It's not where you are going but how you get there. I can say this, coming from a long line of restless spirits who were either gifted or plagued by the wanderlust. My father's father was born in Mexico and though the only son of a wealthy politician, he decided he much prefered the life of a wanderer to ever staying in one place. This wandering spirit caused him to jump countries at least twenty times illegally, causing him to be sent home via La Migra. My father was the result of my grandfather's marriage to a lovely woman, Consuelo, whom he got along with the best when they were not in the same country, let alone the same house. They were from different backgrounds, her being a poor butcher's daughter living in a tiny town whose only attraction was a local Church, blessed with the shrine of Our Lady of San Juan de los Lagos.
My Aubuelo's wandering spirit was halted when he was in an automobile accident in Los Angeles County. As soon as she was able my Aubelita arranged to travel to his side in California, along with her three small children. My Father says that he remembers the journey well because he was squished into a bus seat with his mother, his brother, and his sister when a kindly duo of American sailors decided to have him sit with them. He talked with them all the way North; they, knowing not a word of Spanish and he, knowing no English.
After nursing her husband back to health, my grandparents decided to stay in Los Angeles and they worked as migrant workers, putting their youngest son, my father through seminary. The year he was supposed to take vows to be a transitional deacon (a requirement before becoming a diocesan Catholic priest) he decided to take a year off from seminary to make sure he was being called to that life, after all, he'd been in seminary for ten years by that point, starting as a teenager. Lucky for me, he decided it was not his true calling and shortly after that year of discernment ended he was working at a Catholic camp for handicapped children when my very mexican father met another camp counselor. My father claims that he does not believe in love at first sight but he and she got to talking... and talking... and talking... and talked right through dinner. Sr. Christine, whom I am forever indebted to, reccomended that he take her out for dinner... on a date.
About half a century before this meeting there was another family gifted with the wanderlust. By the time the great depression hit America my great grandfather had made and lost a fortune five times. Being German by birth, with a German accent, and a German name, and the post war United States being of a particular mindset that did not favor Germans, he decided to move his family out west shortly after the birth of his youngest daughter. On her birth certificate he and his wife gave her the name of Baby Laubach and eventually called her Marilyn. Once in California they opened a bakery, specializing in donuts and other baked goods made daily. They also had a bakery route, driving around in the wee hours of the morning delivering fresh baked goods. My grandmother used to tell me that they delivered to such estimable people as Walter and Cordelia Knott and Walt Disney but that the highlight of her morning was when he father let her eat the broken cookies.
Later my grandmother Marilyn married and moved to Las Vegas... before it was Las Vegas. I never met my grandfather but from what I can tell, they were happy together. My Mother says she prayed as a little girl that her life would never be boring, and sadly, she got her wish. A tragedy ended their lives together with his death after eleven years of marriage; my mother was ten and had three younger brothers. From there they moved all over the country for four years and then settled down back in California where my mother's grandparents were. There my grandmother remarried the most wonderful man and his four children and together they had two more children, causing my mother's family to be referred to as the Brady Bunch plus some. This also explained the twenty-year age difference between my mother and my youngest aunt.
My mother eventually went to college and afterwards decided to become a nun. She was living in a convent, though not yet a postulant (the first step towards becoming a nun) when shewas encouraged to work at the camp for handicapped kids. There she met my Father who quickly changed her mind. After they were married and within their first year of marriage they lost my father's father, their first daughter, and had the doctor who delivered my first sister tell my mother that she would never have a baby she could keep. It was a very difficult first year together but they stayed together and eventually had four wonderful children and one spectacular one, along with "adopting" at least five more wonderful ones.
All these wandering spirits being noted it should be no surprise whatsoever that I ended up leaving California as soon as I graduated from college. I say it is how you get there, not where you are going that matters. That being said it is equally as important to know where you come from. My Mother always says that I was the first daughter she got to keep and only the second of her children. I like to think this means I defied some kind of curse, but then again, I do have a younger sister, so maybe not. My Father always told us that because we were raised in both the Mexican culture as well as our Mother's German and American heritage we had been given the best of both worlds. It took me a long time to realize that this was not limited to celebrating Saint Nicholas's Day, Christmas, and Epiphany as equally important, gift giving days. Sometimes I wonder how I ended up here, but perhaps the more accurate title of this blog would be "How I ended up here." This is my background- I pray it gives some explanation as to why I am the person that I am.
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