Morir Soñando:

Orange juice and leche condensada, mixed into a creamy beverage. It smells sweet and tangy, that Caribbean blend that tastes like eternal summer. The only time I went to Cuba, it was December. 

December, and warm as ever. 

We celebrated añonuevo over roast pork and vanilla ice cream soaked in espresso. The small floor was packed to the balconies with family, our line of kinship winding in all directions. Of course, that never mattered. Everyone just delighted, overjoyed to meet you, because any daughter of Diamela was someone they adored. Everyone exchanges kisses upon the cheek: at hello, at twelve, at goodbye. Love and love and love brimming in the air, competing with the smoke floating about. Nine-year-old me had to step outside to escape the fumes I had been reared so steadfastly against back at school, only to be followed by what could have been a cousin or tía or family friend, taking her smoke outdoors. I begrudgingly held my breath then, and today I exhale a chuckle. Well-deserved indulgence in the fruit of Cuban labor, in the prized commodities of the island- rum and cigars.

There’s something philosophical about the way we are: that unconditionally joyous nature independent of daily comforts, a health of the soul. Whether the power is constantly out, whether the water never runs, whether the rationed food is stale. Whether across the way in the wealthy country the demands of the economy wring us dry. Wherever we are trapped in the whole world, we dance on and on, humility and optimism amid the anguish all around. I get it from my mom, from our rhythm, from her food. She gets it from her barrio, from all the time she spent in the sun.

In that everlasting affection for life,

moriremos soñando.