ABUELITOS

I have an inexplicable love for my grandparents. The two of them after all are the only grandparents I have left, and perhaps that's why I pay so much attention to the way they are.

I take careful note of the way abuelito Calin excitedly offers his daughters an idea or a thought (although it's not always realistic or understandable). And if he has patient listeners, he talks about the old stories of Villa Union. He stands at the edge of his seat, always incorporating very expressive hand movements with his stories...And his face is a story of its own, with wrinkles streaming all over his burnt-brown face that become more accentuated with his little "Ahay!" His bushy variegated eyebrows raise with excitement, and his forehead becomes paved by several horizontal creases, indicating he's done this movement a thousand times before. And when his lips become dry from all the talking, he pauses, licks them quickly, and continues with his juicy conversation.

He's such a small man- time on his shoulders, his skinny body seems like it will collapse with every cautious step he takes. And I can't help but think back to the man he was years- decades- before. Calin. His real name is Carlos, like my dad. Both are a mirror-image of each other when abuelito Calin was my father's age. And I can't imagine my tall, skinny, mustached, balding papi aging into someone like this short, fragile old mustached man.... But they're so alike- my dad and his parents- especially when they talk about agriculture and the people from Villa Union. They could go on forever, I think. Talking about how big the pecan tree abuelita planted has grown; how the peaches were so big and juicy this year; how fulanito (so-and-so) got married to fulanita; how some guy retired and dedicated his life to selling popsicles in the streets...

And then there's abuelita Kika. Who tells stories of the hungaras- Hungarian gypsies that often went to her town. How they read people's palms in exchange for goats and pigs or how it was so thrilling to watch them play with their marionettes. She tells me how one time a hungara inexplicably stole great abuelita Gaby's money from her pocket. She has some more spectacular tales- like when she and tia Rebe found gold in an abandoned house, went back to town for help, and returned shortly but found that there was absolutely no gold in that deep hole. She also told me about the Matas family- Arabs that came from San Luis Potosi- that would do business with a rich man that lived in what later became my mom's family's house.

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I've learned to treasure my grandparents... and there's a part of me that secretly fears the imminent time when they'll be gone. Will I have regrets? I'll miss their stories- which I've learned to value and keep in my memory for as long as I possibly can. They are so ocurrentes- witty. And they are always open for a little gossip, in which abuelita Kika responds "Apooooco!"  and abuelito Calin responds "Achis!"

The more time passes, the more I love them... and that scares me the most. Because some day they'll be gone, and now I know nothing can replace these wonderful grandparents I have.