Tag Archives: Inspiration

How We Met — Hats Off

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Many of you asked how I met each person I have interviewed for Another Door Opens, so this How We Met series is an answer to how I met the first 10 generous Another Door Opens people. Thank you for reading. Here is today’s short story.

Hats Off

It was mid-summer in the Windy City, and the urban heatwave was blanketing Chicago.

I wanted to find another door. But which one?

I decided to see where the sidewalk would take me.

Back in time and offtrack is where it took me. Or so I thought.

The plain but smart storefront of Goorin Bros hat shop had caught my attention many times and caused me to swerve a time or two, yet I don’t have a good reason for not stopping in sooner.

Inside, the big band music, ornate carpets, an aged chandelier and the caramel colored kaleidoscope of timeless hats was intoxicating.

Tanya Jaramilla, the shopkeeper,  greeted me with a bright easy smile and confirmed for me the surroundings were intended to evoke a sense of nostalgia for decades past.

Tanya answered every one of my hat-related and shop-related questions with enthusiasm, knowledge and ease.  As she gave me her business card, I asked her about talking with me for the next Another Door Opens story. She agreed.

One hour later, when Tanya’s colleague came in, I returned. We sat down on the old-fashioned sofa, and the conversation began. Thank you, Tanya.

How We Met — Where Is Home

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Readers! I’m going to take a walk back and share with you how I met the first 10 people of the Another Door Opens project. I’ll begin with the most recent and work my way back to the first. 

Where is Home?

Anita Ong and I took Mandarin Chinese language classes together. At 6:30pm on Tuesday nights, we’d meet in a nondescript tiny classroom in Chicago’s Chinatown. Usually I’d speed from work through southbound traffic, past many Chinese restaurants and beyond commercial glass doors to a class that consisted of one teacher and two students: Anita and me. Our mutual friend, Z.J. Tong, founder of the Chicago Chinese Cultural Institute, had placed us in this class together, a chance for small-group adult language learning. Although we learned a bit about each other through our structured Mandarin dialogue, I knew only small pieces about Anita’s background.

Schedules and geography changed, and our class disbanded. More than one year later, while having lunch with Z.J. at Chi Cafe, one of my favorite spots in Chinatown, he told me about Anita’s citizenship and how until that time, she’d been stateless. With Z.J.’s encouragement, I reached out to Anita by email, and we met for lunch about a week later at the very same restaurant.  We talked about the possibility of doing an interview so Anita could share her unique situation in the form of an Another Door Opens story.

She told me after some thought that she would do it. She told me she does at least one thing each year that requires extra courage on her part, something that scares her a little or a lot, and that puts her outside her comfort zone. And so we met again. And she shared her story. Congratulations, Anita! And thank you.

Where is Home?

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Even the most independent person craves a sense of belonging — within a family, a workplace, a community. It’s part of the human experience.

Seated over a cup of hot coffee in a cafe on Chicago’s south side, 56 year-old Anita Ong is thinking about country.

“I was born in the Philippines,” she says. “My parents were from China.”

She pauses.

“So! I am in between.”

Her words carry a bright tone, but her facial expression reveals resignation.  She is taking me through the past, as though we are there.

“In between” because even though Anita was born in the Philippines, she doesn’t have birthright citizenship there. Instead, citizenship follows that of one’s parents.

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In the late 1940’s, around the time Mao Zedong’s Communist Party was declaring victory over the Nationalists, Anita’s parents left China — her father first, then her mother.

“My father went to the Philippines because life was really difficult in his home town — a small rural area. And my grandparents were really poor.”

Anita is the seventh of nine children, all of whom were born in the Philippines. Along with her siblings, young Anita grew up in Laguna and Manila and attended Chinese school.

She had to be linguistically nimble.

“In the morning, we studied English lessons, and in the afternoon, we studied a combination of Mandarin and Fukienese (both Chinese dialects). At home, we spoke Tagalog (the official language of the Philippines) and a little Fukienese.”

To say she was a girl without a country is not far off…

I try to think of the long-term implications of this arrangement. How does one travel without a passport from your home country? How does one answer the question of nationality? What of the question of voting some day?

School of Life

Anita shares accomplishments with humility and brevity.

“In the Philippines, I ended up in medical school. I finished, and I did my residency in pathology.”

Upon completion, rather than a license and a medical practice, Anita received some bitter medicine. Suddenly, her career path appeared to be a dead end. Or perhaps, an “in between” space. Since Anita was not a citizen of the Philippines, she could not practice medicine there.

“It was very frustrating, because when I was doing my residency, my teachers told me that I was a GOOD pathologist.” Anita hints that this was a new kind of praise, a new-found and certain aptitude.

Beyond the issues of personal identity and pride, there was a financial question that accompanied the news: How would Anita earn a sufficient living? While staying with her parents, Anita remembers thinking, “there should be something better for me than this.”

Her mother agreed and encouraged her to go to the United States.

“I had been living a very sheltered life.” Anita spoke softly now. “What would I do in the U.S.?”

Her sister was living in California, but apart from her, she didn’t know anyone.  “I would be on my own,” she reflects. “It’s sort of scary.”

USA 

Anita boarded a plane bound for Los Angeles, traveling on a Taiwanese passport.

“If a person like me does not have a passport, you can choose either a PRC (People’s Republic of China) passport or ROC (Republic of China), which is a Taiwan passport.”

Anita has never lived in either mainland China or Taiwan.

She landed in California and visited her sister in Redlands for a few weeks. She remembers those first impressions with vivid detail. “There were a lot of citrus trees. I could smell the orange blossoms, and that was wonderful. I thought it was a beautiful place.

“Everything in America seemed to be bigger, grander and brighter.”

Weeks later, she made her way to the Midwest, specifically, the University of Illinois in Chicago. There, she would repeat her residency in pathology and add two sub-specialties.

“I realized I can survive.”

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Despite cold urban commutes through dark Chicago winters, Anita felt at home — both in Chicago and in her area of medicine.

“I like details. I obsess with details!” she laughs. “Pathology has a lot of details.”

And in pathology, there is less patient contact, which also suits Anita.

“I like dealing with people sometimes, but sometimes I get shy. And sometimes, it’s a little overwhelming.

“Generally, we are in the background,” she says of herself and her fellow pathologists.

Intermingled with mention of microscopes and objective lenses, Anita says, “We have specimens. They don’t have faces, so in a way, it’s easier.”

Anita wanted to do this kind of work for many years to come.  She wanted to practice medicine in the United States.

Her superiors wanted that too.

Working visa.

Green card.

Employment.

Home.

Sort of.

 July 3, 2013

“Will it sound bad to say that I wanted to be a citizen of a country?” Anita asks me. “I wanted to be a citizen.

“Life has been GOOD to me here.”

Anita was working at the hospital when a woman called from a government office: Anita was going to be sworn in as a United States citizen on July 3, 2013.

“They usually don’t call people, but this was such short notice.” Anita is speaking faster. “She left a message on my cellphone and on my home, so it was like listening to the good news TWICE!” She is laughing now. “Actually, I listened to it a number of times!”

On July 3, Anita went to work, then left for the ceremony at around lunchtime. “I was so excited! So restless!”

In an ordinary room set up with rows of chairs, Anita estimated there were about 60 people, from about 30 countries. They recited the Pledge of Allegiance. Mayor Rahm Emanuel spoke.

“Then there’s a portion of the program where they call the country.”  People from that country are to stand at that time.

“And I was thinking, ‘Should I stand up for the Philippines? Should I stand up for China? Should I stand up for Taiwan? I should stand up for Taiwan, but then, would they have a slot for Taiwan?’

“They did,” she smiles. “So I stood up for Taiwan.”

As soon as Anita’s ceremony was complete and she was a U.S. citizen, she left the room and encountered a man distributing voting forms.

“The FIRST thing I did as an American citizen was register to vote!” Anita can’t contain her excitement. She has never been able to vote in her 56 years of life. “I can have the EXPERIENCE of voting. It makes me feel like I’m doing something MEANINGFUL. It is a privilege!“

Then she looks at me deviously.

“Do you want to know what my SECOND thing was?”

Yes.

“I went to McDonald’s! My second act as an American citizen was to eat a burger!” she laughs. “I didn’t get fries though. I was feeling guilty.”

She went back to work that day as a citizen of the United States. “I was showing off my certificate, and some of my friends called me.

“I was so happy! Really. I was very happy. And now, when I think of it, I can’t help but smile!”

A friend asked Anita what she wanted to do to celebrate. Nothing much. She doesn’t like crowds. They talked playfully about eating hot dogs and burgers, watching the fireworks and buying red, white and blue carnations.

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July 4, 2013

Instead, they decided to get together for a low-key movie-watching afternoon at Anita’s friend’s apartment.

“He said he needed to stop at the laundry room,” says Anita. “So we went down this corridor, and suddenly there were these people saying ‘surprise’! They were cheering!

“I was just so surprised and speechless for I don’t know, a few minutes, I was just standing there and laughing. I felt like I wanted to cry and laugh.

“It was such a heart-warming gesture. It was such a happy…” Her voice trails off and she wipes her eyes.

“There are so many people who care for me….”

Anita received symbolic gifts from her friends that day — a flag brooch, a necklace with a heart-shaped locket bearing red and blue stones, a shawl that is an American flag.

She also received a copy of the Constitution of the United States.

“One guest made copies of the Declaration of Independence and distributed them so everybody could read a portion of the document and discuss,” says Anita.

“I read the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence.”

“When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary…”

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Hats Off

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When I stepped inside Goorin Bros. Hat Shop in Chicago, there were hats on every table and every shelf — fedoras and flatcaps, baseball and bowlers. There, I met Tanya Jaramilla, and not unlike the establishment itself, she wears many hats: shopkeeper, wife, sister, student.

“I’ll be the first person in the whole family to graduate from college.”

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Tanya is 32 years old and approximately one year away from earning a Bachelor’s degree in Management and Communications from DePaul University.

Tanya’s grandparents came to the Windy City in the 1950’s from Puerto Rico on the promise of steady factory work.

“For my family, it was a BIG deal to finish high school.

“For me, I always wanted bigger and better and more.”

Tanya was certain she would go to college.

“I just didn’t know when or how or what that would look like. It’s really, really, really important that I get my degree and graduate — do the whole shebang!”

If you’re doing the math, you already guessed there was a detour after high school that Tanya will tell you was worth every minute and helped her become the person she is today.

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“I have no regrets, because if I hadn’t lived the life I already lived, I wouldn’t be living the life I have now. I run this fantastic little hat shop. The people that work for me are great, and the people that come and shop here are great. I’m doing school the way I wanted to do it, which is with all my focus and energy and attention.”

Straight out of high school, Tanya worked part-time at a Gap store and was soon promoted to a full-time manager position. What had been a balancing act between work and college tipped. “I did that for a really long time. And school just kind of fell to the back burner.”

Simultaneously, Tanya was in a long-term relationship.  About seven years later, and in a cloud of mistrust, Tanya’s relationship ended in a break-up that became a total life shake-up. She changed her job, her home, her city.

“I left and went to Vegas to live for a few months with my grandma, and that was one of the best experiences I ever had. I was able to connect with her on a level that I’d never done before.  We talked about her life, and I learned stories about her struggle.

“It really affirmed for me the decision that I had made to move on and change and do something that was right for me. So when it was time for me to come back to Chicago, I came back with a cleansed soul. I felt like a new me. I felt like the me that I was trying to get to for the last six or seven years, and it just never happened because I kept letting my comfort get in the way of it.”

Tanya says she wanted to do something important. Something that makes a difference. Something she could be passionate about. She found it in a non-profit organization called the Puerto Rican Arts Alliance.

“It was a little surreal at the beginning because I was so used to having to struggle. And having to overcome something.

“I started digging in. I started really working with the organization in the community.”

And she realized something.

“This is what I was supposed to do, you know? It was meant to be. I was meant to get to know these young people who have all of these aspirations but no real support or access to resources. I was able to provide that for them in ways that they never had before.”

Tanya remembers an inquisitive little girl named Susie. “She made me feel like I … showed her that you don’t have to succumb to the neighborhood that you’re from. You don’t have to fall into the traps that the community around you sets for you.

“That’s something I try to instill in my little sisters. They are young moms, and it’s a conversation that I’ve had with them over and over. You don’t have to settle.

“I was settling for a really long time.” She thinks back to that old relationship. “Once I finally broke free of that, it was really important for me to make sure they understood that their lot in life doesn’t necessarily have to be that. They can work harder, they can be better, they can do more, if they want to.

“I grew as a person from my relationship experiences, but also as a woman.”

Tanya says in her relationship, she had become someone other than who she wanted to be. “In order to fulfill someone else’s happiness, I was turning a blind eye. I was in denial. The biggest challenge for me: being honest with myself.

“Another thing I taught my sisters was that people will only do to you what you allow them to.

“If I continue to let someone treat me terribly, they’re going to keep treating me terribly. Because I’m not putting a stop to it. And I’m not ending it. It gives them the message that that’s ok. And it’s not ok.

When Tanya was 27, that year was filled with introspection.  “I did a lot of digging into myself and thinking and feeling.

“It wasn’t easy. I don’t think those moments in life ever are. But I think it paved the way for me to be the person I am today. I feel like I am much stronger. I’m more confident. I have a better view of what my future’s going to be like.”

A future that includes her new husband Sonny Jaramilla. They were married just last month.

“When I found him, I realized that all of the things that I had worked through and I had lived through … that was preparation for me to get my mind right and my head right and my heart right and my soul right, so that when he came along, I was ready.”

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It was Sonny who reminded Tanya of her dream of graduating from college. “He gave me the kick in the butt.

“He is the one who encouraged me to leave the non-profit so that I could focus on school without having to try and juggle the two.”

Tanya is not abandoning her mission of making an impact on the community. She’s investing in it through education. And going forward, she plans to find ways to give young people who are from low income neighborhoods opportunities to engage in the arts.

“I’m very urban. I’ve lived in Chicago pretty much my whole life. And I know the challenges that urban life can bring.  But I also feel like there’s some opportunity and some beauty in that.

“Everyone cannot live in Lakeview, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still enjoy the neighborhood and the community that you’re in. It should still be safe, and it should still be beautiful, and it should still be full of life and creativity!”

And that is where Tanya says her future will find her.

But first, she will keep working toward the day when she dons the style-impaired mortarboard and turns the tassel from right to left.

After that, Tanya will be wearing a proud new custom hat, in a style all her own.

Saddle Up and Ride

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Michael Dean Williams shot out the windows on a row of empty parked cars. It was not his usual behavior. He was very angry at the world.

He wanted to be a police officer.  That was his dream. In the late 1980’s, at a police academy in Huntington Beach, California, Michael Dean was a cadet with a lot of promise.

Plus, he’d spent his entire childhood wide-eyed to his Dad’s exciting, dangerous, adrenaline-rich career in Los Angeles County law enforcement. He wanted to be like his Dad.

There was no backup plan. That was all he wanted. He only needed to pass the medical exam.  But the results of the exam shattered that dream: diabetes.

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It wasn’t new information. Michael Dean was 10 years old when he was diagnosed.

“My Mom had me checked, and next thing you know, you’re a diabetic, and you’ve got all these people around you. They’ve got oranges. They’re shoving needles in them trying to show you how to take a shot. And you’ve got my Dad, a 300-pound mountain man, laying on me while they’re trying to shove needles in my legs.”

Since that day, Michael Dean has had a pancreas and kidney transplant, triple bypass heart surgery and has lost the sight in his right eye. He takes anti-rejection medication, monitors his blood sugar and takes necessary insulin shots. He’ll tell you this is just stuff he’s had to deal with. It is not who he is.

“I’ve lived so much life around the medical stuff. I refuse to let it define who I am. I am a strong guy, and I am strong-minded, whether I’m crying inside or not.

“Most people say ‘I have diabetes’ and diabetes is technically a disease. IIIIIIIIIIIII, Michael Dean Williams, don’t have a disease.” (Yes, the “I” was elongated by Michael Dean for emphasis). “I’ve got some issues I’ve gotta deal with, no doubt. But I don’t have no disease! I don’t want that shit! Keep it away from me!”

He self-medicates with a lot of laughter and a super-sized focus on having much more fun than anyone else.

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He is 47. He is 100 percent original and 200 percent heart and soul. Instead of law enforcement work, he has made a successful career in sales over the years, usually working more than one job at a time. Right now, one of his primary interests is a new product called Green Fuel Tabs.

Open a door to portions of the past and you’ll see Michael Dean in a Harley blur with the 101 freeway whipping by at over 100 mph. You’ll see him hanging out with bikers in motorcycle gangs and with cowboys at rodeos. You’ll see him cruising in old hot rods like his 1949 Lincoln with a big block engine (454), or wearing a sharp black cowboy hat and politely scooping up a pretty girl to dance the two-step. You’ll never see him drink a drop of alcohol or take illegal drugs. Never has. Never will. You’ll see some bonafide fist fights and times when he stepped in to defend a friend or family member or to protect someone from harm.  And you’ll see that short chapter when he shot out the aforementioned car windows. Michael Dean is not proud of some of the rough stuff back then. But it’s part of him, and he owns it and moves on.

As much time as he has spent being tough, he doesn’t hesitate to show love.

Today, notice the lights in his eyes as his six year old daughter Bailee shows him the frogs she just caught in the yard, and you see the proudest, most loving papa.

“The greatest day of my life was the day she was born. No doubt. And every day after…”

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Bailee Williams and Morgan Boyd

See him interact with one of his three best buddies, Brian Boyd, and you understand that friendship is kinship. They’ve known each other for about 30 years and they are brothers, blood or not. There is total loyalty in friendship, in brotherhood, in their business partnership at Green Fuel Tabs, and in life.

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Michael Dean Williams and Brian Boyd

And regardless of the distance that sometimes happens between brothers in families, when Michael Dean calls his brother Dusty on the phone in a crisis, it’s because he loves him. When he talks about his brother Mitchell, it’s because he loves him. When he struggles to keep his composure as he shares the message his sister Megan wrote on his Facebook page, it’s because he loves her. When he speaks in gentle tones with superlative words about his Mom, it’s because he loves her. When he talks about his Dad as his hero, it’s because he loves him.

“I’m not a china doll”

Thinking back to his diagnosis at age 10, he’ll tell you he learned ‘really quick’ that if he said he was alright, everyone else seemed to exhale. “So rather than learning about the disease and really handling it and conquering it, I was like ‘No, I’m good! All my tests are good!’

“I’d take my shot in the morning, and I’d go about my way.” He knows now he might have benefited by monitoring his blood sugar and taking insulin more often back then.

There are medical and emotional pieces to dealing with diabetes, and then there is the sometimes frustrating dynamic that happens around a diabetic, however well-meaning.

More than feeling really lousy sometimes… And more than feeling guilty for his chocolate cake intake… And more than the recovery from so many operations… Michael Dean can’t stand when people treat him like he is different or delicate.

“Get me out of the glass case! I am not a china doll. I am a badass!” he laughs. But he means it.

“A kid that shoves heroin or smokes dope or whatever — that was their choice. It was not  my choice to be a diabetic, and I didn’t do anything to get it. We just have to deal with it. So don’t make me be the pink elephant in the room. I’m not.

“And when you’re sitting at a restaurant, and the waitress asks if you want dessert, don’t scream at the lady ‘Oh, no! He’s diabetic!'”

He whispers: “‘Chill out.’ I know it’s all from massive incredible love, but ‘chill out’.” He breaks into laughter.

He is a stoic pillar of strength and positivity. He says he has to be that way.

“If I sit around and think about the diabetes, and what’s happened to me, and the kidney and pancreas transplant, and some day the kidney is probably gonna fail like the pancreas did, and am I going to wake up tomorrow blind and not see my daughter…You’d be a wreck! How are you gonna live that way?

“I’ve quit several times. I have called Brian and said ‘I’m done with it, man.’ Those were the longest three or five minutes of my life. “Then my own brain says ‘you’re not a quitter. Cowboy up. What’s wrong with you?'”

Cowboy Up

Michael Dean loves American Graffiti and definitely sees himself as a throwback from that 1950’s era. But if that makes him a city boy, he’s equal parts country. When he and Bailee drive around the property in the pickup truck, they listen to George Strait or Zac Brown Band, Vince Gill or Conway Twitty.

One of Michael Dean’s favorite actors is John Wayne, and as he sees it, the man John Wayne is on the big screen is the way men ought to be.

Michael Dean lives by the John Wayne motto: “Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway.”

He does it every day.

He did it the night he drove himself to the hospital many years ago because the call came saying that it was time: the donor pancreas and kidney were ready. He arrived to about 30 loved ones waiting for him at the hospital. “I pulled up, and they said ‘Where have you been’?

I said, ‘I had to return my movies!’ My mom goes, ‘damn you, Michael Dean, what is wrong with you!'” He breaks into laughter again. 

That transplant gave Michael Dean nine and a half years without having to take insulin. The kidney and pancreas were functioning well. Unfortunately the pancreas is no longer working. So he’s back to the shots. “For nine and a half years, I wasn’t a diabetic. It was incredible. I had energy.” The timing is extra painful: if the pancreas had lasted for 10 years, Michael Dean would have been able to get life insurance.

He did it when he drove himself to the hospital in recent years because it was time for triple bypass heart surgery.

“Saddle up and ride anyways is: get in your car, drive, park and get your ass through the door, knowing that you’re about to put a gown on, and you’re about to go under, and could not wake up again and see your baby girl.  I was scared shitless.”

He just wanted to get it done. “I don’t know if it’s stoic, or heroic, or cowardly, just get it done!”  And they got it done. The surgery went well. And the family and friends around him did what they do: they cowboy up too. Michael Dean’s Mom and Dad moved in for a while and friends opened their homes.  “I tell you what, after they crack your chest, you ain’t doing anything ’til it’s time!”

He did it when his wife left somewhere in the middle of all of that.

“That was rough. That was rougher than anything I’ve ever dealt with. This (medical) crap was nothing.

“But I would go through it 10 times over for that little girl,” he says, gesturing to Bailee. “Yah, that little girl to me is … top notch.

“That little girl is what gave me the second wind to go ‘Ok. I gotta cowboy up.'”

Just then Bailee comes running in to the kitchen in her pink dress, smiling, long hair flying. She pulls out a large plastic bowl from the cupboard. Her eyes register an unspoken message from her Dad. Then she smirks and declares, “It’s for FOOD,” and runs back outside.

“She has been told you are not allowed to take another plastic tupperware thing outside, and shove bugs in it!

“It grosses your Dad out when I go to get a bowl — even though it’s been washed — and I remember there were seven frogs in there and I want to put a salad in there! Noooo. Tough guy or not, that’s disgusting!”

And with that fast kitchen visit by a six year old wonder, the mood is lighter, the day is better, and Michael Dean’s smile is even brighter.

Hey Hey Paula

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Life is all the richer because everyone dreams a different dream.

As a sous chef in Grand Junction, Colorado, Paula Pinero loved the high energy of the restaurant world, took pride in her clean kitchen and knew the business at all levels of service.

“I didn’t go to college or anything. So, first I was a waitress, then I started dishwashing, then I moved up to prep, then I moved up to cooking. Basically, it’s all I knew.”

But away from the kitchen, Paula had another passion: thrift stores.

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“It goes back to me and my mom. We were thrift store junkies. Yard sale junkies. And I mean buy and buy and buy and buy! I said, ‘one of these days we’re going to have to open up a store’ because we had so much stuff,” she remembers, eyes shining. “I guess nobody knew about hoarding back then. They’d probably call us hoarders now.”

In fact, she tried making a go of it in Grand Junction. She opened a thrift store of her own. Separately, so did her mom. For some reason, they didn’t do it together.

Paula’s little store went under. Her mom’s store did a bit better.

But somewhere along the way, the two had a falling out, and they didn’t talk for a long time.

Other changes were happening, too.

“I just couldn’t do the pressure of the line cooking anymore.”

So she took her skills and started cooking in hospitals and then nursing homes. The thrift store dream still tugged at her heart. In an ideal world, she and her husband Paul would have a thrift store, with an apartment attached, all under one roof. But that was just a dream.

As the distance between Paula and her mom grew, the residents at the nursing home filled a void. She was more than a cook. She was a friend, a confidant, a constant presence. She remembers the birthday party of a woman who turned a joyful and sprite 103 years old. She remembers World War II vets. She remembers the guilt she felt as she snuck a cigarette out back and was gleefully joined by a 90 year-old smoker who’d been looking for Paula’s nicotine place of escape. The residents, their stories and the relationships gave Paula a sense of connection where there was one gaping hole in her life.

Then one day things started to turn around. Her mom was in a better place.

“We started talking again, and we started shopping! She started perking up. You know, there was a REASON to get up in the morning. A REASON…

“And then, I don’t know why it happened. I guess God took her for a reason…”

Paula’s strong exterior gave way to tears.

“We were talking about opening a store and doing, you know, business together. A thrift store — then she just died.

“Everything for me went down hill from there.  So I said, ‘screw Colorado’,  let’s just get the heck out and just go.”

Paul’s brother-in-law had always talked about Arizona.

“We just packed the car up and came out here to Cottonwood. We were looking for places to live, and it was like God took us right here.”

Reluctantly, they called on a charming little corner property. Located right on the scenic highway stretching through the picturesque town, surely it was out of their price range. Surely it was not really available.

It was in their price range. And it was available. And oh, it has a little apartment attached in back.  No longer just the cute fixer-upper. Now it proudly bears the sign “Paula’s Attic”.

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“It’s a thrift store-slash-treasure chest! And it’s mine!”

Her husband Paul is a contractor and has been helping shape the store into their collective dream place.

“Sometimes a song will come on that we love,” says Paula, “and we just run out here and grab each other and dance.

“We have our little store! We have our little store!

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“If someone comes in, we look at each other and say ‘can you believe this has happened?’

“I’m not a millionaire. But it isn’t about the money. It’s about the dream and the journey.”

Of course the only piece missing is Paula’s mom.

“Sometimes I dream about her for days and days and days. And we’re always in a thrift store.

“Maybe she left for a reason. To push me here. Because if she hadn’t, I wouldn’t have left. I think she’s here in the thrift store. I think she’d be smiling down on me right now.”

Soul of a Cowboy

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Greg Hathcock can swear like a sailor and quote the Bible like a preacher.

One moment he was a stranger in a New Mexico Starbucks, the next, he was standing near my table with a smile and earnestness in his eyes. “I needed to come over here and tell you to have a good day.” 

I heard a hint of the South. I sensed kindness. I saw a touch of cowboy.

But there is always more, isn’t there? We all have pieces. We are all a patchwork quilt. We are all a coat of many colors.

For example, there are people who know Greg the quarter horse trainer, but they don’t know Greg the Tennessee farm boy who chopped cotton and pulled corn. They know Greg the Grazing Bull restaurant owner, but they don’t know Greg the 1963 state track champion in the 100 and 220 dash. They know Greg the father of three who has been married for 31 years, but they don’t know Greg who enjoys a mocha alone at the cafe most mornings. They know Greg the jocular sweetheart who will turn 69 in July, but they don’t know Greg the bull rider. They know Greg the high school running back, but they don’t know Greg who broke a mustang. They know Greg who has a soft spot for people, but they don’t know Greg who wants to make a feature film. They know Greg the boy who didn’t like school very much, but they don’t know Greg the boy who suffered regular beatings from his parents at home.

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But there is no self-pity. Just self-reflection. There is no regret. Just determination. There is no speaking of what is not, only of what can be. When you talk with him, you get his passion for horses and for life, and what he has to share may blow you away.

The Track and the Truth

Greg’s fast feet on the track as a kid have been replaced by fast quarter horses as an adult. A trainer for more than 20 years now, he knows the dark side of the race world and it lights a fire in his belly.

“I’ve seen horses drop dead at the finish line. There’s no reason for the horse to drop dead at the finish line…”

Mistreatment of these animals is something he can’t tolerate, and he doesn’t mince words.

“…unless they got shit in him that they ain’t supposed to have in him. That will kill him. I’ve had them come back after they finish the race, and they drop dead right there when they unsaddle them.

“That-should-not-happen! That’s cruel and inhumane and downright un-Christian-like, if you want to know the truth — do an animal that way.” He leans in and locks his eyes on mine. “If you train your animal, and you feed that animal, and you take good care of that animal, they’re gonna wanna run.”

He wants me to understand that no amount of drugs will change a horse’s potential, and he uses racing lingo to make his point: “You can hang every drug in the world in me, and I can’t play basketball like Michael Jordan. You understand? You only got so much speed in that horse.”

You Gotta Have Heart

We sat down over a pot of coffee at his Grazing Bull restaurant in Capitan, New Mexico, and I asked him if he had a philosophy he lives his life by. I could not have hoped for a better response. You might want to sit down.

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“I love setting goals every day to accomplish something. If I’m 80 years old, I’ll still be getting up and going to accomplish something, because you never get too old or too tired to do something.

“No matter what disappointments you have in life, no matter how many failures you have in life, you never quit. Because sooner or later, you’re going to do something that fits. And you will be successful at it.

“But if you are going to say ‘I can’t’, ‘I’m sick’, ‘I don’t feel good’, you’re not gonna accomplish nothing. You gotta get up.

“You gotta have a lot of HEART in this world. Even if you’re going to an eight-to-five job every day, you gotta have heart. That’s all there is to it. So, if you’re gonna have heart, plan a big thing. You show me a dreamer, and I’ll show you a guy that landed on the moon!

“You gotta set goals and you gotta have BIG goals. ‘Cause God will help you accomplish being President of the United States of America as he would the Mayor of Capitan. You set the stage in your mind right there. But you cannot be a quitter. You have got to keep going no matter how many times you fall down. ‘Cause that’s the only way to make it. I’m telling you, you fall down, get up, dust your pants off, and say ‘I’m gonna do it.’

“And I had to do that a lot. I still do it a lot. And a lot of people wonder why I’m doing it at my age, but I don’t ever want to quit. I like LIVING, I like LIFE.

“Be a CAN-do person, not a CAN’T-do person.  No matter what your goal is, the same energy is flowing through you to do a big goal as it is to do a little goal. So set your sights high.

“Get up and say you feel good, ‘I am healthy, I am well, I’m beautiful, I’m talented, I’m empowered.’ You say that every day, and it will work.

“You know, your words are so creat–ive.” He breaks the word, lending it new meaning.

“Life and death are in the tongue. I think it’s Proverbs 18:21. ‘Life and death are in the tongue. And you will reap the fruits thereof.’ LIFE and DEATH. POSITIVE and NEGATIVE. And what your words are are creat–ive.  It’s no question about it.

“If you speak words long enough, I GUARANTEE that’s what’s going to happen. If you want to look at the way your life’s going to be five years from now, see how you’re speaking right now and it’ll be exactly that way.

“You’ve got to fill your brain with the positive. Somewhere in the Bible, ‘think of things that are NOT as if they WERE.’ It’s in there. It’s in the Bible. Job said ‘the thing that I feared has come upon me.’ So if you’re sitting around thinking about negative, fearful things, that’s what you’re creating and breeding in your mind, and it’s going to manifest in your life. I done see it happen too many times!

“It takes EFFORT to be positive. It takes effort to ACCOMPLISH. It takes effort. It takes effort every morning to get up and to FEEL good. But you gotta TELL yourself. Hey, when I feel bad, ‘I feel good.’ The Bible says ‘let the weak say they’re strong.’ Same thing!”

Greg fills our coffee cups again and as he does, he continues.

“If I don’t have somebody around that I can help do something, I feel like I’m lost a lot of times,” he says.

“I like young people. I like youth, and I wish I could just open their brains sometimes and pour into them what I already know.”

Greg’s words draw his 23-year-old waitress and friend Kalyn over to join us at the table. Greg thinks of her like another daughter.

“I’m gonna tell you something else,” he said to me. “And I’ve never told Kalyn this.

“Kalyn’s an inspiration to me. I see such high qualities in her. And if I can do something to motivate her to be more than maybe she’s thinking sometimes, I’ll feel like I hung the moon.”

Disco Taco

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My morning eyes were diverted from the tar of I-70 by a flash of vibrant color painted across a building set back from the road.

“That’s where I’m going for lunch!” I declared to no one.

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The sun was high in the New Mexico sky by the time I returned. As I stepped inside Disco Taco, it took a second for my eyes to adjust, and no sooner, David Medina was standing in front of me with a smile as warm as the southern sun. A few wisps of gray hair brightened his face even more, just below his temples and brushed through his mustache. The little restaurant with the 1970’s-era name exudes warmth — from the friendly welcome to the Mexican food to all eight tables topped with a yellow check cloth and a flower.

Based on the attentive and easy treatment I was given, I would have thought Medina had been taking care of restaurant customers forever. I would have thought he was more than comfortable in his role. I would have thought hospitality had been his line of work for a long time. In addition to his professional manner of speaking, he stood tall, and his tucked-in shirt and shined shoes told me he took pride in his work. On that last point, I would have thought right. But on the assumptions before that, no no no. I would have thought wrong.

David Medina is the manager of this little spot, and has been since 2011. This job is a blessing in his view, and the offer to come work here arrived at just the right time.

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For 31 years, Medina was an engineer in Juarez, Mexico, working at Delphi and making electrical harnesses for automobiles. He had stability. He had status.

Then he was laid off.

That was only part of the cascade of changes to come. At the same time, the small grocery store Medina and his wife had operated for 10 years in the border city was under threat. Juarez was rapidly destabilizing under the stress and violence of Mexican drug cartel activity, and it was not long before intimidating characters showed up at their grocery store. “Bad guys” began demanding money from Medina, and in exchange they would “allow” him to continue to do business. Some people call it protection money. The rest of us call it extortion.

Doors were closing for Medina, and as he and his family faced this new reality, something happened: another door opened, in response to action he’d taken about 14 years prior. Back in the 1990’s, Medina had applied to become a legal U.S. resident. And then at this critical juncture in his life, the paperwork finally came through.

His new life in the U.S. didn’t take off instantly.  He and his wife struggled to find work and a place to live in El Paso, and even though the city was just across the border from Juarez, the new place and the new process felt foreign. Eventually Medina received the offer to come to the little town of Ruidoso Downs, where he had been a customer at Disco Taco on previous visits.

He is 55 years old now and is rebuilding his personal and professional life “from zero.”

“I don’t have any experience with this kind of business. I have experience buying and selling groceries.”

He pauses. “It’s really hard to start again.” While he’s happy that he and his wife have found a new opportunity in the U.S., until his grown children can join them from Mexico, he won’t feel whole.

But his optimism doesn’t fade. He said he feels he is being protected and implies that good things happen to him.

“In Mexico, we have a saying,” he says. “The best school is life.”