The Eyes of the Blind

Today I had an eye-doctor appointment. The doctor dilated my pupils. I saw lights and reflections that were otherwise hidden to me.


I don't want to wait until I'm 45 to write something great.

Moros y Cristianos

I had an interview today with Rogelio, President of CASA. I'm pursuing a story about ethnic food, specifically Cuban food, and how it has this amazing connection to cultural identity. So after our interview I was beaming, ready to transcribe my notes and breeze through my story. Rogelio also told me of the best Cuban restaurant he knew of in the city, and I had already made a romantic dinner date with Grayson in my head for this Friday (after interviewing of course).

As I passed the grocery store on my way home, I was struck with the urge to cook my own Cuban dinner. I went inside, bought some bell peppers and chicken (I'm still hesitant to eat too much beef), and headed back to whip up some black beans and rice. The dinner came out fabulously! The rice was perfectly fluffy, the beans nice and rich, and the chicken deliciously spiced. (Grayson and Emma loved it too).

Proud of my exertions, I continued to work on my story and research Cuban cuisine. During my interview with Rogelio, he kept mentioning these weird dishes that I hadn't heard of, but I decided to just look up the Spanish when I got home instead of cutting off his quotes. Anyway, as I was reading about typical Cuban cuisine, everything started looking shockingly familiar. Congri is just rice and beans, something my mother served 3 times a week. Ropa Vieja? I knew the look of the tomato stewed, stringy beef all too well. Mojo? Just some garlic sauce my mom loved to smother on everything.

I began to realize what a strong hold food really holds on culture. As separated as I've always felt from my Cuban identity, I was always held close to it every night at the dinner table. I never recognized my mom's food as something other than just that: food. But the spices, the beans, the perfect rice, all tie back to an island. Centuries of people are connected merely by what their mothers have served them every night.

I'm going to make an effort, I've decided, to perfect my home-made, Cuban cooking.

CASA de Cuba

With an unusual force I plopped onto the scratched, blue subway seat, and flinched slightly when the seat yelped back with a loud pop. Apparently someone pulled it, loosing the screws, and my rough sitting loudly shoved it back in place. I know the entire car heard it, and reacted just as I did, blindly ignoring the fart/fatass-sitting-breaking-the-seat sound.

"Please stand clear of the closing doors."

We were off to Spring. Usually, at this point, I zone out completely on the train because it really goes by faster that way (something about anticipation making it seem longer to get there than to come back). I stared directly in front of myself, which happened to be exactly where a pole was standing. I'm always so confused as to where to look on the train because we're all supposed to be acting like we're alone and gazing nonchalantly around the cart, but my eyes are trained to point out, stare at, and examine anything that comes into view. Luckily today it was just a silver pole and not that hobo-chic girl who caught me memorizing the angles of her large, crooked nose. On the opposite wall my face was reflected in the tinted glass, only cut sharply in half by the pole. I leaned to the right, so my full face was in view, then I leaned back and saw myself divided.

How easy it was, in one quick move, to be so incomplete then suddenly awaken a connection to each part: left and right.

Past and present. I smiled in the cart, reflecting on this new-found discovery. It was like when I attended CASA, Cuban American Student Association, tonight. I was surrounded by other Cuban-Americans like myself and felt for the first time an intimate connection with a stranger. The way Rogelio slung his words in his mouth, the accents he placed, the way he said Patricia, sounded like home. I've never before in my entire life connected with someone based on heritage, other than family. I was leaning the right and seeing my whole self reflected in these people.

I wanted so deeply to belong to this. I wanted to share secrets of our culture and our language, though I knew I had none to give. Growing up in San Antonio I bloomed completely without the colors of my Cuban ancestry. Sure, I aqcuired the general traits from my mom, but I never really felt Cuban.

I want to feel Cuban. At this club, I still felt like an outsider. Probably that's because I don't know any Spanish, I don't know Cuba's history, I don't know my family's history, and I don't know any Cuban Arts. But I want to belong.

It seems silly, I guess. Maybe it's similar to Alana joining that sorority. I just want to put myself in a circle of people I know nothing about and create new friends. Period.

My turtle ran away

This afternoon Grayson and I walked through Prospect Park and he stopped me to point out, what he likes to call, the 'Steve Jobs House.' I stopped pushing the handle of my blue grandma-cart and angled my right hand around the metal bedframe piece jutting from it so the frame wouldn't fall and hit the wheel. My other hand still groped a 99c Arizona Peach Iced Tea. The house was similar to the others surrounding it, in idea really. Like the simple, 3 story brick town houses, this Steve Jobs House looked like it housed 4 or 5 apartments. But it was shockingly white, obviously new, and instead of old-rusted metal bars on its windows, an elaborate dual staircase flanked the front of the building. Both right and left the stairs criss-crossed in sharp, geometric lines, being cut off at each floor with a wide, consuming deck. The whole place had a MC Escher-esque design. It stood out like a pearl on the pavement of glass pieces and asphalt. I licked the top of the can, trying to pry the straw out of it's silver mouth, without moving my eyes from the bright, shiny object. Who had the audacity to build this place?

I moved forward, pushing the cart ahead of me. Because I was still mesmerized by this building, I accidently ran into the full-sized box spring Grayson had balanced on his skateboard.

"I don't get it," I said. "It's such an asshole move to build such a nice building in a community where people pass by it everyday and know they could never afford it. And it seems like such a tight-knit community here too."

"Well why don't you just become an anti-gentrification journalist then, Patty?" Grayson responded with a wide-smile.

We pressed on through the neighborhood and to our building on Putnam and Grand, the edge of Fort Greene. I forged ahead with the idea to unlock the door for Grayson. As I was within, say, 6 yards of the door, two young black girls approached me, probably about 15 years old. I glanced at them and then quickly back in front of me, in typical NY fashion. As we passed, I suddenly felt something slap against my shoulder. I looked at the ground and saw what appeared to be a bitten-off end of a vienna sausage. I looked at the girls, confused, expecting to hear either a "Sorry!" or "Fuck you dumb bitch!" Instead I received only the look of their backs as they kept walking. Did they mean to hit me? If they did, why the cold, awkwardness about it? The little Cuban woman in me wanted to yell, "Puta!" but luckily logic kicked in. I didn't want to start any trouble.

As Grayson arrived, and asked what was wrong, I explained the bizarre situation I just had.

"Yeah, you know I hear that most of the muggings going on now are from young girls," he said as we maneuvered the bed through our door. "So if it makes you feel any better, they probably weren't throwing the hotdog at you, personally.."

I sighed, continued inside the door, and set down the cart with the bedframe and wall shelves we bought off craigslist. I couldn't get those nonchalant, cold-meat-throwing girls out of my mind.

"Patty, where is the turtle?"

My eyes snapped to the left at the plastic container filled with water and disolved turtle food. No turtle. Great, now my turtle ran away.