Love, Amalia

Abuelita signaled Amalia to come sit at the mas sive dining room table. Before she sat down, Abuelita put on a CD quietly in the background. Amalia could not remember Abuelita’s home ever without some soft music. On the lace tablecloth there was a stack of Christmas cards, several red and gold leaves, and a box made of beautiful olive wood that Amalia immediately recognized. Her grandmother used that box to save the special cards and letters sent by relatives and close friends. At the bottom there were old letters neatly kept in bundles tied with ribbons. Amalia loved the feel of the old polished wood, the gentle waves that had been stroked so many times before.
“Are you writing your Christmas cards already, Abuelita? It’s not even Thanksgiving!” Amalia was relieved to change the subject. “What are the dry leaves for?” “I like writing my cards slowly,” her grand mother replied as she picked up an unfinished card. “That way I can really think about what I will write on each one. There are so many things I want to say.”
After a moment, almost as if talking to herself, Abuelita added, “I’ve made terrible mistakes in my life when I didn’t think before speaking.”
Amalia looked up, surprised. Abuelita always looked so calm and sure. It was almost impossible to imagine her acting foolishly.
Looking at the half-written card, Abuelita continued, “As I was telling you, one must find ways to keep loved ones close, even if they move away. This year I have decided to send a little bit of my backyard with each card. Every year at this time, my children and I had many good moments getting ready for the holidays. So I have gathered some of this autumn’s leaves to remind them of those times. Look at this one!” and she held a maple leaf that had turned a deep crimson. “See how red it is? One of the things I have always loved about this house is seeing the trees change colors with the seasons.
“The same is true with the things we treasure. They happen, bloom for a time, and then fade away. Then sometimes they may reappear again, or something else will take their place.”
Holding the leaves up one by one, she added, “There is a poem I like very much. The poet says that a dry leaf is not an elegy, a song of death, but rather a prelude, a promise of a distant spring.”
Abuelita almost seemed lost in her own thoughts, but then she returned to Amalia, saying, “Before writing each card, I like to read ones I received from the person to whom I am about to write. This reminds me that I am not the only one who wants to stay close. Do you want to look at some of last year’s cards with me?”
“Sure, Abuelita,” Amalia said, pushing back the lock of hair that kept falling in her face. She always enjoyed listening to her grandmother’s stories, especially stories about their family. The distant relatives, some of whom Amalia could not remember ever meeting, came alive when Abuelita spoke about them. Even things that hap pened a long time ago, like the story of how her grandfather’s parents had come from Mexico to Chicago, became so real when Abuelita told them that Amalia felt as if she had actually been there.
Today she did not feel much like listening, but making an effort to show some enthusiasm for her grandmother’s offer, she added, “You can tell me all about the people who sent them.”
Abuelita began pulling cards out of the box one by one. With each card she had something to say, and although she had spoken about these faraway relatives many times before, it seemed to Amalia that today she was adding special details to every story.
Holding a card with a picture of a lush landscape, Abuelita spoke for a while about her old est son. Amalia’s tío Patricio had fallen in love with a Costa Rican girl he met at the University of Chicago. Soon after they graduated they got married, and because she did not want to live far away from her family, they moved to Costa Rica.
“He was very concerned about leaving me and moving away. However, I reminded him that we, too, had moved away, and sometimes that is necessary,” Abuelita said. “It’s true that I gained a beautiful daughter-in-law and grandchildren, but it has been hard having my eldest child live so far from me. Yet they love each other and have a happy family, and that, Amalita, is one of life’s greatest gifts. See how happy they look in this picture they took as soon as they arrived in Costa Rica.”
It wasn’t easy to imagine Tío Patricio and Tía Graciela as two young people in love when Amalia thought of the pictures her mother had received from them recently. In those pictures Tío Patricio was a balding man and Tía Graciela a rather proper-looking lady, but in the old photo Abuelita held, they were a handsome young couple looking adoringly at each other under a palm tree, almost like a movie poster. Abuelita gently put away the card with a pleased look on her face.
“Someday you must go to Costa Rica, Amalia, and visit them. It is an amazing place.”