Write@Home
Winter 2015

Family

Silhouette of a mother kissing his son in a forehead on the sunset summer day.

My mother is a fountain of inspiration for me for many reasons. This is her history. Ana Maria was born in April 1934, in Mexico City, in a modest family. At only 4 years old, her mother left home, and my mother and her sister stayed under the protection of my grandfather.

But my grandfather had to go to the United States to work in the fields picking vegetables and fruit. My mom and her sister stayed with their new stepmother, who not was friendly with both girls.

At age of 10 years old my mother lost her sister who passed away at only 12 years old. After that, my mother could not return to school, and started to work selling flowers and vegetables in a small town in Tlalpan. At 18 years old, she found a job in a pharmaceutical company packing medicines. With time, she saved money to buy a house, and my father and her were married and welcomed 5 kids. But when I was 17 my parents divorced.

My mother worked all the time on a little family farm, and she encouraged her kids to finish their university studies. I am so grateful for my mom, because she is happy all time and she always says, “You can do it!”

It is why I feel so lucky to have an amazing mother, who is a fountain of inspiration to me.