Determination

I have some memories of my childhood in El Monte.  I believe at the time when I was about 6 or 7 years old, I was probably one of the smallest ones around.  I wasn't that outgoing.  In fact, I was considered the strange one (due to autistic behavior).  I had cousins who were very outgoing and were always the center of attention.  I used to admire that they knew how to do so many things and were fearless.

I have cousins who I thought should have been surgeons.  I don't know why at the time I thought it was acceptable, but a few of us would see our male cousins hanging around an old shed in my Grandmother's (Abuelita's) backyard,  They would be intently concentrating on a rock.  It was then that we realized what they were doing.  They were doing surgery on a poor lizard.  This particular one was called a blue belly lizard because it had a blue belly.  Evidently we had caught them after they had observed the working organs of the poor little lizard and one of them was proceeding to sew up an incision they had made.  After they sewed the lizard up, miraculously the lizard ran off.  God only knows how long that lizard lived after that.

These were the same cousins who thought it was great fun to throw each other into the cactus in my Grandmother's yard.  The whole house would run out when we would hear the cry of one of the boys coming from the back yard, because we all knew they had been thrown in the cactus.  All my Aunts (Tias) and Grandmother would gather around the poor victim and using whatever means and work at getting all those horrible stickers out of their body.  Of course the boys who threw the other cousin in the cactus would get a reprimand and then proceed to laugh at the one who was in the dining room getting the stickers taken out.

These cousins all knew how to ride skateboards and ride bicycles.  Even my cousin who was a little older than myself had a wonderful stingray bike she used to ride.  Her dad had adjusted the seat much lower than the older kids, because she was small in stature.  I used to admire that she was able to ride her bike back and forth from her house to my Grandmother's.  I didn't know how to ride a bike so I would run beside her always running out of breath.  Because she loved me, she would stop and then walk her bike until I caught my breath and then we would proceed again.  I remember thinking in my little girl mind, "I wish I knew how to ride a bike."

One day when there were no cousins around my Grandmother's house, I noticed that my cousin had left her stingray (I think that was the brand) bike laying on the ground up front.  I went over to it and awkwardly picked it up.  It seemed so big and heavy for me.  I had observed my cousin riding the bike, so I put my legs over and straddled the bar.  I put my foot on a pedal and pushed it down and fell hard to the ground.  I remember it hurt so bad.  But I picked the bike back up and did it again.  The same result over and over again.  The searing pain, over and over again.  I remember at one point seeing my knee scraped.  During this learning experience, I was able to get one pedal down and eventually getting the left pedal down, but falling repeatedly.  I remember crying.  But I was determined to ride that bike.  I must have been trying for hours and then it happened.  I pedaled a few times without falling and then would fall.  Mind you all this time, I couldn't reach the seat because it was too high.  I was doing a standing and sometimes sitting on the bar of the bike.  At some point, I was able to ride the bike in a full circle and fall.  Then by the end of my trying, I had mastered the balance and pedaling of the bike ride.  I was so happy, but there was no one to show.  So I took my chance and rode my cousin's bike up to her house to return it.  I remember feeling so proud that I had learned how to ride her bike.  I don't remember her reaction when I brought her bike to her.  I know for the rest of the day I was beaming.  I can only imagine what my legs looked like for days after. But, my determination paid off that day.