Dear Cali Chica:

Basically, no matter what, you are unlucky, this is your fate. Nothing you can do about it. I suppose you have a touch of luck, it being that your skin and eyes are of a lighter color, but a touch of luck can carry you only so far, not far at all.

Oh, how great other people’s lives are, the lucky ones, something you can never have.. and yet, your father says, “no matter what, we have to work hard.. to our potential and talent”, so you work hard, “make sure to always (work hard)”, spinning your wheels in place, on the same old unlucky place.

In other words, no matter what you do, sitting in Paris, touring South Africa.. no matter the trip to Peru and other places years ago, no matter the prestigious title of Doctor in front of your father’s name, and your own, and your husband.. nothing matters, it is always other people who are lucky, who have the good lives.

All you can do is be happy for them, oh how wonderful for them to have something I can never have.

And it is not that you came to this conclusion by yourself, based on your  own life experience over time. She handed this experience to you as you sat there with her, “wide eyes and intensely listening”.

Young Cali Chica is “sitting at home in despair, looking out the window- hoping and dreaming and wishing- oh if only! if only I could be so lucky”-

– what would happen then, little Cali Chica, what would life be if you were lucky, tell me?

anita