On this morning he has received our blessings for his special day. Of course, like his peers he may enjoy a small dinner or barbeque. We can’t miss it as it is always the end of the San Vicente Novena.
Our parents have shared what the world was like when they turned desisietti. They endured an imperialist Japanese government, strict in discipline but industrial in strength. They labored in the fields. They suffered the ravages of war. They experienced the Liberators, running with them to help neighbors and friends, and capture the enemy. After that they had to rise up the ranks in the camps and Naval Administration. Read. Learn. Study. Walk to school by the light of the moon. Study at night by lamplight. At seventeen they dreamed of a world of possibilities beyond our shores. Our world today is their vision. Maybe. Today only a few remain, in their eighties, having lived a full life.
In his novel “Bless Me, Ultima,” the Chicano writer Rudolfo Anaya drew from his experiences growing up in New Mexico during World War II. He told the story of a young boy who had to reconcile the many conflicting influences of family, religion, and community. The little boy Tony must come to experience evil in the world and struggle with family expectations and religion. He spends time with Ultima, the curandera who helps him figure out his dreams and the family’s mixed messages. There is the harvest in the fields and the expectation that Tony will become a priest. Yet he is different. Se habla Espanol, not English. Tony doesn’t eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. He eats tortillas. He prefers chile and beans over ham and eggs. Tony experiences the community struggle when Lupito, a war veteran, kills the town sheriff and Lupito is himself killed. The story is one of the loss of innocence and growing up.
For Max, like each of us with a son or daughter, we fear the loss of innocence. We wonder what the world will be like for him as he moves through the decades of his life. He must discover the struggle of this community with this question: “Is it what you know or who you know that matters?” He will struggle with finding himself in this world. Like the great fish described in Elizabeth Bishop’s poem, he will live a life which will leave scars from his battles and conquests. He will survive, even if we want to shelter and protect him. Yet, we wonder what world will his eyes see at twenty-seven? Thirty-seven? Does he know what it will take? Like all our children, he carries within him the hopes and dreams of his community. But he is different. He will be different wherever he goes. How could we forget returning to Saipan and he bursts through the house after the first day of Kindergarten exclaiming, “Mom! All of my classmates have black hair and brown eyes like me!” And he worried he was different in San Diego because he didn’t have red or blond hair and blue eyes. Different. Yes. Absolutely different. He lives here on this island. This special place. No other place in the world like this home and village.
He looks at us strangely as we wax nostalgic. He is amused when we lament that only yesterday he was crawling through Chinatown house, playing with Na. He grew up in Grandpa’s shadow, discovering that Dionicio was from where his name Nisho came. He received the healing hands and herbal medicine of his Uncle Achu. Here he discovered the world of stories in books which came alive in his mind. At confirmation he received the blessing of his Nino, a suruhano. This gentle giant of a young man now pulls out of our driveway, behind the wheel. We sit anxiously. But we have to let him go and let him experience the world. Today he is seventeen and the world awaits him. And we celebrate with baited breath and hope for his experience in the world.
//
