I Fell Asleep Smiling

9 days
only
"number 9, number 9" (cheers to you if you can tell me the song reference)
i can't really believe it
only 3 more days of class
& then tests
& then an airplane
& then home
i don't know how to take that
these ending moments are all i've been waiting for this semester
now they are upon me asking me "what do you think Cyndi?"
i think i am ready to go home
i think i like seeing Christmas trees in cafes in Spain
i think i liked watching "the karate kid" in spanish today
i think i just fell in love with the chocolate fudge cookies here at Pan's Cafe
i think this all leading towards an ending beautiful
also?
i have learned something wonderful about my senora
last night she told me the story, her story
& now i will tell you...


until 2 years ago she lived in a tiny apartment with her 4 kids in what we would consider the ghetto
she & her husband are seperated, he hasn't seen her or his children in 10 years
while living in this delapidated apartment
she was caring for a sick woman
when that woman passed away, god rest her, her (the sick woman) husband's health also started failing
so my senora, needing the extra money, started caring for him instead
soon she stopped taking money for her work, claiming it just wasn't right
she cared for him while his children, 6 hrs away, never bothered with him
he passed away, god rest him, within a year or so of his wife
my senora cared for him as if he were her family
she stayed by him while his family left him out in the cold
he came to see her & her children as his true family
so when he died
in his will
he left her & her 4 kids the huge house he was living in
the one i am now living in
and?
$700, 000
my senora tells me this over evening pizza
her words, spanish, settling in like the warmest of blankets all around my soul
i went to bed last night
blessed with her new found confidence in me
blessed to have been cared for all this time by a woman who feels it her calling in life to care for those who need it
blessed to be living within the walls of a house that once belonged to a perpetually kind man
who's sweet presence i felt for the first time last night
comforted
welcomed
warmed
fed
loved
i fell asleep smiling
thinking of this man's kindness
of my spanish family's huge hearts
of my senora, whose sleeping breaths i could here through the wall, & all she is to me
her eyes tell me everything about her
four words especially stream from her gaze
wisdom, grace, tiredness, loneliness
she is all of these things
i feel love within my spanish home for the first time
i will soak myself in it
until i leave this place for a different kind of love
i will take this story of hope & spread it all around me
so we can remind ourselves we are all here & living & breathing & present

"i am he as you he as you are me and we are all together"

& now?
i return to my spanish home that lets me fall asleep smiling