A friend of social networks told me (via chat) that life of each man can be an exciting novel. “In fact, he added, the story of each of us is a potential bestseller. Each one has the germ of the great universal story; that made me think. I have said again and again that there are millions of good stories that remain untold (the air is full of memories / which will not be narrated ever-I recently wrote in a poem). The thing is in finding the chronicler. I answered my friend: everyone can be a best-seller, but not everyone can write it down. ” Overwhelming answer” he replie d, and we kept talking about other things. But, by these days I have returned again and again to the subject and have come to the conclusion that the story of my family, particularly my father’s family story, deserves a book. Maybe there are much more interesting stories, but I assure you that the one of my father does not lack of crowd puller and adventures. You may judge by yourselves: my grandmother was only fourteen when she got pregnant, it was a scandal considering she was a girl of respectable family, there was no way to get her out the name of the father, my grandmother shut up and all she did was crying, my great-grandfather locked her up in a room of the house until she had the child, my dad, at the time of registering him, she insisted on giving him a name that did not exist (or exists, obviously) in the calendar of saints´ days: Nórido, nobody knows where she got that name, nor it was not way to dissuade her, they wanted to take the baby away of her, give him to an orphanage, but she defended him with all her might , she became ill with tuberculosis, had to be admitted in a sanatorium, no one wanted to take care of the bastard; finally she left him in an asylum of a church in Camaguey, she died of consumption when my dad was only eight … And there the odyssey of my father begins.
Don’t you think a good novel can be made with all that? Moreover, everything could be a large fabulation: who was the father of my father ? What if he was a powerful man? What does this strange name: Nórido mean? Is it an acronym? Is it a message? Although, now I think there is not need to weave tales. The stories of my father in the asylum have everything: adventure, deep drama, pure tragedy (the day my grandmother died, my father was allowed to do whatever he wanted, before going to bed, a priest told the boy: do you know why I did not scold you in all day? because your mother is no longer among the living. My dad said he will never felt again so much pain in his life), also mischief, romantic dalliances (my dad fell in love with a girl who daily walked in front of the asylum, with feather hat and a governess, pure outdated picture of the Belle Époque), and heartbreaking moments of melodrama, such that farewell of my grandmother at the door of the asylum: “I will return for you, Nórido, my child. I’m going to heal myself and we will live together forever … “she left walking slowly, with tears in her eyes, without strength to look back, while my father fell down by despair behind the closed door. I tell you: more than one of you will cry, as I did every time my dad told me those stories. Like any good novel, it also had a villain. And we must not invent it: it was my great grandfather, who, according to my father, was the most despicable man he ever knew. He was miser, inveterate gambler, womanizer, liar, cynical, ungrateful, manipulative … and very good looking, as expected. I’m getting excited; soon I will tell you some stories of this man that will seem incredible to you. It’s decided! From time to time I will use this column to start building that network. I hope you not to get bored …
