8-10 Pg Paper on Self Development Analysis

My Family Origin Wilfredo Perez

As I think about how to approach this paper, I draw a blank. A week or so goes by and I have yet to hand in this assignment. “Why?”, I ask myself. The more I think about it the more I feel guilty or isolated. As a young child I was always the quiet one that sat down and stayed out of everyone else’s way. In my house, the adults spoke and the children were not to speak or be in the same room. The times when I did open my mouth, I was often told to shut up, that I didn’t know anything, or that I was just a kid. Time went by and I learned to keep many thoughts and feelings inside my head.

Sad to say, although I lived with my family until I was about sixteen, I never really knew too much about them. It was about a year ago when I went to my family physician and I realized I didn’t know my family health history that I started to wonder. Sure enough, high cholesterol, diabetes and heart problems are common in my family.

My sister, the youngest of us three siblings, knows more about our family because she was always around my mother and heard and saw more than I ever have. I looked to my sister for more information on my family and to finish this paper. I called up in her New Jersey home and she got pretty excited.

The roots of my family- I’m thirty-four years old and know that I’m Puerto Rican. However, my sister gave me more detailed information. My great-grandmother came to Puerto Rico from France, where she married my great-grand father, who was half Spaniard and half native Puerto Rican. That would make my grandmother half French a quarter Puerto Rican and a quarter Spaniard. My grandmother then married my grand father who was one hundred percent Puerto Rican, making my mother three quarters Puerto Rican and a little of this and a little of that. My mother married my father who too was one hundred percent Puerto Rican. So I guess my little pinky on my foot has a bit of French in it.

Strength-What my family relies on to get them through hard times- My sister jokingly replied “food stamps” to this question as we both laugh over the phone. The truth is that there is some truth behind that joke. Unfortunately, the very thing I’m trying to change in my life, seems to be my family’s modus operandi. My family deals with most of their issues with things found outside ourselves, such as shopping. As a child, waiting for my mother’s monthly check was like waiting for our birthdays to arrive. At this time of month we looked forward to food and clothes.

To this day, my sister and brother are both very successful in the “world of man.” My sister spends money as if she was going to die tomorrow with the attitude that the more expensive something is, the better it must be. She constantly shows love to others through gifts, the bigger the gift the more the love. My brother doesn’t fall to far behind, taking vacation after vacation with his wife and six kids, and having recently sold his first house and moved into a more affluent neighborhood. This is a reflection of how we as kids were brought up, always trying to keep up with the Jones’. We didn’t practice any religion at home, and mostly used God’s name in vain. We went to church three times a year, Christmas, Easter and maybe Thanksgiving.

Challenges- what did my family have to overcome for us to be here- My mother never really learned to speak English. My sister believes that my mom was teased and made fun of, and that caused her to stop learning and using the English language. One incident in particular will always stick out as a significant challenge pertaining to language and my family.

I remember when I was in the ninth grade, my mother was called in to school for my behavior (again). The principle kept asking my mother questions, and my mother either answered “yes” or “no.” Finally, the principle looked at the security guard who was in the office with us and stated, “they come over here, and refuse to learn our language, but if I say Goya or Budweiser, they understand that.” I quickly jumped up and looked at my mother. I told her to sign the papers on the principal’s desk giving them permission to transfer me to another school. I wanted out right away

My mother calmly looked at me and refused to sign. Later that evening at home, I over heard my mother talk to a friend of hers, and explaining what had happened. It broke my heart. I thought that my mother was calm because she did not understand, but she did understand every word the man said. She did what she felt she had to do so I could stay in a good school. This was only a small fraction of the racism and discrimination that my family had to go through in order for us to have what we have now, knowledge and freedom of choice.

Legacy-what is a family story that has survived through generations-My sister was kind of surprised that I couldn’t think of a family story that has been passed down. As I stated before, though, I was out of everyone’s way and to myself for most of my upbringing. My sister told me that my mother always told one story in particular about my grandmother who used to whistle when she snored. Although I don’t remember, my sister says that at holidays or birthday parties my mom would always tell this story.

One day my grandmother was laying on the sofa and fell asleep with her balcony doors wide open. She lived on the second floor of a building. There were a bunch of guys hanging out outside of the building, and they heard what appeared to be a whistle. The guys heard this over and over and they actually thought someone was flirting with them and playing around with their heads. Finally, one guy got up the nerve to climb the balcony to see who was whistling. To my grandmother’s surprise she awoke to a young man climbing inside her balcony. She started to scream and the young man got scared and started to scream too. It turns out that she apparently knew the young man and after they stopped screaming, they both started to laugh. I’m not sure why this story is funny nor why it is told over and over again. If you ask me they should stop telling it. My poor grandmother probably turns over in her grave every time it’s told.

Thirty-four years after my birth, I sit and wonder about my family. For many years I tried to avoid them, but I can’t they are a part of me whether I like it or not. In some shape or form, the way I was shaped and formed helps me to help other people. I see isolation in the people I try to talk to. I see loneliness and I see myself as a child when I hear someone tell their story. Although my family depended on things outside of themselves to cope with life, there is always love present. Love in the way two different ethnicities came together. Love in the struggles that my family had to go through in order for me and my brother and sisters to be successful in life. Love behind the corny stories that are told time after time at the dinner table. It is through the love of my family, that I can extend my love to another individual so they too can feel love and overcome whatever it is that they need to over come. Whatever the core of the issue, love must be the practice, and I thank my family for practicing love with me.