My son, Joaquin, is eight.
Full of life.
Full of love.
Full of questions.
And as I learned yesterday, full of faith.
On Monday, my wife and I drove our kids to San Diego to pay respects to their Great-Grandmother, Leonor Baez, a pioneering woman who not only built a home, family and church in Rosarito but a lasting legacy of strength and bad-assery, forever evidenced in my bad-ass wife.
Leonor lived to nearly 90. She smoked several times a day, often waving to the priests across the street with her free hand as they walked in and out of the church she helped build.
On the two hour drive to San Diego, we listened to music, talked early childhood , listened to more music and entertained a range of questions from the kids.
“What’s a Mormon?”
“What’s a Baptist?”
“What’s peace and quiet?”
You can trust I did my best to over-explain.
“You see…Martin Luther King Jr. was named after Martin Luther, who was the person that nailed 95 theses…”
‘Actually, Dad, Martin Luther King Sr. was named after Martin Luther.’
That was Maya.
And on and on.
And this and that.
When we got to the mortuary, we were greeted with a temperature check at the door.
The viewing happened in rotating shifts by household. These things are always tough but the isolated grieving made it more difficult, less humane. Before wrapping up the viewing portion, we had one last opportunity to say farewell.
Joaquin wanted to go back in. I took him by myself. When we got to the casket, Joaquin lifted his hands, as if performing some sort of magic trick. I was dumbstruck.
“What are you doing, bruh,” I hushed.
“I’m really into this Jesus thing right now, so I’m trying to see if I can heal her. Or bring her back to life.”
It didn’t work.
But it didn’t stop him from trying, again. Down at the grave site, hands lifted, the boy tried. Again, in the mausoleum, trying.
You know what? Maybe it did work.
Not on Leonor but on me.
