I made a new schedule:
Housework – Monday-Wednesday
Writing – Thursday-Sunday
By Wednesday I was exhausted. Instead of doing laundry I stayed in my pajamas extending housework to Thursday. It is Friday morning and I don’t know what to write.
There are two squirrels playing outside my kitchen window. They chase each other up and down the telephone pole. I learned how to climb a tree at 20 years old. I am scared of heights. When I was a little girl Mami let me play in the lobby of my apartment building with Elaine from upstairs. She used to jump three, four, five steps at a time. She was older. After she took her afternoon showers her sneakers filled with new talcum powder left puffs on the stairs. I miss her. I want to look her up on Facebook but her name is too common Elaine Lopez. She taught me about life beyond the walls of my apartment. She was mature even at twelve years old.
When I dream of my home it is always the apartment on 45 street. I wish I could go back to it. I want to see the wallpaper from the 1970s, my mother’s altar in the hallway corner. I want to smell my father’s Sunday cooking and hear the neighbors talk to their children. I want to take a bath in my clawfoot tub for hours like I did when I got bored with reading books and watching TV. There were times I felt I didn’t have a childhood then I remember how I was allowed to imagine. There were plays and dances in my head. I was in the jungle, on ships and in faraway places. I wanted to act in the TV shows I watched after school. I could have been the Cuban cousin Alyssa Milano didn’t know she had and move into that big house in Connecticut in Who’s the Boss?” Only rich kids got to act. That’s what my parent said. In a way they were right. Who would pay for my acting classes and agent?
My son is being raised in an apartment. It is a lot smaller than the one I grew up in. It only has one bedroom. There is sunlight when the sun decided to show itself. The windows overlook the street. We get to watch the neighbors go by and the squirrels play outside. I want him to have a backyard like I always wanted. The first time I lived in a house was in Venezuela. It was a huge house with three living rooms and three dining areas. I spent three months there and each day I wrote in a new place. There were only two people who lived in this house besides me. They had a dog outside that helped me eat the mangoes off the tree. He was a Doberman. They only greeted him with food. We became friends I let him pretend he was biting off my arm. Such a big dog, I am not sure why I was never scared. I didn’t really have friends there. All the girls thought I would take away their boyfriends and all the guys made up stories of their rendezvous with me. I may be a legend there. Who knows? I was just trying to be nice to people.
Omar just woke up. I want to write to be continued but I have to be realistic.
The end.
Dripping River Water 