.  She didn’t know we would become the best of friends, but I did, and so we did, and we are. I grew to believe in soulmates.

During my childhood I recall sitting in the classroom of a catholic elementary school in Queens, hearing nothing but white noise while I relearned a language that sounded indescribably foreign and impossible. I grew fearful of nuns.

During my first long stay in Colombia I learned that I sounded like a North American TV show, you know, like in the Sony Channel. People wanted me to speak in English and entertain them.  It wasn’t a real talent, just something I could do. I grew skeptical of what entertains people.

During my first days in a predominantly black high school in Brooklyn, a girl told me I had white-girl hair. I couldn’t understand what it meant or why it mattered.  I had never been anything close to a white-girl in Colombia nor had I been considered light-skinned. I grew aware of my race.

During the same time I met a Haitian girl named Lindsay. She was a stocky black girl with a lot of attitude. She was unapologetically outspoken and told me she would take care of me as if she knew I needed to hear it. Her mother and little brother waited for us after school in their one bedroom apartment in Flatbush. They would play soca on the radio and deep fry ripe plantains, it felt like home. I grew hopeful of strangers.

In Colombia, my brother who is 8 years older than me would always let me ride shotgun. Even when he had girlfriends, he would let me sit in the front seat. He taught me to appreciate Metallica, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Queen, Motley Crew and how to head bang. He would cook meals for me. I grew in love with my brother and fond of heroes.

I was usually the tallest in school. During all the back and forth between countries I was left back a grade a couple of times. My classmates became younger and I became older.  I realized I wanted to be around older people, I longed to be taken seriously. I grew aware of time and my struggles with it.

My mom and I were in Colombia packing my bags for me to catch a flight into NYC  when my best friend called me to tell me I probably wouldn’t fly out and I should turn on the news. My mom and I sat crying in silence watching planes fly into the twin towers. We figured it meant war, something bigger than us, but all we could think about was my brother who was in the Marines at the time. I grew infinitely small in a world full of actions I could not comprehend.

I remember how dark it felt inside when my father died and I wasn’t with him. I grew heavy and remorseful and forgetful.

unassessed damages

Born with maps built in, concrete jungle cradles childhood
born so brave
certainty in every step, smooth navigation
toy soldiers mirror back the fight, signal for your future

you grow up

Fists crash into walls
violent waves of air in your lungs, yell at the world
shove it back
on the defense, proving yourself
born so brave
brave or not, always a hero in my eyes
way before the guns, way before they planted enemies in your head

You. can't. sleep.
Little white pills, blackout
bombs burst eyelids open
red curtains fall warm behind your eyes, children's faces
sandstorms wrap your throat, try to breathe
explosions ripping through your dreams like bullets through flesh
fast thoughts, injuries in your words, habitual struggles
you can't sleep, sounds of pulses fading sting
muscles like brick shield your terrors
your fragmented bones, your glassy eyes
unassessed damages

blackout

Walk slow and aware through hate, minefields in your soul
you've survived
unlearn your targets, surrender your tags
so brave to come home

I want to hold you, little boy
draw your smile until it feels real
and hold you until I heal every one of your broken parts.

Ni aquí, Ni allá

Impresionante esta cuestión de la memoria. Los episodios de mi niñez que se despliegan en mi cabeza están tan entremezclados que ya han perdido su cronología. Lo que sí puedo recordar con claridad es que hogar nunca ha sido una ubicación geográfica específica, sino el calor de mi familia. Los libros, la picardía y fortaleza de mi mamá; la sonrisa, la ternura y la recocha de mi papá.

Nací una de tantos accidentes geográficos que existen en el mundo. Mis papas, Colombianos hasta morir, vinieron a coincidir lejos de su tierra en la gran ciudad de Nueva York, en los años 70 durante plena explosión salsera. Y del amor y la fiesta, Brooklyn me vio nacer. De ahí en adelante mis aventuras atravesando el atlántico se han convertido en un déjà vu sin fin. Que iban a imaginarse mis papas que me condenaban a  una vida de respuestas incómodas a preguntas como “Pero cuál es tu lengua materna?” o “En qué idioma piensas?” o mejor aun “De dónde eres?” porque ahí sí que se pone complicada la cosa “Pues, a qué te refieres exactamente? En qué ciudad nací? O en cual he vivido más tiempo? O donde vivo ahora? Que de donde vengo?”.

Y la estresante tarea de aprender dos idiomas. Y aprenderlos lo mejor posible. Y trabajar, en todo momento, de no usar equivocadamente la expresión de uno en el otro y sonar como una soberana idiota.

Y entre tanto, a qué país se le debe fidelidad? Con ambos tengo una relación de amor y odio que me embarga todos los días. Con ambos tengo historia. Historias hasta inventadas. Mi sensibilidad hacia ambos me impide tomar una postura determinante y me inyecta una vacilación crónica que me impide juzgar a uno de los dos. 

Aquí y allá, me duele todo. Me duele todo, lo siento todo. Me duele el señor colombiano que se sienta a mi lado en el tren, feliz de encontrarme y poder contarme todo lo que extraña a Medellín, y que difícil la vida en este país, y que implacable la rutina. 
Me duele la señora Salvadoreña, con su tono de piel canela, facciones indígenas y la cara más dulce del condado, que se despierta cada día con el corazón fracturado por la falta de sus hijos de 6 y 8 años que se han quedado en El Salvador y no entienden porque ella no regresa. 
Me duelen en los huesos los obreros al pie de la autopista a las 6 de mañana esperando trabajo, viviendo en una habitación compartida. 

También me duele la joven norte americana, madre soltera de dos hijos de 14 y 16 años, que tiene dos jornadas de trabajo y lleva años intentando crear una mejor vida para ella y sus hijos. Pero cuando no es un ladrón que se le mete a su casa a vaciarla de tesoros y recuerdos, es una emergencia que le asalta los ahorros. 

Me duele el anciano norte americano, ultra-conservador, aunque no esté de acuerdo con él. Me duelen sus historias sobre la guerra porque sé que teme en todo su ser no reconocer en lo que se ha convertido el país de su infancia Se siente forastero en su tierra y su familia lo tiene alienado en la habitación más alejada de la casa, en el mejor de los casos. El representa todo lo que ellos evitan convertirse a todo costo.

Me duele la señora norte americana clase media alta, con un esposo tipo galán de película, dos gemelas con inteligencia inquietante y una cocina del tamaño de mi apartamento. Me duele que nunca logra saciar sus necesidades, pero eso  no limita su capacidad de sentir. Cuando ve otros pueblos celebrando muertos en las noticias se pregunta en voz alta y entre lagrimas “Como nos regocijarnos con la muerte tan violenta de un hombre? Como podemos ser tan crueles?”.

Puedo sentirlo todo corriendo por las venas. Es difícil juzgar a otros cuando consideramos su vida en contexto. Ver un país, un pueblo, una historia desde afuera nos arma de argumentos y soberbia, pero sentirle latir desde adentro desmorona paredes y nos hace vulnerables. 

Quizás mi falta de memoria es un mecanismo de defensa, porque al recordarlo todo, todos los sentidos se estremecen. Suficiente tengo con el peso de estos dos países y su sinnúmero de historias sobre mis hombros.

You. Can. Do. It. Can't you?

"No se si tal vez les ha pasado a ustedes..."

Aquí me tienen, mordiéndome los dedos. El amor me he traído a estos extremos, y cuando digo el amor, me refiero al mio, de carne y hueso. Me ha dicho "Porque no escribes un blog?" después de tantas conversaciones en las que intento de la mejor manera describir con palabras los sentimientos que desbordan mis limites. Después de tantas conversaciones en las que intento explicar las extravagancias de mis sentimentalismos y la frustración por no tener un hobby constante, que me mueva. Lo único constante es que todo me mueve. Por todas las veces que le he dicho lo mucho que he querido escribir. El lo ha puesto muy sencillo: "Porque no escribes un blog?". Por qué no?
Quizás por que no soy escritora y le tengo fobia a la mala ortografía. Me da pánico. Y temo convertirme en una de esas personas que las otras personas recuerdan por tener mala ortografía. Quizás porque cuando escribes algo personal que sabes que nadie va a leer, no te cohíbes, y no temes tanto al error o la mala forma. Quizás porque no sabia por donde empezar. No soy autora, ni siquiera una lectora aficionada. He perdido la cuenta de cuantos libros he empezado. Ya creo que se ha convertido en manía, compro libros compulsivamente. Libros que empiezo, que no leo, que ya leí y vuelvo a leer. 


Supongo que también dudo de tener mucho que decir, o si lo que tengo que decir en realidad valga la pena. 
Pero ya está.
Aquí estoy, dando mi primer paso hacia un blog incierto.