Profile Draft

John Kennedy 4*

A lot of people in my life have brought me down but no one has brought me up like she has. Through the struggles I faced as a child and the hard life I lived she was there through it all. Born and raised in a impoverished family in Bella Vista, Mexico she had it hard as well. Always thinking about others over herself she shows what it really means to be a mother and my grandmother.

Eva is not very tall measuring around 4’8” and a very weak old looking women but she is much stronger then she looks. She is very quiet and sounds soft because her voice has died over the years. However you can tell when she is happy. She has very beautiful light brown eyes and when she gets happy her eyes widen and her smile widens. You will catch her sitting down most of the time but when she is walking she walks very slow and most of the time uses a cane. She is 88 but until a few years ago she was very active but she still eats very healthy and because of this she is still living. She comes across as a wise sage type of person as she doesn’t speak a lot unless spoken to but most of what she says is very wise. She has curly gray hair and glasses. She isn’t physically emotional but you can see much of her emotions through her eyes and facial expressions. However when she smiles or cries it is very powerful. She doesn’t make it evident that she is sad or extra happy but the aura you feel when around her gives a strong feeling of emotion especially when she looks at you while crying or smiling. Looking at her you can tell she is very powerful inside. She has a look of a woman with many memories and stories locked inside her. Looking at her I can see much of her characteristics inside me.

I was cold and I was young. Eva Garcia gave me a blanket to keep me warm in the cold winter in Tepic, Mexico. She was awake and the only reason was to check on me. She knew that I wasn’t used to the cold winters of Mexico or the new home and environment I was in but her kindness and devotion to keep me safe and loving gave me a sense of well-being but most importantly comfort. I was six and I was living in a totally different environment. However she made me feel at home while I was living with her. I was very nervous and shy being in a new home and country but she made me feel comfortable and at home. She made breakfast, lunch, and dinner everyday. She bought me gifts and took me around her hometown and neighborhood. She did everything possible to make me feel right. I never been away from home and my family so long. Nevertheless it was like I never left California and and never left my family. It was like she brought family to me.

Eva Garcia lives with my family at my new home in Albany/Berkeley(I live on the border). She always tells me before I leave school and go to sleep for the past Fourteen years, “te quiero mucho, oro para ti.” “I love you a lot, I pray for you.” She has a shrine in her room and a statue of the Virgin de Guadelupe(Mary). She is always very spiritually and mentally in tune with God. The way she carries herself you can feel a sense of passion and spirituality in her. After losing her husband fourteen years ago, losing a son two years ago, losing two grandchildren, and losing almost all her brothers and sisters but two (she has fifteen brothers and sisters), she still has her faith in God never once doubting his existence and always praying and thanking him for all he’s done. If anyone asks why things are the way they are she exclaims, “Es la voluntad de Dios.” “It’s God’s Will.”

It was Christmas Day 2005 and most of the gifts I had gotten were not specifically what I wanted. I thought the people who knew best, my Mom and Dad, would know what I want. However I still thanked God for what I had and went on with my day. Before I left with my Dad, Mom, and Grandma to go to the traditional family dinner at my aunts house my grandma pulled me aside and said in her little Spanish accent, “ I give this to you. You can buy los videojuegos con eso.(videogames with this)” Even though I didn’t ask her for it she gave me a hundred dollars to buy video games and that was exactly what I wanted. I just wanted some video game spending money yet I have never told anybody I wanted that. She knew me too well. It brings back all those times she was quiet and just sitting there. However when she is sitting and watching me play or watch tv or whatever I’m doing she is taking careful note on what I like and am doing. Even though she can’t really can’t understand English or exactly what I’m doing she can understand me and my emotions and she knows me better than anyone.

My Grandma or Abuela is more to me than she think she knows. Many people outside of our family think of her as my moms mother who lives with us at our home. To me though she is like a a second mother or guardian angel. Everything she does in her power she does to keep me safe. Sometimes it can irritable like every time it is slightly cold she says put on jacket. Or other times when I’m hungry and there is no money she gives me money out of her own wallet so I can eat. She has many grandchildren but she always tells me I’m her closest and her favorite. For someone who is old and tired she does a lot to keep me safe. One time my Abuela even walked outside after me because she knew I wasn’t wearing a sweater. She just had that ambition to keep me healthy.

The one thing that always set apart my grandma from any other relative I have is her story telling. She has the ability to make any story sound like a legend. A small meek looking old women will have you vibrating in awe of how strong she actually is. She starts by looking you me in the eye and when she locks eyes with me I’m overcome with a feeling of being grasped. Grasped by her prescence and the story.(Actual Dialogue in Spanish) “I remember when I was a young girl. I worked in the canneries in Mexico for cents an hour just so my family could live. I was the smallest one but the strongest and hardest working. Back then in Mexico people were struggling to make a living and one day hope for a better life and mine was America.” As she came to the climax she looked me in my eye a stare so strong it is like you can look right inside her. It was like she had you in a trance and she was storytelling through her hands, facial expressions, and her eyes. “Then one day another worker who didn’t like me tried to blackmail me and push me around. I knew I wasn’t let her get away with it. She stepped to me and as she did I grabbed her by the collar and said so help me god if you try anything again like this I will knock your teeth right out our mouth.” The way she spoke I knew she wasn’t lieng especially she stared right in my eye the whole time.

She tells stories of my dead Abuelo who passed away when I was a little over two. She speaks to me in sad, solemn, happy but loving voice every time she talks to me about him. “He loved you so much. When I first met him he would come all the way from his hometown a 20 mile walk just to see me. He would put cologne on, get dressed up, and say the most romantic things. He was very athletic, loved to party, was very social, and very well liked. I see so much of him in you.” When she says those final words she looks right at me like I was him and I look back at her and her words almost come to life as I look in her sad but loving eyes and the image of him appears to me. She even sometimes cries and says to me, “Cada dia me recuerdas mas y mas a tu Abuelo. Se pareces y actuas justo como el. El estaria orgulloso de ti. Él le está mirando de cielo.” Translation: “ Every day you remind me more and more of your Grandfather. You look and act just like him. He would be so proud of you. He is watching you from heaven.”

Living back and forth from Mexico and America my Grandma never learned English or to drive. She has always been depended on people to do things for her like she was brought up to do as a child. She isn’t greedy it’s just once she got used to people driving her or talking for her she never really needed to learn. However she knows some words and phrases. When talking to me or some of my cousins or someone who doesn’t speak Spanish she tries speaking English but usually mixes English with Spanish and it turns out weird. She will struggle to say in her heavy english accent, “get your mother por favor.” “Give me the telefono.” Every time someone fails to understand her she puts her head down and walks away. Her fractured English nevertheless doesn’t hold her back from getting free rides everywhere she goes. With a handicap sticker and over 10 people who can drive her around daily she is constantly asking to go places. Whether it’s Target, Wal-Mart, or wherever she will find a way. I remember when I was 14 she asked me, “Paulie puedo conducir a Walgreens.”

“Lo Siento Abuela. No puedo, Soy Catorce. No puedo obtener mi permiso de manejar.”

“Paulie can you drive to Walgreens.”

“No Grandma I can’t, I’m fourteen. I can’t get my Driver’s Liscence.”

I can tell where I got my persisitency from.

My Grandma lost my uncle Alex in 2008 a very hard loss for the whole family. He was one of three sons and one of six children. He was such a great and nice man. Even though he lived a hard life and had some problems he was a great man. He was 58 and it was a young death. He was so lively and had one of the biggest hearts of anyone you could know. He was so funny and could make any one smile. He had so much life. That’s why when he died my grandma took it hard. She told me in her soft voice, “It’s hard losing a parent but ten times harder losing a child. Their someone your supposed to protect and it feels like you failed.” Alex didn’t have the greatest relationship with his kids or my Abuela but she knew he loved her. He tried bringing our troubled family together but he died before he could. After his death instead of being sad and meek she had a smile and said with tears, “ he is in a better place now.” My Abuela took the positives and made herself stronger. Instead of being sad she was nicer to people and appreciated life more. She even became closer with all her children. She knew that was what Alex would want. Bring us together.

She has to do deal with so much in her life. She grew up in her teen years working in a cannery. Having six children, fourteen brothers and sisters and two strict parents she lived in many peoples lives. Getting married and having her first child at 17 she grew up early. She proceeded to move to America in 1945 and ever since live a busy and hard life as a house wife and suffer many loses. She lost her husband in 1996 to a heart attack and as well has lost Three grandchildren and a son. All of her sisters and brothers have past away leaving her one of the last Three. Past the tears, the fighting, and the pain she never lets it affect her. Praying to God every day and continually looking out for those who she still loves even though she could just give up shows a lot about her character. And every day even when it seems all hope is lost she musters up the strength to come up to me and even say in English, “Paulie, I love you.”

One characteristic that my grandma holds that almost everyone in my family holds that dates back to times of the Aztecs and Spaniards is the ability and longevity to hold a grudge. Although not good it is something that our whole family has and look at my grandma for giving to us. For me I don't think she is the one to blame for this attribute. I think that their is something more to it then just something we inherited from her. She is too sweet and kindhearted to really come up with such a strong evil characteristic on her own. Her mother and father were very strict and beat her regularly to keep her in line. However their parents probably did the same to them and so on. Holding a grudge from an early age spread to her children and then on to me. She always feels that its her parents fault she couldn’t get an education and I believe her parents made her feel that way and had the same feelings for their parents. It is something I feel but don’t want to feel but is a a symbol of the pain, hate, and the blame held inside her from, her tough years as a human being.

She may not be the best parent or best grandparent but she does the best job she can. To me shes irreplaceable and to a lot she is as well. She is the head of the family and has many children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren who look up to her. I look to her for everything that why she’s my Abuela.