My Dad and Lucha

My dad was always in love, he embraced life as if everyday may have been the last.  As a lover, friend, comrade I’m sure he made a grand partner but as a husband and father his wild and carefree spirit lacked grounding.

My father, I’m sure felt too much of life deeply and as sentimental as any Mexican novella. My father loved music, he danced, sang, played music and drank with a fervor and passion. What stands out most is Lucha Villas record by the player.  Lucha Villa in a seductive pose, a black blanket covering bare breasts and little else, her sultry dark hair, smoky eyes as if intoxicated from singing her love songs. And this is how I remember my father liking his women.  Half dressed, sultry and ready for a romp.  Children, rent, car repairs, and an eight month pregnant wife did not fit his whims, his need to escape the life in his lap, the daughters begging him to stay.  He couldn’t.  He needed Lucha Villa the way a man needs air to live. And I held on to him in every way until I was dragged and bloody, all but dead, then I let go.

I don’t know when the letting go happened. Perhaps it was the pain of seeing my own children holding on to their own father and holding on to me. And I let go and I was free. I no longer needed to chase Lucha out of their heart, his thoughts. One day I woke up and knew I was done with Lucha, she’d run her course, and I sang her songs of love and heartbreak. I let out a grito and off I went into my sunset, to live finally free of sultry smokey eyes, and bare breasts, and longing for what I thought she had that I didn’t. And wasn’t my love enough.  And when I accepted the flawed parts of my father, my husband, myself, I faced the darkest parts of my soul.  I no longer wanted to be Lucha, I was happy finally to be me.  I knew he missed us when he left us for Lucha and he cursed the day, the loss, more so than we did. And how lonely he felt after the Lucha Villas left and he was all alone in his old age and begging for a meal at our table once again. And we forgave him. And when we forgave we were free.