Puff Pieces by Adrian: Refusing to Break

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Refusing to Break

It was during the week between Christmas and New Year that I found myself at a gas station, dropping some serious coin on fuel. As I was pumping, I leaned back against my car as usual to check out the scene. It was empty, in the middle the afternoon, except for one other person. As I watched the slovenly beast, I looked closer, and noticed that he was not the usual slovenly beast that I’ve been used to. He was middle-aged, maybe close to fifty years old, and very overweight. His shoes were worn badly on the outside edges from years of walking bow-legged, and his jeans and t-shirt were worn out and too tight.

He didn’t seem to notice much of anything going on outside of his personal area. His small pick-up truck was full of lawn mowing equipment, which was a rare sight these days as most of the landscapers around these parts are Latinos. The thing with this guy was that he was alone, and he looked very sad and downtrodden. I couldn’t help feeling bad for him in that moment.

The thing with me is that I have unfortunately been born with a soft heart. It has always been my weakness, but it doesn’t mean that I am weak. Even when I was a kid in school, I often found myself sticking up for the weak when they were being picked on. I have compassion for those that lack the strength and courage to stand up to bullies or to persevere over the hardships that life deals out. On the flip side, I find comfort in watching justice prevail, and watching the bullies, liars, and cheaters of the world receive their sentences from life.

I’m not a complete fool, of course. This man appeared to be sad, and I really knew nothing about him. He appeared to be a nice man, and even though he was cutting lawns and looked to be very poor, the situation in reality could have been the opposite. He could have been rich, and retired, and the lawn cutting was merely something he did to keep busy. Maybe he had been an asshole all of his life, and was indeed a liar and a cheat, and this was life’s karma coming back around to him. I don’t really know, but my tendency to assume that he was a victim of life’s harsh reality always wins the battle in my heart. It is something I know all too well about myself.

Either way, I am proud of this man. He is hanging on to life by a string. He is refusing to break, as am I. That day, we were in it together, even if he didn’t realize it. This economy has been tough, and life is not easy, but we are not giving up. We are working hard. We are both probably better than what we are getting paid to do everyday, but that doesn’t matter, because we keep moving forward no matter what life creates for us. Maybe he will rest in the shade, on a grassy knoll someday, rich with love and happiness. Maybe I will too. I hope so. I hope we all do, except for the assholes, of course.

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Revolution of the Soul. A Mission Statement.

I am by default, and through no fault of my own, different. I’m not out cruising the boulevard on the weekends, blasting oldies-but-goodies with the homies. I am also not listening to rock en Espanol, speaking in Spanish-only with my friends. I could fit into either stereotype perfectly though, and to an outsider, I probably appear to be from either or both worlds. I have brown skin, which is pretty much all it takes. It’s not that simple though, as others like me surely understand. I speak some Spanish but I also speak perfect English. I went to college. I love hamburgers and fries, and hip-hop, and alternative music. I have simply integrated into American culture from the start, because I was born here, and because I wanted to.

I’m glad that I’m not still stuck in Mexico somewhere, growing up a third world existence, which statistically would have been the case, had my familia never come here. But I am glad to have come from a country and peoples with such a rich and vibrant history. There are many reasons having such a heritage is a good thing, and I am proud to be a part of it. I am glad to have been born here in America, and happy to be part of this system. I’m happier yet that I didn’t grow up as a cholo gang-banging, tagger, too-cool-for school type of guy, even though I’ve had plenty of chances, given my surroundings. That subculture is not all bad either, depending on the level of involvement and the choices one makes. In other words, you can look the part without being a thug, or a social, or immigrant, or anything else, que no? This is true of all life.

So even though I am different, I am by no means alone, and I know this. The problem for me is that I’m not seeing enough representation out there in the media. I’m not seeing a lot of works written, or filmed, for people like me. It annoys me, too, for a lot of political reasons, because our image is grossly misrepresented. Sure the gangbanger cholos are fun to include in film, because violence sells. However, that only perpetuates a false image. These days, it seems as though everyone in this country sees us either as cholos or as immigrants that refuse to assimilate, legal or not. This angers me because we are so many different things including a multitude of diversity within our own subculture. It’s pretty frickin’ beautiful, if everyone only knew…

Either way, I decided to make the changes I wanted to see, on my own. I’m writing stories for me, for you, and for everyone else, and my main characters are all Latino, and not just Mexican-Latino either. My stories are not about quinceaneras or growing up as a pocho in high school. They are not about crossing the border, or starting any revolutions. The only revolution I write about is the Revolution of the Soul. My stories are meant to entertain and inspire people, and hopefully many of you will relate to them in one way or another, and see yourselves there in them, wherever that may be.