Abuelita's Little Black Book

The echoes my aunt singing my grandmother’s favorite song ringed in my ears as I prepared to round up the bit of energy I had left to get up and share a few words. Fidgeting with a now unrecognizable little looped libreta, I begin to doubt whether to share this poem with everyone. I am always carrying around a little notepad, you could say I take after my grandmother. I was not planning on saying anything during the burial but the ride over to her final resting place, this familiar warmth came over me and the words just spilled out. Before I knew it, the padre was asking us if anyone else wanted to share their last parting words to Estefana Maria.

“Wait, when did Tia finish her song, mom?” she grabs my hand tightly trying her best to bring me back to reality.

“Mi hija, like ten minutes ago. Your cousins Janice, Jessica, and Joyce all shared some memories with you’re Abuelita while…” before she could finish her sentence, I jumped out of my seat so fast I almost landed on her coffin.

“Hi everyone, before I read this to all of you; fair warning ya’ll know my Spanish sucks when I read out loud.” I clear my throat followed by a deep breath to help me hold back my tears for the next sixty seconds.

Even though your gone, you will always be,

A beautiful life with a heart that has never been closed

The one and only for us, you have become the highest and brightest star of all

A loyalty so strong that no one else compares

An unforgettable woman, her words and laugh fill my soul with happiness and sadness that sometimes the only thing left to do is cry and smile

I love you and I will miss you for all the years I left to live

Continue your next life with ease and ill be waiting for you at the park with a new pair of glasses

Suddenly the vibrations of my final words from the burial are replaced by some raspy toned attorney with freckles a couple of days later.

“Hi Smiley, I know you have been feeling stuck the past couple of years, but I know you will find your place in the world and you will thrive in it no matter what you decide to do. Remember, time doesn’t exist so don’t rush your path Emelia; te amo Smiley.” I feel a quick tap on my shoulder from my uncle Elder.

“Hmmm?” He grabs my letter and my copy of her little black book she had been carrying around since I was a child. She gifted all us grandchildren a copy. She must have wholesaled all of these because there are some fifty of us; honestly even more. He gently places the letter and the book on my lap. I stare at it; bug-eyed. I am petrified to open it because once I do it makes her death even more real and I am just not ready to say goodbye yet. I snatch it off my lap as if I were shoplifting a candy bar from a 7-Eleven, along with a bottle of Flor de Caña out of my uncle Ellis’s hand. I jump over the fence to the park next door and make my way to my favorite structure of the park. I used to climb to the top and just enjoy the wind on my face up there. Now that I am thirty, this climb is not much of a challenge but its still the best place to think things through and get things done.

“Okay Abuelita, just a couple of swigs and we can have a little chat.” In between swigs, I begin to caress the envelope as if it were her cheeks in between my palms. We always said goodbye to one another by putting our foreheads together and holding each other’s faces. We could feel one another’s energy so much that there were no needs for words. It took everything in me to not crumble it up in my hand like a stale cracker from the anger that was beginning to consume me. I am beginning to see two envelopes in my hands so, I climb down and made my way to the bench. The more I stare the more I drink; no longer taking swigs but gulps the size of a 5th grader taking spoonsful of a chocolate flavored super snack pack. I tilted my head up to the moon, with a rum infused tongue begging for just one more droplet out of this bottle. As I was swaying from side to side, I managed to open the envelope. As I am pulling the piece of paper out, I can hear my mother’s voice telling me it is time to head home. As I am lifting myself up off this bench, my mother’s two pieces of Styrofoam rubbing against each other’s voice shatters my ear drums as I see three little slightly blurred words: “Invest in yourself”. These three words were on repeat the car ride home; I could not help but wonder if we all got the same note as I drifted away to a pitch-black cozy view.

The warmth of the sun reflecting through my window slowly begins to wake me up along with the lingering nine-hour aftertaste of rum in my mouth; I could not wait to brush, rinse, floss and scrape my mouth clean. Once I get myself bathed and purified, I make my way to the kitchen. Once I turn the corner into the kitchen, I see my little black book with a note in my mother’s handwriting.

“Love you. See you in couple of hours.” I remove the note from my little black book, I begin to rub my fingers along the spine of the book as if asking for the book’s permission to open it. As I lift the little hardcover to reveal the sacred pages of a warrior woman of ninety-four, I am overwhelmed with peace that its almost as if she were sitting across from me watching me read her poetry and thoughts of her life. Part of me felt as if I were violating her privacy but the other part of me was so full of excitement that I could not stop reading. Once I get to the final page, the excitement jolts out of me and confusion takes its place. On the last page, she wrote in black ink numbers repeatedly and in blue ink she wrote dots and dashes repeatedly too.

“What the hell is this page about?” The more I stare at the dots and dashes; the remaining alcohol in my blood begins to ooze out of me once I realize what this is.

“Holy shit! Its Morse code!” I taught it to her when I was high school when I was considering going into the military; I was a marine for eight years.

-. . -..- - / -.- .. -. / ... -- .. .-.. . -.-- / -.. .- -. -.-. . / --- -. / .. --- -. ...

Translated it says, “Next kin Smiley dance on ions”.

“Okay she wouldn’t write something in Morse code for no reason; these six words mean something.” Suddenly, I got déjà vu of the day she taught me and my cousins how to play scrabble. This has to be an anagram, right? I begin to frantically rearrange the letters on a terribly opened envelope of the water bill. Oh my god! No, she did not?! Abuelita you scrabble freak! I set the pen down and lift the raggedy envelope with a smile a mile wide with a tear on my cheek the size of a snowflake.

“Emily Dickinson Anne Sexton.” These two women are my top two poets of all time. A lightbulb goes off; if we all got copies of her book that means the rest of the cousins could crack this message too. Would they even care to? She was far gone towards the end they might just think that she was out of her mind when she wrote this. Okay Abuelita, what are you trying to tell me by putting Emily Dickinson and Anne sexton in an anagram and in morse code? I began to pace my apartment for what felt like weeks trying to put myself in her mind. I went so far into her mind that I bumped into the fridge and a small shot glass fell off and shattered on my arm. I ran to the sink to run some cold water over my bloody tatted arm. As the blood runs down the drain, I clean my arm off to reveal just a few cuts on my Emily Dickinson tattoo. Wait a second?! What if she hid the numbers of my Emily Dickinson poem tattoos and the years of Anne Sexton poems published in the number collage? I have three tattoos of quotes from these fantastic women on me; lets look for these numbers. I run to my room for a magnifying glass to help me search for them and soon enough I did. She wrote 372, 690 and 1966 in a straight diagonal line so small it almost looked like cursive.

“I’m so close I know it. She used my career then my favorite poets which lead to my tattoos. What if she… holy fuck I know what she is telling me!” I quickly bandage my arm with some gauze, grab my keys and speed off back to my aunt’s house. As I am driving, I remember the day she told us our grandfather sent her a genie lamp with a lotus on it from Nicaragua in 1974. This is also the year of my second favorite poem by sexton was published. This is the only tattoo of poetry I have not gotten a chance to do. She had the lamp since she was kid and when I was eight, she gifted it me to stow away my poems in it. I have a lotus and genie lamp accompanied with the quotes. She hid something for me in the lamp I know it! I parked so fast I am not even sure I took the keys out by the time I got inside the house.

“Tia, I’m going to the attic.” Before she can reply I was already pulling the string to reveal the ladder to the attic. The orange tones of the sunset begin to come through the window reflecting on this rusted gold lamp revealing its location. I drop to my knees and I swear it felt like that lamp weighted a million pounds. As I am rubbing the dust off it, I began to wish she were there as I lifted the cap revealing a small pen wrapped in a rectangular piece of paper. I set the lamp down, unravelling the piece of paper off the pen. My hands begin to tremble as tears pour down my face trickling into the lamp almost as if my tears were bringing it back to life once I saw what she left for me in our lamp.

“Twenty-thousand dollars to invest in myself.” She believed in me this much that she set aside this money for me, me. I bring the check close to my heart, soothing my chest from the impact she is still having on me even from the afterlife.

“Gracias Abuelita.” I say with my eyes shut with one final tear landing on the lamp.

“De nada Smiley.” I know that voice. I could feel this broad-shouldered shadow hover over me with an aroma of lilacs and lavender that replaces the air in my lungs. I open my eyes and suddenly the check is no longer on my chest, the gauze on my left arm is gone; my tattoos are gone; I am no longer a thirty-year-old woman. I am simply an eight-year-old tomboy reaching for her grandmother’s hand.