Familia

Familia…security, safety, stability, comfort, protection, established, foundational, nucleus. 

My family has been the current pushing my fins forward. They’ve generated the wind lifting my wings higher as I leaped towards adventure, risks and dreams. They’ve been the quiet cornerstone so innate to my world that I never detected or identified how core to my stability and identity they are. I never imagined that dynamic being disrupted or its protection giving way. I was awakened to how fragile life is. How monumental it is to fight for memories, and invested time with our loved ones. This dynamic I naively took for granted because it was always there. But in 2022, I saw my loved ones come close to life altering experiences that could have either left me completely without them.

I finally came to my own thoughts, ideals, values and lifeviews. My dreams were becoming real and I would have to change it all to help support whatever void would have surfaced. While they have never asked me to forsake my dreams, but rather go hard after them, I did not have the character inside of me to leave them. Because of time.

Time is never guaranteed and when it is gone, all we have are memories. I was faced with the thought of being without them, and it was not an option. Pursuing romantic life ventures across the world no longer was an option. To live with the memories I had was not enough. After crying, and grieving, it was an opportunity to create a new compromise where I could pursue my dreams, support my family and live another day to create memories and show them love.

Familia is who we make of it. We’ve heard that not all skinfolk are kinfolk. We’ve been awakened to the understanding that family does not always consist of those in our bloodline. When the plans to leap out into the world towards my own fantasies and adventure were so close that I could taste it, leaving my family behind with health battles would not be something I could live with myself and still find true happiness and peace.

Don’t get me wrong, everyone has different family experiences and there’s not one life-fitting formula of decision making that works for all family dynamics. We must do what’s best for us. We should pursue decisions that leave us without regret and while giving us full peace to also come into our own. Sometimes that takes time and tears. It also takes changing our minds while also navigating back and forth, to and fro.

We can always make money, but we can never have time back. When it is gone, memories are left. 

My mother has been the soft feminine energy with an underlying giant that moves mountains for her family. My father has been truly the soldier in the trenches digging up a way through the rough earth in order to make my path smooth. They fight for me and my sisters even in their feeble bodies. I have never seen anyone apart from Jesus Christ Himself and God the Father, sacrifice so much for my sisters and I.

My sisters are my second mothers. They’ve taught, nurtured, protected, fought and spoken all truths to me. They’ve been my friends, my confidants, my safety and now that I am a grown woman they are the oxygen I need to breathe. I cannot see my life without them. Their voice lets me know I am home and everything is going to be okay. My family has made the way for me through so much. They believe in me and are proud of me. And I am so proud of them. We’ve fought, screamed, disagreed, cried but we’ve always grown, adapted, learned and challenged one another while in the end always coming back together. The universe decided to also add two brothers in love - handsome and with the quiet strength fortifying our unity, locking arms with whatever we’ve needed through words of affirmation, correction, resources and their mere presence. My nieces and nephews bring so much youthful insight, perspective, light and life to me. My babies that I didn’t birth, but have no problem extending the rod of loving correction and safety simultaneously. I wish to be like them when I grow up.

We’ve gained a God brother and sister in Lourdes, Eddie and Veronica Rosario. They’ve seen it all and have showered us so much love, so much support, so much joy, patience and relentless love. We are intentional about family and we’re intentional about time. 

Family should be safety, security, support, growth, vulnerability, comfort, joy, protection, security, foundational, nucleus, and unconditional love. Love is not automatically conditional, but it requires growth and time. Choose yours - physical blood lines or not. Be intentional with time, memories, community and love.

We are the real deal! Not perfect in any way, but real! I always felt that God had favorites, and arrogantly would say it’s the Curet-Bermudez-Stewart-Nava-Rosario family!