Growing up I always just assumed the course of my life was going to be a natural one. That I was going to find the right girl, settle down and get married, have a couple maybe three kids, have a career and life would just be. Not once did I think I would be where I'm at today, neither in my career or my living situation or what happens next.
These past couple of years have been interesting to say the least. Losing friends far before their time to both the pandemic and other causes that it's really made me take a little bit of stock in my life and what vestiges I may leave behind for anyone. Not having any kids of my own to carry on my name. I can't even say carry on any traditions. My family doesn't have anything to pass along to future generations. I was thinking about that recently back during Thanksgiving where I had asked Mom if maybe she had anything left from Dad's stuff.
I think further back to my grandfather's both Rocha and Verdin. Grandpa Rocha, Beto, he didn't have a lot to his name. He was kind of a vagabond for the lack of a better term, spending time here in the states but also spending time back home in Mexico with his business and his acquaintances there. I remember shortly after he passed away there was a lot of questions the family had about his personal effects, what little he did have and someone mentioned they couldn't find his hat. He had this, I guess, trilby would probably be the best description of the hat, and you'd see him wear it all the time when he's working around the yard, walking the neighborhood like he would and some of my aunts and uncles started asking Grandma where the hat was and nobody knew what happened to it. Came to find out maybe a year or so later that Uncle Tony had acquired the hat shortly after Grandpa passed and was keeping it for himself. Someone mentioned they went to go visit Tony and he was sitting on his lazy boy in the living room drinking a beer and wearing Grandpa's hat. And that was pretty much the only personal effect that I can recall anybody asked about after he passed. Grandpa Verdin, Papa Agapito, on the other hand he had a violin, a fiddle is probably a more apt description, and I can't recall who took possession of it and I don't even know who might even have it today. So he also had something that the family wanted after he passed.
Dad on the other hand, he wasn't much for owning stuff. For him owning anything really meant nothing to him. He was just disinterested in property and real holdings of any sort. But going back to this past Thanksgiving I started asking mom if she kept anything of Dad's and what I was kind of hoping for was, even though dad was a Dodgers fan, he owned a San Francisco Giants jersey. The home jersey, the ivory colored jersey and the reason he owned that and he wore proudly and often, was because his grandson Robert played for the Little League Giants and dad would go to all his games when he could, when he was still capable of driving. I decided to buy him a Giants jersey so he could wear that proudly while supporting Rob at his Little League games. So I started asking mom, did you keep the jersey? Where is it? I thought at least that maybe something like that I could take and have it framed as my memento, my memory of Dad. But as it turns out all of his stuff, what little there was of it, was given away and donated to the four winds. All that's left of him for us are his memories.
Just a few nights ago on Christmas Eve, Mom I guess, had been rummaging through her collection of stuff and found a couple of CDs and a DVD of something that she asked me if I wanted those were dad's. Well CDs, I gave those to him and I have those copies and they're really not not the kind of things I was hoping for so I turned her down and left them there with her and but that's when she also gave me the slide of him working in the strawberry fields back in '69.
I've heard often over the course of my adult life, both at Christmas and my birthday, that I'm the most difficult person to shop for. It used to be because nobody knew what to get me. I thought how odd to say that since my interests are so varied and I've got an apartment FULL of stuff that I've got that interests me. Then the real truth came, I'm not hard to shop for because they don't know what to get me, I'm hard to shop for because I'm always buying my own shit. And a LOT of it. Lol to that, I will own up to. It's true, I buy a ton of shit for myself and a few times over the years when I've received anything, the gift giver often says, "You don't already have it, do you?" 🤣 It's true though. I'm an impulsive buyer. But a lot of that has to do with how little at had growing up. Even with both parents working, I knew how hard we had it that I didn't want to be a burden by asking for anything they couldn't provide. I mean, our family often wouldn't even have something as simple as bacon with our breakfast because we didn't have the money. Certain luxuries had to be cut out to keep a roof over our heads.
Only now as an adult, I'm earning more than twice as much as my parents did by myself and I don't have 3 kids at home that need to be taken care of. I guess you could say I'm making up for lost time.
And while it may seem like I'm practically hoarding memories of my missed youth, part of me is also hoping that when my time comes, even though I don't have any children to leave my legacy to, that friends and family can maybe take a little something of mine that reminds them of me. One of my hats that you always see me wear, one of your favorite t-shirts of mine, what have you. I'd rather that happen than to have all of it get tossed out or sold off at a garage sale.
As for the here and now and what you can get me, give to me for my birthday? All I ask is for something you can't put a price on. Your time. No amount of money could buy you one second of time. And that means more to me than anything I can put up on a shelf to collect dust.
