Parents; we admire them, at times we fear them - I feared one parent exceedingly more than the other; we delight in our parents, and sometimes we even despise them. Through it all; we always loved them, even when we felt they didn't deserve our love.
My father seemed larger than life to me when I was young; though in real life he was only five foot eight, it felt like he towered over us, his demeanor dominated even more so - its presence always took our attention regardless of what we were doing at the time. He came across like some superhuman being - with powers I clearly didn't understand at the time or probably just suffering from a wild imagination - regardless it felt real to me. Being an ex-Marine had a vast effect on his personality which made him a very strict and demanding father, not in a way of WHAT he wanted us to be in life, but HOW he wanted us to be in life. He hated insubordination to him or my mother - like most soldiers who were regimented, he also hated us to be late for anything; waking up, getting ready for school, eating breakfast, eating lunch, eating supper, taking our baths, homework, cleaning our rooms, coming inside, going to sleep, or going anywhere outside the home. He HATED being late for anything. At the same time apart from his military makeup - he had a surprising and quite endearing quality of being spontaneous at the most inopportune times - coming home and waking us up from a night of deep and satisfying sleep to tell us to get our clothes on and get ready to go to Galveston, or Texas City, or even to our aunt Licha's (her name was Alice, but we never called her by that) house to visit. It was something we never complained about though my mother would beg him at times to be more reasonable. It was one of his attributes I certainly duplicated in my life. But there were other times I just absolutely despised my father - something I just didn't think I could do since I never really hated anyone, much less my parents but this was as close I would get in doing so. And I didn't hate HIM so much, but what he DID - I would be so confused as he developed a Jekyll and Hyde personality that came without warning and we all dreaded it when he transformed. We would be the object of his wrath, us, and our mother, but mostly our mother, and we were helpless when it happened. It was like a bad dream that we were living in real-time and it was one we couldn't wake up from and just has to suffer from seeing our mother suffer or eventually us. But my mother was strong.
My mother was a small woman in stature (five-foot-two), but her identity was strong, pillar-like, immovable, and determined. She was the glue that kept our family together and I'm sure most people reading this would agree that most mothers are the glue that keeps the family together. I don't know how she did it; she had six children - five of us by the time she was twenty-six years old. My mother and father were thirteen years apart when they met; she was eighteen and he was thirty-one. She had her first three children; me, my oldest brother, and my brother after me within less than 24 months of each other. My oldest brother was born in March of 65', myself 10 months later in January, and our third sibling 11 months later in December of that same year in 66'. Afterward, she had her only daughter three years later, then the fourth son another three years later, and the last son six years later. Five boys and one girl, not what my mother wanted since she wanted at least one more girl and that's why she had another two more kids before calling it quits medically since they tied her tubes. By the way, all of our names start with "M", including my father. Her name was Santa - yes that's like the Claus dude but she's real. Her full name was Santa Maria Inez Cruz - then, Santa Maria Inez Cruz Garcia after marrying. Most Mexican children usually take on the mother's maiden name as their middle name so all of us boys have "Cruz" as our middle name. Our sister bucked the tradition having the middle name "Yvette" - and she wanted her second daughter's middle to be Yvonne, but that never transpired. So initially, she wanted the boys to be MCG (Mark, Michael, Martin, Malcolm, and Malachi) and the girls to be MYG, (Melissa Yvette Garcia and Michelle Yvonne Garcia), funny on how and why parents determine how we get named. She seemed ethereal to me, so loving, patient, kind, warm, honorable, forgiving, faithful, honest, and spiritual. There were times she did expose her bad side, but to me, it was always warranted - and she made sure we understood why even when she went berserk the few times she did - like I said, it was always warranted - we were pretty bad at times. She was the one that really taught us about life and how to be a decent person and eventually a decent man. My father did teach us respect, hard work, not to fight, and honesty as well, but she did most of the work by example. If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't be the person I am today.
So you can see, parents have a deep impactful effect on their children, sometimes to our detriment suffering the rest of our lives for it; bad choices, addiction problems, violent, lazy, entitled, ungrateful and at the same time the effect is so powerful we make a determination we NEVER want to be that part of our parents' personality. Other times we see the good in them and hope to aspire to be like them in every virtuous and decent way. My personality is definitely part of both parents, the good and the bad. The bad I've just about stamped out, though at times there are sparks I have to make sure that doesn't become flames ever again. We're always a work in progress, so that goes without saying.
Growing up with 6 children and a father who's an ex-Marine, a keep it all together very spiritual mother who basically had to raise those six kids because my father wasn't there physically or emotionally, except the few times when he had to discipline us - something so traumatizing we'd never forget - and my mother maintaining a fine balance keeping my father happy, all of us occupied, and her sanity intact. Until next time.
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