... for a collection of letters written in portuguese...
the original text can be found at... http://luisantoniofreire.blogspot.com/
luisantoniofreire...
... introduction to the series... "philosophising"...
…dear mother…
in the year of 2009…
I wrote a series of historical letters…
to my sons… taue… and peter…
actually… these are autobiographical letters…
where I tried to follow a certain chronological order…
which begins with the facts in boston…
… where my father used to study at MIT…
… and goes all the way... to jota-carlos-street…
after that… there was an interruption…
which still remains on "hold"… until today…
… but… for sure…
one day… I intend to continue with this project… again...
in the meantime…
I decided… to forward this collection-of-letters to you…
with the certainty that you will enjoy this reading…
… these memories…
I say a ( temporary ) good-bye to you…
with tenderness…
a big hug…
…luis antonio…
in the year of 2009…
I wrote a series of historical letters…
to my sons… taue… and peter…
actually… these are autobiographical letters…
where I tried to follow a certain chronological order…
which begins with the facts in boston…
… where my father used to study at MIT…
… and goes all the way... to jota-carlos-street…
after that… there was an interruption…
which still remains on "hold"… until today…
… but… for sure…
one day… I intend to continue with this project… again...
in the meantime…
I decided… to forward this collection-of-letters to you…
with the certainty that you will enjoy this reading…
… these memories…
I say a ( temporary ) good-bye to you…
with tenderness…
a big hug…
…luis antonio…
...1... simply philosophising... ( 1 out of 18 )...
dear son taue...
dear son peter...
there has been sometime already…
that my mind “spaces-out” through some memories…
recalling… several moments that we’ve been together…
now… I’m with my life all settled-down…
here in the farm… with maria…
enjoying a healthy life…
a life which I've always dreamed about…
I’m taking care of myself…
eating the good meals prepared by maria with all her love…
in short…
enjoying a life where there’s nothing to complain about…
--- --- ---
but… the sentiment of missing-you-guys is enormous…
but… that’s ok…
I don’t want to interfere in your lives…
I want you guys to move-on with your lives…
with courage… wisdom… tenderness…
and kindness towards everyone surrounding you…
being able to stand up for your rights…
calmly… with good-manners… and without aggressiveness…
--- --- ---
since you are in the united-states…
and I’m in brasil…
then… the best way to diminish the distance between us…
is to write emails like this one…
emails where there’s no predetermined subject…
simply an email where the conversation flows…
motivated by the pure pleasure of the conversation itself…
--- --- ---
I’m willing now… to talk a little-bit about myself…
telling you a little-bit of the history-of-my-life…
as surprising as it can be… very often…
in spite of living together for a long time…
very often… we forget to stop… and talk about basic-facts of our lives…
usually… we are so absorbed… in our daily worries…
that we forget to spare a little time...
to REVEAL to the dear ones that surround us…
such important issues which are the fundamental facts of our own history…
when I was six-month-old… me… my sister ana emilia… my father and my mother…
moved to boston…
my father got a scholarship from the brazilian-navy…
to study in the master’s program…
at MIT… ( massachusetts institute of technology )…
we stayed there for only three years…
so I can’t recall anything from this period…
the only thing I can tell… from the stories my mother later told me…
was that… at this time… when I was a very little baby…
I didn’t want to eat at all..
then… she took me to the doctor… there… in boston…
the doctor told her to buy a funnel…
and... to make a soup…
and… to pour the soup down into my throat through the funnel…
and… can you imagine that she completely believed on the doctor’s advice…
and she tried to do exactly what he told her to do…?
--- --- ---
I’m stopping the story at this point…. today…
because I don’t want to take too much time away from you…
later on… please… let me know if you’re interested in knowing more…
about the continuation of these stories of my life…
if you tell me that you’re interested…
I’ll be happy to continue…
writing emails like this one…
otherwise…
I’m going to find something else to do…
please feel free to ask me any kind of questions…
doubts… any kind of doubts…
any subject…
from the past… present or future…
all the care that I’ve been giving during all my life… to you…
still remains valid…
and you know it...
you know that I’m always ready…
to do... the "possible" and the "impossible"… for you...
please… consider me always a friend…
never an enemy…
avoid listening to bad advices…
from people who… by some reason…
want to encourage a division between us
never let yourselves be deluded…
thinking that I don’t deserve the trust from you…
it would be a waste…
to think that I don’t deserve the trust from you…
and… as a consequence… to hide something from me…
I believe… that there are some people that keep trying to convince you…
that your grand-mom is evil…
that I am evil…
I respect these people’s opinions…
but… if we allow ourselves to listen to this kind of opinion…
we end up all “sinking”…
because one of the easiest way to weaken a person…
it’s to convince this person to be against his own father…
… or his own mother…
in the popular wisdom… there’s a saying which illustrates this fact very well:
“the union makes the force”…
( I’m not sure if your keyboard deals with the latin-character “c-cedilha”…
for the word "forca"… "forsa"… "fortaleza"… a strong-person…)
so… a divided family… is a weak family…
everybody loses…
--- --- ---
so…
if we start practicing the exercise of communicating more frequently…
this would make us stronger…
this would bring benefits to all of us…
a family where there’s no habit of talking…
becomes a weak family…
a fragile family…
vulnerable to the adversities of life…
you attended a good school… the notre dame…
fortunately you have good moral principles…
but these good-principles should be constantly updated…
constantly improved
constantly being aware of…
the world is always spinning…
a person can be very healthy one day…
and… on a wheelchair… next day…
complete attention sometimes is not enough…
let’s be even more united than we are right now…?
would you be willing to trust on me…
… the way we’ve always used to do…?
thankyou for reading this email…
see you soon…
a super-super-super hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
dear son peter...
there has been sometime already…
that my mind “spaces-out” through some memories…
recalling… several moments that we’ve been together…
now… I’m with my life all settled-down…
here in the farm… with maria…
enjoying a healthy life…
a life which I've always dreamed about…
I’m taking care of myself…
eating the good meals prepared by maria with all her love…
in short…
enjoying a life where there’s nothing to complain about…
--- --- ---
but… the sentiment of missing-you-guys is enormous…
but… that’s ok…
I don’t want to interfere in your lives…
I want you guys to move-on with your lives…
with courage… wisdom… tenderness…
and kindness towards everyone surrounding you…
being able to stand up for your rights…
calmly… with good-manners… and without aggressiveness…
--- --- ---
since you are in the united-states…
and I’m in brasil…
then… the best way to diminish the distance between us…
is to write emails like this one…
emails where there’s no predetermined subject…
simply an email where the conversation flows…
motivated by the pure pleasure of the conversation itself…
--- --- ---
I’m willing now… to talk a little-bit about myself…
telling you a little-bit of the history-of-my-life…
as surprising as it can be… very often…
in spite of living together for a long time…
very often… we forget to stop… and talk about basic-facts of our lives…
usually… we are so absorbed… in our daily worries…
that we forget to spare a little time...
to REVEAL to the dear ones that surround us…
such important issues which are the fundamental facts of our own history…
when I was six-month-old… me… my sister ana emilia… my father and my mother…
moved to boston…
my father got a scholarship from the brazilian-navy…
to study in the master’s program…
at MIT… ( massachusetts institute of technology )…
we stayed there for only three years…
so I can’t recall anything from this period…
the only thing I can tell… from the stories my mother later told me…
was that… at this time… when I was a very little baby…
I didn’t want to eat at all..
then… she took me to the doctor… there… in boston…
the doctor told her to buy a funnel…
and... to make a soup…
and… to pour the soup down into my throat through the funnel…
and… can you imagine that she completely believed on the doctor’s advice…
and she tried to do exactly what he told her to do…?
--- --- ---
I’m stopping the story at this point…. today…
because I don’t want to take too much time away from you…
later on… please… let me know if you’re interested in knowing more…
about the continuation of these stories of my life…
if you tell me that you’re interested…
I’ll be happy to continue…
writing emails like this one…
otherwise…
I’m going to find something else to do…
please feel free to ask me any kind of questions…
doubts… any kind of doubts…
any subject…
from the past… present or future…
all the care that I’ve been giving during all my life… to you…
still remains valid…
and you know it...
you know that I’m always ready…
to do... the "possible" and the "impossible"… for you...
please… consider me always a friend…
never an enemy…
avoid listening to bad advices…
from people who… by some reason…
want to encourage a division between us
never let yourselves be deluded…
thinking that I don’t deserve the trust from you…
it would be a waste…
to think that I don’t deserve the trust from you…
and… as a consequence… to hide something from me…
I believe… that there are some people that keep trying to convince you…
that your grand-mom is evil…
that I am evil…
I respect these people’s opinions…
but… if we allow ourselves to listen to this kind of opinion…
we end up all “sinking”…
because one of the easiest way to weaken a person…
it’s to convince this person to be against his own father…
… or his own mother…
in the popular wisdom… there’s a saying which illustrates this fact very well:
“the union makes the force”…
( I’m not sure if your keyboard deals with the latin-character “c-cedilha”…
for the word "forca"… "forsa"… "fortaleza"… a strong-person…)
so… a divided family… is a weak family…
everybody loses…
--- --- ---
so…
if we start practicing the exercise of communicating more frequently…
this would make us stronger…
this would bring benefits to all of us…
a family where there’s no habit of talking…
becomes a weak family…
a fragile family…
vulnerable to the adversities of life…
you attended a good school… the notre dame…
fortunately you have good moral principles…
but these good-principles should be constantly updated…
constantly improved
constantly being aware of…
the world is always spinning…
a person can be very healthy one day…
and… on a wheelchair… next day…
complete attention sometimes is not enough…
let’s be even more united than we are right now…?
would you be willing to trust on me…
… the way we’ve always used to do…?
thankyou for reading this email…
see you soon…
a super-super-super hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...2... philosophising part two... ( 2 out of 18 )...
greeeaaat… taue…
greeeaaat… peter…
all right !!!...
assuming that the idea of telling stories of my life…
was well accepted by you…
I’m going to “jump” into the project…
in other words… “let’s get down to business”…
( I mean… to the keyboard…)…
and see if something fairly acceptable…
can come out of these stories…
in the last email… I was still in boston…
my father studying at MIT… ( massachusetts institute of technology…)…
my mother taking care of both: me and my sister ana emilia…
and... my mother was in company of a maid… ( sebastiana )…
who came with us from brasil… to help her with the domestic work…
we used to live in one of those calm residential neighborhoods…
where there was no fence between the houses…
on the road… there was rarely any cars…
and… my sister and I… used to spend a long time outside…
playing with the tricycle…
( those little bikes for children… with three wheels…)…
then… on a nice bright day… my sister and I…
got lost… by chance… on those neighborhood roads…
my mother… went “crazy”… she called the police…
and… the police finally found us…
( my father… later told me… that the police strategy… was to do a search…
first “ scanning ” through a sort of a big circle along the outer roads…
and then… through smaller circles…
until they could finally find us…)
unfortunately my father is not here on earth anymore…
so I cannot ask him to develop…
a little-bit more of this story… with me …
anyway… after this episode… my parents decided to install…
two little necklace-dog-tags… on both of us…
with our name… address… and… telephone-number…
--- --- ---
I lived in boston…
from… six-months-old…
until… three-years-old…
I don’t remember anything…
except these two stories told by my parents…
the one of the funnel… and the one of the necklace-dog-tag…
from boston… we moved to recife…
where I lived... from three to six-years-old…
at those times…
I had nothing to do at all…
I used to spend all day…
just sitting on the front-yard-wall
watching the cars pass by…
which were not many… at those times…
amazing…
how a child… is an innocent being…
he is capable of staying hours and hours…
with no worries…
just enjoying the view…
without thinking on anything…
with no fears…
no ambitions…
just enjoying the moment…
when an ant passes by…
the child…
simply looks at the ant…
simply follows her movement
it’s like a dog…
innocent…
as long as he is well fed…
without diseases…
sleeping well…
his life… is… simply… his life…
peaceful… without judgments…
without complexes…
without obligations…
( by the way… this resembles…
the yoga doctrine…
it says that all of us… even the adults…
can… ( and… should…)… practice the exercise…
of staying… everyday at least fifteen-minutes…
without doing anything… only breathing…
without thinking on anything…
like that little child… with age four… ( or five )…
sitting on the front-yard-wall…
watching the few cars pass by…)
briefly… living the moment…
--- --- ---
should we stop now…?
we should stop now…
otherwise… you’re going to be late for your fifteen-minute-yoga…
stay healthy…
see you soon…
a tight hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
greeeaaat… peter…
all right !!!...
assuming that the idea of telling stories of my life…
was well accepted by you…
I’m going to “jump” into the project…
in other words… “let’s get down to business”…
( I mean… to the keyboard…)…
and see if something fairly acceptable…
can come out of these stories…
in the last email… I was still in boston…
my father studying at MIT… ( massachusetts institute of technology…)…
my mother taking care of both: me and my sister ana emilia…
and... my mother was in company of a maid… ( sebastiana )…
who came with us from brasil… to help her with the domestic work…
we used to live in one of those calm residential neighborhoods…
where there was no fence between the houses…
on the road… there was rarely any cars…
and… my sister and I… used to spend a long time outside…
playing with the tricycle…
( those little bikes for children… with three wheels…)…
then… on a nice bright day… my sister and I…
got lost… by chance… on those neighborhood roads…
my mother… went “crazy”… she called the police…
and… the police finally found us…
( my father… later told me… that the police strategy… was to do a search…
first “ scanning ” through a sort of a big circle along the outer roads…
and then… through smaller circles…
until they could finally find us…)
unfortunately my father is not here on earth anymore…
so I cannot ask him to develop…
a little-bit more of this story… with me …
anyway… after this episode… my parents decided to install…
two little necklace-dog-tags… on both of us…
with our name… address… and… telephone-number…
--- --- ---
I lived in boston…
from… six-months-old…
until… three-years-old…
I don’t remember anything…
except these two stories told by my parents…
the one of the funnel… and the one of the necklace-dog-tag…
from boston… we moved to recife…
where I lived... from three to six-years-old…
at those times…
I had nothing to do at all…
I used to spend all day…
just sitting on the front-yard-wall
watching the cars pass by…
which were not many… at those times…
amazing…
how a child… is an innocent being…
he is capable of staying hours and hours…
with no worries…
just enjoying the view…
without thinking on anything…
with no fears…
no ambitions…
just enjoying the moment…
when an ant passes by…
the child…
simply looks at the ant…
simply follows her movement
it’s like a dog…
innocent…
as long as he is well fed…
without diseases…
sleeping well…
his life… is… simply… his life…
peaceful… without judgments…
without complexes…
without obligations…
( by the way… this resembles…
the yoga doctrine…
it says that all of us… even the adults…
can… ( and… should…)… practice the exercise…
of staying… everyday at least fifteen-minutes…
without doing anything… only breathing…
without thinking on anything…
like that little child… with age four… ( or five )…
sitting on the front-yard-wall…
watching the few cars pass by…)
briefly… living the moment…
--- --- ---
should we stop now…?
we should stop now…
otherwise… you’re going to be late for your fifteen-minute-yoga…
stay healthy…
see you soon…
a tight hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...2.1... peter's reply...
I’m going to consider my fifteen minutes of doing nothing,
as filled by these fifteen minutes that I spend reading your emails
your journals.
That’s it Dad, I’m waiting for the next chapter 3,
a hug
Peter
as filled by these fifteen minutes that I spend reading your emails
your journals.
That’s it Dad, I’m waiting for the next chapter 3,
a hug
Peter
...3... philosophising part three... ( 3 out of 18 )...
dear son taue…
dear son peter…
well… after last week’s interruption…
which… fortunately… had a happy-end…
I decided to continue with the stories of my life…
since last email was a little bit… too much scientific…
and… nothing like to listen to a story more human…
as opposed to the more scientific ones…
( it seems to me that the stories which are more human…
“get in” more easily… they are easier to “digest”…)
but this doesn’t mean that the scientific-type-of-stories are worthless…
they are important too…
it’s like in life…
sometimes we are not too enthusiastic about doing a certain type of activity…
( to clean the dust off the room… for instance…)
but we have to do it anyway…
because if we don’t…
we would end-up breathing-in all that dust…
which obviously is not good for us…
( although I read once in a book… in a humoristic tone…
that… it’s been scientifically proved that…
once the dust reaches three centimeters high…
we don’t have to clean it anymore…
because… it’s been proved…
that… beyond those three centimeters…
it’s impossible to accumulate more dust…)
--- --- ---
we had stopped our story… in recife…
at age four… ( or five )…
sitting… all day long on the front-yard-wall…
watching the cars pass by…
thinking on nothing…
just savoring the moment…
without deep thoughts…
without deep worries…
it seems like my childhood was sectioned in a series of three-years-periods:
the three first years of life… in boston…
the three next years… in recife…
and… the three next ones ( from six to nine-years-old…)… in rio-de-janeiro…
more precisely… in a neighborhood which is on the border of jardim-botanico…
…and gavea…
with a road made of those little-rectangular-stone-blocks…
a place resembling “the vila”… in ipanema…
where you used to play with juninho… and the other kids at “the vila”…
the aura was similar…
we used to play soccer…
on the sidewalk…
without much fussiness…
it wasn’t necessary a soccer field…
in order to play soccer…
the sidewalk was just perfect…
I used to study in a public school by the “lagoa” area…
and take the trolley-bus to school…
I was eight-years-old… when my mother said that I could take my sister clarice…
( who was four-years-old ) to her kindergarten…
which was located right in front of my school…
and… that was the scene…
me at age eight… taking my sister ( age four )… to her school…
and… from there… going to my classes on the other side of the road…
good times… no violence… a life with no stress…
my mother used to give me the exact amount-of-money…
for the trolley-bus-ticket…
at the end-of-classes… I didn’t have to pick up my sister anymore…
because my mother had already done it…
since my sister’s classes ended before mine…
so… at the end of classes…
since I had the exact amount-of-money for the trolley-bus-ticket…
I rather… instead of taking the trolley-bus…
I rather spend the money on a little-bag of pop-corn…
and… walk home…
arriving at my home-street… even before going home…
I used to “dive” into the soccer-game with my friends… on the side-walk…
a very calm life… with no deep worries…
but… not everything in the garden was rosy…
in contrast to my life of a dreamer in recife… sitting on the front-yard-wall…
thinking on nothing… just living…
there… on rio-de-janeiro…
at age eight...
I passed through an experience... that made me see the reality:
not everything in the garden is rosy…
one day… as I was coming home from school… on foot…
as I approached the street… with everybody playing soccer…
I started saying…
“you can throw me the ball…!!
like a “shower” throw…!!
so I can head it…!!...”
and… at this moment… all my friends totally ignored me…
as if I wasn’t existing at all…
they didn’t pay any attention to my presence…
they wanted to make sure that I was being ignored by them…
in a way that I’ve never seen anything like that…
in my whole life…
at this point… I didn’t understand anything…
I thought to myself… “what is going on…?”
I asked them…
they answered… saying that…
they were “giving me the cold shoulder”…
I didn’t know what the expression “give the cold shoulder” means…
they explained:
“ it’s when somebody stops talking to another one…
for some reason…”
then I asked what was the reason…
they told me…
but even today… I still don’t remember what was the reason…
( I think I was so shocked with the “cold-shoulder” episode itself…
that… when they explained me the reason…
my mind probably wasn't in conditions to understand what they were saying...
and I didn’t ask them to repeat the explanation… either... )
I became a little-bit disturbed with this first experience on my life…
of feeling that… the society… the group of friends…
has this capacity for rejecting someone…
and… life is a sequence of lessons of this type…
life keeps moving on…
episodes like this-one keep on happening…
regardless of the age…
we keep on knowing new people…
we start to feel relaxed and at home with them…
and… suddenly… something happens…
we hear something from them that suddenly surprises us…
and it does get us by surprise…
it’s like receiving a big “punch” in the face…
life… often embarrasses us with something similar…
but this kind of thing doesn’t happen only between two people…
sometimes such surprises… such disappointments…
show up between a person and an institution…
between a person and a government…
between a person and a school…
between a person and the corporation where he (she) works…
when I was in Hawaii… still on my first years there…
when I was studying for my master’s in math…
working hard to be a “straight-A” student…
I used to do my homeworks in an exaggerated diligent way…
on the first semester I got an “A”…
on the second semester I got a “B”…
on the third semester I got a “B”…
on the fourth semester I got a “C”…
suddenly… I received a letter from school…
saying that I was in “probation”…
that is… if I didn’t get an “A” on the next semester…
I would be “kicked-out” of school…
that was a kind of a “punch” in my face…
to realize that they had been so harsh on me…
yes... on me… who had tried to do my best…
as a “straight-A” student…
but… this time… in this case… I let myself get too much depressed…
because of a simple little letter coming from school…
I should… ( facing the problem brought by the letter…)
I should have tried to go there…
to get more information about what was going on…
I should have tried to listen to the opinion of my teachers…
who deeply knew me…
… instead of letting myself get so depressed by a letter…
that maybe was sent by an administrative-office of the university…
which… maybe… had nothing to do with the math-department itself…
but… the world keeps spinning…
after that letter…
by coincidence… my sciatic nerve got worst to the point…
that I couldn’t neither sit… nor stand up…
I really had to… quit the math program…
I ended up enrolling myself into the music department…
which… definitely… would add much more to myself…
as a human-being… than the math would do...
and… returning to my friends pals who used to play soccer with me…
at the time I was eight-years-old…
after the "cold-shoulder" episode…
fortunately… in two or three days…
everything went back to normal…
my relationship with the group turned out to be the same…
children… in general… don’t keep too much resentments…
they fight on one day… and on the next one everything is fine…
this capacity to forget the fight…
and to forgive…
the capacity of being able to say… “ let’s move on “…
this capacity of the human being…
I consider… a very good one…
see you next time…?
see you next time…
I want to give a very tight hug…
on you two… my sons…
with tenderness…
your father…
…luis antonio…
dear son peter…
well… after last week’s interruption…
which… fortunately… had a happy-end…
I decided to continue with the stories of my life…
since last email was a little bit… too much scientific…
and… nothing like to listen to a story more human…
as opposed to the more scientific ones…
( it seems to me that the stories which are more human…
“get in” more easily… they are easier to “digest”…)
but this doesn’t mean that the scientific-type-of-stories are worthless…
they are important too…
it’s like in life…
sometimes we are not too enthusiastic about doing a certain type of activity…
( to clean the dust off the room… for instance…)
but we have to do it anyway…
because if we don’t…
we would end-up breathing-in all that dust…
which obviously is not good for us…
( although I read once in a book… in a humoristic tone…
that… it’s been scientifically proved that…
once the dust reaches three centimeters high…
we don’t have to clean it anymore…
because… it’s been proved…
that… beyond those three centimeters…
it’s impossible to accumulate more dust…)
--- --- ---
we had stopped our story… in recife…
at age four… ( or five )…
sitting… all day long on the front-yard-wall…
watching the cars pass by…
thinking on nothing…
just savoring the moment…
without deep thoughts…
without deep worries…
it seems like my childhood was sectioned in a series of three-years-periods:
the three first years of life… in boston…
the three next years… in recife…
and… the three next ones ( from six to nine-years-old…)… in rio-de-janeiro…
more precisely… in a neighborhood which is on the border of jardim-botanico…
…and gavea…
with a road made of those little-rectangular-stone-blocks…
a place resembling “the vila”… in ipanema…
where you used to play with juninho… and the other kids at “the vila”…
the aura was similar…
we used to play soccer…
on the sidewalk…
without much fussiness…
it wasn’t necessary a soccer field…
in order to play soccer…
the sidewalk was just perfect…
I used to study in a public school by the “lagoa” area…
and take the trolley-bus to school…
I was eight-years-old… when my mother said that I could take my sister clarice…
( who was four-years-old ) to her kindergarten…
which was located right in front of my school…
and… that was the scene…
me at age eight… taking my sister ( age four )… to her school…
and… from there… going to my classes on the other side of the road…
good times… no violence… a life with no stress…
my mother used to give me the exact amount-of-money…
for the trolley-bus-ticket…
at the end-of-classes… I didn’t have to pick up my sister anymore…
because my mother had already done it…
since my sister’s classes ended before mine…
so… at the end of classes…
since I had the exact amount-of-money for the trolley-bus-ticket…
I rather… instead of taking the trolley-bus…
I rather spend the money on a little-bag of pop-corn…
and… walk home…
arriving at my home-street… even before going home…
I used to “dive” into the soccer-game with my friends… on the side-walk…
a very calm life… with no deep worries…
but… not everything in the garden was rosy…
in contrast to my life of a dreamer in recife… sitting on the front-yard-wall…
thinking on nothing… just living…
there… on rio-de-janeiro…
at age eight...
I passed through an experience... that made me see the reality:
not everything in the garden is rosy…
one day… as I was coming home from school… on foot…
as I approached the street… with everybody playing soccer…
I started saying…
“you can throw me the ball…!!
like a “shower” throw…!!
so I can head it…!!...”
and… at this moment… all my friends totally ignored me…
as if I wasn’t existing at all…
they didn’t pay any attention to my presence…
they wanted to make sure that I was being ignored by them…
in a way that I’ve never seen anything like that…
in my whole life…
at this point… I didn’t understand anything…
I thought to myself… “what is going on…?”
I asked them…
they answered… saying that…
they were “giving me the cold shoulder”…
I didn’t know what the expression “give the cold shoulder” means…
they explained:
“ it’s when somebody stops talking to another one…
for some reason…”
then I asked what was the reason…
they told me…
but even today… I still don’t remember what was the reason…
( I think I was so shocked with the “cold-shoulder” episode itself…
that… when they explained me the reason…
my mind probably wasn't in conditions to understand what they were saying...
and I didn’t ask them to repeat the explanation… either... )
I became a little-bit disturbed with this first experience on my life…
of feeling that… the society… the group of friends…
has this capacity for rejecting someone…
and… life is a sequence of lessons of this type…
life keeps moving on…
episodes like this-one keep on happening…
regardless of the age…
we keep on knowing new people…
we start to feel relaxed and at home with them…
and… suddenly… something happens…
we hear something from them that suddenly surprises us…
and it does get us by surprise…
it’s like receiving a big “punch” in the face…
life… often embarrasses us with something similar…
but this kind of thing doesn’t happen only between two people…
sometimes such surprises… such disappointments…
show up between a person and an institution…
between a person and a government…
between a person and a school…
between a person and the corporation where he (she) works…
when I was in Hawaii… still on my first years there…
when I was studying for my master’s in math…
working hard to be a “straight-A” student…
I used to do my homeworks in an exaggerated diligent way…
on the first semester I got an “A”…
on the second semester I got a “B”…
on the third semester I got a “B”…
on the fourth semester I got a “C”…
suddenly… I received a letter from school…
saying that I was in “probation”…
that is… if I didn’t get an “A” on the next semester…
I would be “kicked-out” of school…
that was a kind of a “punch” in my face…
to realize that they had been so harsh on me…
yes... on me… who had tried to do my best…
as a “straight-A” student…
but… this time… in this case… I let myself get too much depressed…
because of a simple little letter coming from school…
I should… ( facing the problem brought by the letter…)
I should have tried to go there…
to get more information about what was going on…
I should have tried to listen to the opinion of my teachers…
who deeply knew me…
… instead of letting myself get so depressed by a letter…
that maybe was sent by an administrative-office of the university…
which… maybe… had nothing to do with the math-department itself…
but… the world keeps spinning…
after that letter…
by coincidence… my sciatic nerve got worst to the point…
that I couldn’t neither sit… nor stand up…
I really had to… quit the math program…
I ended up enrolling myself into the music department…
which… definitely… would add much more to myself…
as a human-being… than the math would do...
and… returning to my friends pals who used to play soccer with me…
at the time I was eight-years-old…
after the "cold-shoulder" episode…
fortunately… in two or three days…
everything went back to normal…
my relationship with the group turned out to be the same…
children… in general… don’t keep too much resentments…
they fight on one day… and on the next one everything is fine…
this capacity to forget the fight…
and to forgive…
the capacity of being able to say… “ let’s move on “…
this capacity of the human being…
I consider… a very good one…
see you next time…?
see you next time…
I want to give a very tight hug…
on you two… my sons…
with tenderness…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...3.1... taue's reply...
Hi dad:
Only you... really...
I found it very funny : “ it’s been scientifically proved that…
once the dust reaches three centimeters high…
we don’t have to clean it anymore…
because… it’s been proved…
that… beyond those three centimeters…
it’s impossible to accumulate more dust… “
…you, and your philosophies. (hahaha)
But I love your stories keep sending them, and I’m going to keep them all in a file so that I can show to Evy thirty years later.
The text about the heart was pretty interesting too , but a little-bit boring.
I was reading the newspaper today ( I read it everyday from monday to friday during my lunch-time) , and since I don’t read everything ( only the parts that interest me most ) , I saw an article of a person who was saying that everyday in his life is a good day… you wake up and see the daylight , this is already a good day , you breathe the air , this is a good day… at the end he says that we complain too much about life without appreciating it , because life is too short. One day you are happily here and next day you are dead… so enjoy it as much as possible!
So that’s it dad, for sure I didn’t succeed you. I don’t have too much patience to write.
Hugs… Taue.
Only you... really...
I found it very funny : “ it’s been scientifically proved that…
once the dust reaches three centimeters high…
we don’t have to clean it anymore…
because… it’s been proved…
that… beyond those three centimeters…
it’s impossible to accumulate more dust… “
…you, and your philosophies. (hahaha)
But I love your stories keep sending them, and I’m going to keep them all in a file so that I can show to Evy thirty years later.
The text about the heart was pretty interesting too , but a little-bit boring.
I was reading the newspaper today ( I read it everyday from monday to friday during my lunch-time) , and since I don’t read everything ( only the parts that interest me most ) , I saw an article of a person who was saying that everyday in his life is a good day… you wake up and see the daylight , this is already a good day , you breathe the air , this is a good day… at the end he says that we complain too much about life without appreciating it , because life is too short. One day you are happily here and next day you are dead… so enjoy it as much as possible!
So that’s it dad, for sure I didn’t succeed you. I don’t have too much patience to write.
Hugs… Taue.
...3.2... lunch-time readings...
dear son kaue...
yes... once you told me... sometime ago…
that you enjoy reading the newspaper while...
you are eating your little-nice-sandwich during lunch-time…
that’s a very good habit… my son…
it’s a moment… where you can relax…
disconnect yourself from the worries…
and… simply savor your lunch…
distracting yourself…
as you read the newspaper articles that you’re interested on…
I found it very wise the text that you forwarded to me:
…” I saw an article of a person who was saying that
everyday in his life is a good day…
you wake up and see the daylight , this is already a good day ,
you breathe the air , this is a good day…
at the end he says that we complain too much about life without appreciating it ,
because life is too short.
One day you are happily here and next day you are dead…
so enjoy it as much as possible!...”
--- --- ---
I also like this kind of wisdom…
indeed… very often many of us forget to appreciate certain basic things…
like… for instance the capacity to have a normal vision…
to be able to see the objects…
have we ever thought about a blind person…
who could suddenly be able to see normally…?
could we ever imagine a better reward than this one…?
or… if a person has serious chronic respiratory problems…
be able to… suddenly get better…
and… be able to breathe the pure air… normally…?
I really liked this newspaper article…
you write well…
it was thanks to your email…
that I’ve been thinking about what you wrote…
not only about the article itself…
( the beauty… the wisdom of the article )…
but also…
your sensibility…
to be able to realize… that the article was special…
that the article was bringing a message of wisdom…
and I… as I was reading your email…
I... became happy…
happy to confirm what I knew already…
that you… taue… is a good guy…
a calm guy…
simple…
who just want to be in peace…
to find your place in the world…
without disturbing anybody…
without being disturbed…
to be able to read your little-newspaper… at lunch-break-time…
to be able to savor an article from the newspaper…
where there exists a message which reveals a regard about life…
a pure regard… of peace… of wisdom…
of gratefulness… for being able to be healthy…
so we can see the colors…
and breathe the morning air…
yes… my son…
from this life… we don’t take too much…
we only leave in the memory of these few people who really like us…
we leave with them… only our tenderness…
our words of kindness and friendship…
and… not too much beyond that…
the sun… like all other stars in the universe…
will extinguish itself one day…
( since the fuel that it burns… is not infinite…)
( it’s going to happen many billions of years in the future…
the scientists already calculated it…)
when this day comes…
our dear planet earth…
will become an ice ball…
( since there’s no more sun to warm her up…)
and… so… there will be no living soul here…
not even to tell the history of mankind…
so… the newspaper article did make a lot of sense:
let’s be thankful each day in the morning for being alive…
for being able to open our eyes and see the daylight…
for being able to take a deep breath… and feel the fresh morning air…
and also… to relate with everyone who surrounds us…
in the most gentle and truthful possible way…
so that… whenever we go to the other dimension…
we can be sure that we left here on Earth…
only good memories…
with everyone who really wants us… truly well…
see you soon… my son…
keep being like that…
you’re realizing what is really important in life…
it’s the purity of spirit…
the peace of conscience…
to be aware that you are gentle and good towards everyone…
briefly… a good man…
a person with a good heart…
I’m happy to know that you’re like that…
because I’m also like that…
and… thanks to this…
I can feel that God protects me…
and… naturally will be protecting you too…
why…?
because you are a person with good heart…
see you soon…
thankyou for your email…
it was very good…
a hug…
tighted…
your father…
…luis antonio…
yes... once you told me... sometime ago…
that you enjoy reading the newspaper while...
you are eating your little-nice-sandwich during lunch-time…
that’s a very good habit… my son…
it’s a moment… where you can relax…
disconnect yourself from the worries…
and… simply savor your lunch…
distracting yourself…
as you read the newspaper articles that you’re interested on…
I found it very wise the text that you forwarded to me:
…” I saw an article of a person who was saying that
everyday in his life is a good day…
you wake up and see the daylight , this is already a good day ,
you breathe the air , this is a good day…
at the end he says that we complain too much about life without appreciating it ,
because life is too short.
One day you are happily here and next day you are dead…
so enjoy it as much as possible!...”
--- --- ---
I also like this kind of wisdom…
indeed… very often many of us forget to appreciate certain basic things…
like… for instance the capacity to have a normal vision…
to be able to see the objects…
have we ever thought about a blind person…
who could suddenly be able to see normally…?
could we ever imagine a better reward than this one…?
or… if a person has serious chronic respiratory problems…
be able to… suddenly get better…
and… be able to breathe the pure air… normally…?
I really liked this newspaper article…
you write well…
it was thanks to your email…
that I’ve been thinking about what you wrote…
not only about the article itself…
( the beauty… the wisdom of the article )…
but also…
your sensibility…
to be able to realize… that the article was special…
that the article was bringing a message of wisdom…
and I… as I was reading your email…
I... became happy…
happy to confirm what I knew already…
that you… taue… is a good guy…
a calm guy…
simple…
who just want to be in peace…
to find your place in the world…
without disturbing anybody…
without being disturbed…
to be able to read your little-newspaper… at lunch-break-time…
to be able to savor an article from the newspaper…
where there exists a message which reveals a regard about life…
a pure regard… of peace… of wisdom…
of gratefulness… for being able to be healthy…
so we can see the colors…
and breathe the morning air…
yes… my son…
from this life… we don’t take too much…
we only leave in the memory of these few people who really like us…
we leave with them… only our tenderness…
our words of kindness and friendship…
and… not too much beyond that…
the sun… like all other stars in the universe…
will extinguish itself one day…
( since the fuel that it burns… is not infinite…)
( it’s going to happen many billions of years in the future…
the scientists already calculated it…)
when this day comes…
our dear planet earth…
will become an ice ball…
( since there’s no more sun to warm her up…)
and… so… there will be no living soul here…
not even to tell the history of mankind…
so… the newspaper article did make a lot of sense:
let’s be thankful each day in the morning for being alive…
for being able to open our eyes and see the daylight…
for being able to take a deep breath… and feel the fresh morning air…
and also… to relate with everyone who surrounds us…
in the most gentle and truthful possible way…
so that… whenever we go to the other dimension…
we can be sure that we left here on Earth…
only good memories…
with everyone who really wants us… truly well…
see you soon… my son…
keep being like that…
you’re realizing what is really important in life…
it’s the purity of spirit…
the peace of conscience…
to be aware that you are gentle and good towards everyone…
briefly… a good man…
a person with a good heart…
I’m happy to know that you’re like that…
because I’m also like that…
and… thanks to this…
I can feel that God protects me…
and… naturally will be protecting you too…
why…?
because you are a person with good heart…
see you soon…
thankyou for your email…
it was very good…
a hug…
tighted…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...4... philosophising part four... ( 4 out of 18 )...
dear son taue…
dear son peter…
we were in rio-de-janeiro at age eight…
going to school by trolley-bus…
together with my sister clarice who was four-years-old…
and… on the way back… I preferred to walk home…
since the money of the trolley-bus-ticket…
was spent on the pop-corn-little-bag…
my life together with the group of kids on the street…
was pretty good…
we used to live near the “jockey club do brasil”…
where the people who had money… used to go there and have fun…
gambling on the horse-races…
one day… one of the kids of our group… had an idea…
he proposed that we could spend the whole sunday…
of the “grande premio brasil”…
each one of us… with a flannel duster…
taking care of the cars... of the people who went there to gamble…
that was the first time I worked in my life…
although I’m not sure if we can call this… work…
the cars were coming around noon time…
they parked on the streets of the neighborhood…
we helped the drivers to maneuver their cars into the…
narrow slots parallel to the side-walk…
at the very end of the gambling section of the “grande premio brasil”…
that was the time of our real activity…
we had to go from one car to another…
trying to get the tips…
they were so many… at the same time…
that… many of them… just went away…
it was like the end of a movie-section…
at a certain instant “X”…
everybody leaves at the same time…
well… after that…
we counted all the money collected…
and… we purchased a leather-soccer-ball “G-18”…
I still remember the model of the ball: “G-18”…
--- --- ---
at age ten…
my family moves back to recife…
this time… we were living in the house of my grandfather…
the father of my father…
he had just passed away…
and… that was the first (and only) time that I saw my father crying…
he was crying out loud…
saying…
“this is terrible…”
“this is terrible…”
and… my mother was at his side... comforting him…
a scene of tenderness…
of love between my father… and my mother…
something rare…
because… usually… they were fighting… almost all the time…
for some silly reason like…
“you left the window open…”
( my father complaining to my mother…
when he was coming home from work…
usually… tired and bad-tempered…)
“you were probably reading the "Time-magazine”…”
( he… complaining of the fact that she… (according to him…)…
used to spend all day reading the “Time-magazine”…)…
--- --- ---
my grandfather had passed away recently…
and… soon after… my grandmother… also…
they used to live in recife…
in a big house…
with an enormous yard…
full of trees…
in a street called amelia…
since my grandparents had passed away…
the house became kind of empty…
and... a cousin of mine called mariana…
was living there together with one of my grandmother’s sisters…
whose name was tia lurdes…
so… my parents decided to move from rio-de-janeiro back to recife…
because… since the house of my grandparents was… almost empty…
we could live there…
at this point… something interesting happened…
I… had to go to recife… earlier than my family…
because I had an entrance exam ( in order to be able to enroll myself at school )…
on a certain day… which was about two months earlier…
than the time my family was supposed to move…
and that was when… for the first time in my life… I travelled by plane…
and... all by myself… with age ten… going from rio to recife…
( but my father knew a friend of him…
who was travelling on the same flight…
and so... my father asked him to accompany me during the trip…)
arriving at the airport in recife…
I found... waiting for me:
my uncle marcos ( my father’s brother… who later became a politician…
and… even later… a senator…)… and his wife carolina…
from that point on… a very new phase in my live just started…
me… at amelia street… in company of my cousin mariana…
and of tia lurdes…
they used to watch soap-opera in the evening…
and... for the first time in my life…
I “dove” into the world of “soap-operas”…
fictitious stories… virtual stories…
but they were able to put myself in contact with a certain “reality” of life…
which I wasn't used to...
later on I could realize that…
many of these dramas from the soap-operas…
can indeed happen… in the real world…
should we stop here…?
we should stop here…
see you soon…
with tenderness…
your father…
…luis antonio…
dear son peter…
we were in rio-de-janeiro at age eight…
going to school by trolley-bus…
together with my sister clarice who was four-years-old…
and… on the way back… I preferred to walk home…
since the money of the trolley-bus-ticket…
was spent on the pop-corn-little-bag…
my life together with the group of kids on the street…
was pretty good…
we used to live near the “jockey club do brasil”…
where the people who had money… used to go there and have fun…
gambling on the horse-races…
one day… one of the kids of our group… had an idea…
he proposed that we could spend the whole sunday…
of the “grande premio brasil”…
each one of us… with a flannel duster…
taking care of the cars... of the people who went there to gamble…
that was the first time I worked in my life…
although I’m not sure if we can call this… work…
the cars were coming around noon time…
they parked on the streets of the neighborhood…
we helped the drivers to maneuver their cars into the…
narrow slots parallel to the side-walk…
at the very end of the gambling section of the “grande premio brasil”…
that was the time of our real activity…
we had to go from one car to another…
trying to get the tips…
they were so many… at the same time…
that… many of them… just went away…
it was like the end of a movie-section…
at a certain instant “X”…
everybody leaves at the same time…
well… after that…
we counted all the money collected…
and… we purchased a leather-soccer-ball “G-18”…
I still remember the model of the ball: “G-18”…
--- --- ---
at age ten…
my family moves back to recife…
this time… we were living in the house of my grandfather…
the father of my father…
he had just passed away…
and… that was the first (and only) time that I saw my father crying…
he was crying out loud…
saying…
“this is terrible…”
“this is terrible…”
and… my mother was at his side... comforting him…
a scene of tenderness…
of love between my father… and my mother…
something rare…
because… usually… they were fighting… almost all the time…
for some silly reason like…
“you left the window open…”
( my father complaining to my mother…
when he was coming home from work…
usually… tired and bad-tempered…)
“you were probably reading the "Time-magazine”…”
( he… complaining of the fact that she… (according to him…)…
used to spend all day reading the “Time-magazine”…)…
--- --- ---
my grandfather had passed away recently…
and… soon after… my grandmother… also…
they used to live in recife…
in a big house…
with an enormous yard…
full of trees…
in a street called amelia…
since my grandparents had passed away…
the house became kind of empty…
and... a cousin of mine called mariana…
was living there together with one of my grandmother’s sisters…
whose name was tia lurdes…
so… my parents decided to move from rio-de-janeiro back to recife…
because… since the house of my grandparents was… almost empty…
we could live there…
at this point… something interesting happened…
I… had to go to recife… earlier than my family…
because I had an entrance exam ( in order to be able to enroll myself at school )…
on a certain day… which was about two months earlier…
than the time my family was supposed to move…
and that was when… for the first time in my life… I travelled by plane…
and... all by myself… with age ten… going from rio to recife…
( but my father knew a friend of him…
who was travelling on the same flight…
and so... my father asked him to accompany me during the trip…)
arriving at the airport in recife…
I found... waiting for me:
my uncle marcos ( my father’s brother… who later became a politician…
and… even later… a senator…)… and his wife carolina…
from that point on… a very new phase in my live just started…
me… at amelia street… in company of my cousin mariana…
and of tia lurdes…
they used to watch soap-opera in the evening…
and... for the first time in my life…
I “dove” into the world of “soap-operas”…
fictitious stories… virtual stories…
but they were able to put myself in contact with a certain “reality” of life…
which I wasn't used to...
later on I could realize that…
many of these dramas from the soap-operas…
can indeed happen… in the real world…
should we stop here…?
we should stop here…
see you soon…
with tenderness…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...5... philosophising part five... ( 5 out of 18 )...
dear son taue…
dear son peter…
we were in recife at age 10…
watching soap-opera with my cousin mariana…
( who was 18 at that time…)
and my grandmother’s sister… tia lurdes…
and my grandmother… mother of my father…
who was pretty well healthwise…
( she passed away two or three years later…)
they were my only companions there…
because… as I mentioned before…
I had travelled from rio to recife earlier than my parents and brothers did…
so I could do the admission-exam to the middle-school…
which happened on a time earlier than the one scheduled by my parents…
to move from rio to recife…
to me… those times… were interesting…
in the sense of finding myself… for the first time in my life…
distant from my brother… sisters… and parents…
I found myself in the companion of two nice old-ladies…
( my grandmother… and her sister… tia lurdes…)
in a house with a super-good mood… very calm…
with that kind of good-mood typical of the northeast-part-of-the-country…
( different from rio-de-janeiro...)
a house... where everything functioned without stress…
there wasn’t those eternal fighting between my father and my mother… anymore…
there wasn’t that monotony typical of rio-de-janeiro…
… immersed in those environments full of concrete… of appartments…
… together with a total absence of dirt-ground… and trees…
in contrast… there… in my grandmother’s house…
I felt like I was in paradise…
the house was inside a huge big yard… full of trees…
I used to spend all day doing nothing…
climbing and then sitting for a long time…
on the branches of certain trees…
specially the rose-apple-tree… ( the “jambo” tree )…
at this age… ( ten-years-old )…
all that a child used to live in an apartment… wants…
is to be able to enjoy nature… to climb the trees…
to walk barefoot…
and… the interesting part is… those weren’t trees outside... far in the neighborhood...
or... in a public place where everyone could pass by…
the trees were located inside my grandmother’s yard…
in her property… it wasn’t a public place…
it was like a private paradise immersed in the world…
but… at the same time… with a total privacy… protected by a (short ) wall…
which delineated the border between that private “sanctuary”…
and the confusion of the world outside…
where there was an already present… traffic… pollution… bad-vibes… etc…
those things which… today… we are so used to deal with…
and the yard was simply… huge…
something really gigantic…
I used to climb each tree…
as if they were living things… ( and… indeed… they are…)
I used to climb it’s branches… conquering each region of its interior…
the goal was always to reach the highest branches…
but… as time passed by… I learned… that each tree had its own secrets:
it liked to be climbed…
but the process of climbing… had its own limits…
each tree had its ideal-point of climbing…
beyond that point… its branch would get thinner… and thinner…
and the fall would be… certainly… unavoidable…
--- --- ---
I used to write to one of my friends in rio-de-janeiro…
telling him how good it is to climb the trees…
he replied to me… telling... in details…
how the goal of the flamengo-soccer-team did happen…
with illustrative sketches drawn by himself…
describing through a dotted line…
the trajectory of the ball towards the goal…
as I read his letter… I could start realizing…
how different our universes were…
in the sense of what I really liked…
and what my friend liked…
the world for him... was… soccer…
for me… I wasn’t much caring…
to see how was the shape of the trajectory...
which conducted the ball...
to the goal of the flamengo-team...
what really did make me feel happy…
was to be able to enjoy the harmony I was experiencing...
inside an enormous tree… way up there…
feeling the wind to swing its branches…
feeling a happiness which I had never felt in my life…
the happiness of being able to play in an yard like that…
barefoot…
in the peaceful mood of my grandmother’s house…
--- --- ---
at night… after a nice-little-beans-soup with spaghetti strips…
and with a nice-little-taste of “coentro”…
( an herb typical from the northeast-part-of-the-country…)
it was time to watch television…
with my cousin… my grandmother… and her sister tia lurdes…
tia lurdes had broken her ankle…
it was at the bus-stop…
the bus took off… squeezing her ankle…
between the bus-wheel and the side-walk…
she used to spend all day sitting…
in front of the television…
with the leg in a plaster-cast…
sometimes she used to cry…
one day when she was crying…
my cousin mariana arrived closed to her…
and hugged her…
comforting her…
this scene was kept in my memory…
I found it very beautiful…
the scene of someone comforting the other one in her suffering…
I wasn’t used to see scenes of this kind…
my parents didn’t have the habit of hugging each other…
and... my brother and sisters… neither...
so… this scene was like something new to me…
--- --- ---
I was ten years-old…
my cousin… eighteen…
one day she invited me to go out with her… and her boyfriend… erick…
who had the habit of going out with her in a certain day…
once in a week… at night…
he came over to pick us up at home…
with his cool… neat… volkswagen-bug…
very shiny…
he also… all neat… and bathed…
really well-shaved… with a certain parfum…
ready to date…
as we got into his car…
him… on the driver’s seat…
my cousin… on the passenger-seat…
and me… on the back-seat…
about thirty-seconds later…
after we were all accommodated on our respective places…
and the car already moving on the road…
erick says to my cousin…
… " it seems like you’re acting differently tonight "…
at this point she comes closer and gives him… a true-love-kiss…
very slowly…
and I… who wasn’t very used to see such scenes…
for me… it was like a sort of “shock”… in the good-sense of the word…
then… I started thinking to myself…
that she didn’t start kissing him from the very beginning… ( as usual…)
probably because of my presence…
but… as soon as he gave her the hint…
( “ it seems like you’re acting differently tonight”…)
she let her shyness go away…
and acted normally… as usual…
I realized immediately… how pleasant it must be… to go on a date…
--- --- ---
a few days later… my family… my parents… my brothers…
arrived from rio-de-janeiro…
my old family…
in the new-paradise: in my grandmother’s house…
full of trees…
but my family… wasn´t too much caring about the trees…
my father’s obsession was to be able to transform my sister ana emilia…
into a new world-record-champion in the swimming-sport…
should we stop here…?
we should stop here…
a big hug on both of you…
with tenderness…
your father…
…luis antonio...
dear son peter…
we were in recife at age 10…
watching soap-opera with my cousin mariana…
( who was 18 at that time…)
and my grandmother’s sister… tia lurdes…
and my grandmother… mother of my father…
who was pretty well healthwise…
( she passed away two or three years later…)
they were my only companions there…
because… as I mentioned before…
I had travelled from rio to recife earlier than my parents and brothers did…
so I could do the admission-exam to the middle-school…
which happened on a time earlier than the one scheduled by my parents…
to move from rio to recife…
to me… those times… were interesting…
in the sense of finding myself… for the first time in my life…
distant from my brother… sisters… and parents…
I found myself in the companion of two nice old-ladies…
( my grandmother… and her sister… tia lurdes…)
in a house with a super-good mood… very calm…
with that kind of good-mood typical of the northeast-part-of-the-country…
( different from rio-de-janeiro...)
a house... where everything functioned without stress…
there wasn’t those eternal fighting between my father and my mother… anymore…
there wasn’t that monotony typical of rio-de-janeiro…
… immersed in those environments full of concrete… of appartments…
… together with a total absence of dirt-ground… and trees…
in contrast… there… in my grandmother’s house…
I felt like I was in paradise…
the house was inside a huge big yard… full of trees…
I used to spend all day doing nothing…
climbing and then sitting for a long time…
on the branches of certain trees…
specially the rose-apple-tree… ( the “jambo” tree )…
at this age… ( ten-years-old )…
all that a child used to live in an apartment… wants…
is to be able to enjoy nature… to climb the trees…
to walk barefoot…
and… the interesting part is… those weren’t trees outside... far in the neighborhood...
or... in a public place where everyone could pass by…
the trees were located inside my grandmother’s yard…
in her property… it wasn’t a public place…
it was like a private paradise immersed in the world…
but… at the same time… with a total privacy… protected by a (short ) wall…
which delineated the border between that private “sanctuary”…
and the confusion of the world outside…
where there was an already present… traffic… pollution… bad-vibes… etc…
those things which… today… we are so used to deal with…
and the yard was simply… huge…
something really gigantic…
I used to climb each tree…
as if they were living things… ( and… indeed… they are…)
I used to climb it’s branches… conquering each region of its interior…
the goal was always to reach the highest branches…
but… as time passed by… I learned… that each tree had its own secrets:
it liked to be climbed…
but the process of climbing… had its own limits…
each tree had its ideal-point of climbing…
beyond that point… its branch would get thinner… and thinner…
and the fall would be… certainly… unavoidable…
--- --- ---
I used to write to one of my friends in rio-de-janeiro…
telling him how good it is to climb the trees…
he replied to me… telling... in details…
how the goal of the flamengo-soccer-team did happen…
with illustrative sketches drawn by himself…
describing through a dotted line…
the trajectory of the ball towards the goal…
as I read his letter… I could start realizing…
how different our universes were…
in the sense of what I really liked…
and what my friend liked…
the world for him... was… soccer…
for me… I wasn’t much caring…
to see how was the shape of the trajectory...
which conducted the ball...
to the goal of the flamengo-team...
what really did make me feel happy…
was to be able to enjoy the harmony I was experiencing...
inside an enormous tree… way up there…
feeling the wind to swing its branches…
feeling a happiness which I had never felt in my life…
the happiness of being able to play in an yard like that…
barefoot…
in the peaceful mood of my grandmother’s house…
--- --- ---
at night… after a nice-little-beans-soup with spaghetti strips…
and with a nice-little-taste of “coentro”…
( an herb typical from the northeast-part-of-the-country…)
it was time to watch television…
with my cousin… my grandmother… and her sister tia lurdes…
tia lurdes had broken her ankle…
it was at the bus-stop…
the bus took off… squeezing her ankle…
between the bus-wheel and the side-walk…
she used to spend all day sitting…
in front of the television…
with the leg in a plaster-cast…
sometimes she used to cry…
one day when she was crying…
my cousin mariana arrived closed to her…
and hugged her…
comforting her…
this scene was kept in my memory…
I found it very beautiful…
the scene of someone comforting the other one in her suffering…
I wasn’t used to see scenes of this kind…
my parents didn’t have the habit of hugging each other…
and... my brother and sisters… neither...
so… this scene was like something new to me…
--- --- ---
I was ten years-old…
my cousin… eighteen…
one day she invited me to go out with her… and her boyfriend… erick…
who had the habit of going out with her in a certain day…
once in a week… at night…
he came over to pick us up at home…
with his cool… neat… volkswagen-bug…
very shiny…
he also… all neat… and bathed…
really well-shaved… with a certain parfum…
ready to date…
as we got into his car…
him… on the driver’s seat…
my cousin… on the passenger-seat…
and me… on the back-seat…
about thirty-seconds later…
after we were all accommodated on our respective places…
and the car already moving on the road…
erick says to my cousin…
… " it seems like you’re acting differently tonight "…
at this point she comes closer and gives him… a true-love-kiss…
very slowly…
and I… who wasn’t very used to see such scenes…
for me… it was like a sort of “shock”… in the good-sense of the word…
then… I started thinking to myself…
that she didn’t start kissing him from the very beginning… ( as usual…)
probably because of my presence…
but… as soon as he gave her the hint…
( “ it seems like you’re acting differently tonight”…)
she let her shyness go away…
and acted normally… as usual…
I realized immediately… how pleasant it must be… to go on a date…
--- --- ---
a few days later… my family… my parents… my brothers…
arrived from rio-de-janeiro…
my old family…
in the new-paradise: in my grandmother’s house…
full of trees…
but my family… wasn´t too much caring about the trees…
my father’s obsession was to be able to transform my sister ana emilia…
into a new world-record-champion in the swimming-sport…
should we stop here…?
we should stop here…
a big hug on both of you…
with tenderness…
your father…
…luis antonio...
...5.1... peter's reply...
I received philosophising part 4..
I would like to know more about the training of your sister to become a world record champion in swimming.
a hug,
Peter
I would like to know more about the training of your sister to become a world record champion in swimming.
a hug,
Peter
...6... philosophising part six... ( 6 out of 18 )...
dear son taue…
dear son pedro…
my family had just arrived in recife…
at the house of my grandparents in amelia street...
a house… full of trees…
along with the family… it came also... one of my father’s passions:
the adoration for the swimming-sport…
as soon as he arrived in recife…
the first thing he did…
was to enroll… me and ana emilia… in the swimming-team…
at the portugues-club…
a club which was located about one kilometer away from our house…
thereafter… everything changed in my life…
the focus was not directed towards the trees anymore…
I had to go to school in the morning…
and… in the afternoon… to the portugues-club…
to practice swimming…
in spite of all these activities…
life remained calm…
to swim in the northeast-part-of-the-country…
was much more pleasant than to do it in rio-de-janeiro…
the water in rio… was much colder…
whereas in recife… the water was really nice…
and… on the warm days…
the swimming turned out to be a real pleasure…
my sister ana emilia… was already signalizing that she had a good potential…
to be a champion in swimming…
this passion for swimming which my father involved us… wasn’t something new…
way before we moved to recife… still living in rio…
ana emilia and I used to swim already at botafogo-club…
and… I remember well the first day that my father…
took us there... to introduce us to the swimming coach…
there were two coaches…
one... was the argentinian coach… called “Carranza”…
and… the other... was the coach for the beginner’s team…
( a team which didn’t have too much future… in terms of championship…)
… his name was “Rui”…
so… my father took me and my sister there… to botafogo-club…
he talks with the coach Carranza…
my sister and I… jumped into the water…
we did a little swimming… so that he could evaluate us…
and then… Carranza speaks to my father…
… “ it’s obvious… she… (ana emilia )… it’s going to stay with me” …
and… at this point… a doubt remained… naturally… in the air…
“… and… how about him…? ” … somebody asked…
then… Carranza responds…
he… ( it’s obvious…) goes to Rui…
--- --- ---
a sort of an awkward mood floated in the air…
after all… what was the main difference between me and my sister…?
maybe… because I had a pair of legs too thin…?
I don’t know…
things were handled in a way… as if there was no doubt…
“ ana emilia… obviously… is going to be my athete…
but him… ( this little-mouse…)… it’s obvious… he will go to Rui”…
nothing was said as above… of course…
but… the way he talked…
“ him…?... he goes to Rui…”
the way he talked… did have this kind of meaning…
which is:
I obviously didn’t have the necessary conditions to become a champion…
therefore it would be “foolish”… it would be a waste…
to consider that I could be someday a champion…
but… I didn’t take anything of that… very seriously…
I went to Rui…
my sister went to Carranza…
we used to practice everyday…
still in rio… at the botafogo-club…
one or two years before we moved to recife…
in a super-cold weather…
it was like a torture to deal with such cold conditions…
specially during the time of the “speed-drills”…
when we used to swim the 25-meter-lap… at full-speed…
then we had to get out of the pool… to wait in line…
then… jump in the water again for another lap at full-speed…
get out of the water… wait in line… etc…
and… in this process of getting-out-of-the-water… and get-back-in-line…
that’s when the cold really reached us… because of the wind…
so… re-focusing this story from the “frozen” swimming-pool…
of the botafogo-club in rio-de-janeiro…
to the swimming-pool of the portugues-club in recife…
with that super-nice and pleasant temperature…
which only could be found in a swimming-pool…
located in a region like the northeast-part-of-the-country…
so… in this case… oh boy… that was good…
the swimming-activity in recife was something good… something pleasant…
--- --- ---
my mother decides to buy an used piano…
she accommodates it in the house at amelia street…
she taught me how to play an italian song…
I enjoyed it… very much…
sometimes… on saturday afternoon…
there was a dance-party at the portugues-club…
we used to go there… we used to dance with other people…
from the swimming-team… it was nice…
one day… a girl started to kiss me…
my father saw it… and gave me a rebuke…
( I felt a little-bit embarrassed…)
years later… when my father was already doing psychotherapy…
he asked me to tell stories from the past between me and him…
when I told him the portugues-club episode…
in spite of not remembering it…
he became very surprised at himself…
without understanding why he would had given me such a rebuke…
( feeling as if he had done something of great stupidity )…
my contacts with my father…
didn't occur very often…
this was due to the fact that he used to work a lot…
he was always working very much…
and… when he arrived home..
he was usually… very tired…
but… with respect to my mother… things were different…
during all my life…
we had always a lot of things to talk about…
besides the habit of being constantly telling me many stories…
she knew how to teach… in a way…
that I could rarely forget the subject of the lesson…
she taught me basic mathematics…
how to solve math problems…
portuguese… geography… english…
she used to sit with me in front of a record-player…
while we listened to some beatles songs…
she would translate them to me…
the record was the sargent pepper’s lonely heart club band…
while I was reading the lyrics (in english) printed on the back-cover of the
“long-play”…
she would explain to me... its meaning in portuguese…
in the song… “a day in the life…”
at the point where they sing…
“ I read the news today oh boy
About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to laugh “…
she explained to me that the expression “made the grade”…
was… in such context… meaning… “he was able to pass”…
in the sense of “he was able to pass to another dimension”…
in other words… “he died”…
and… so… I was always receiving from her… all these teachings…
in a natural and calm way…
learning… not only english…
but several other subjects…
after receiving this initial “jump-start” from her…
from that point on… I used to be able to do the learning… by myself…
in this way… I started to feel pleasure studying…
I felt comfortable studying…
also… because… I realized…
that the studies… are like a key…
which gives us access to new horizons…
for instance…
nowadays… I know fairly well the portuguese-language… and english…
but… if someday… I decide to go… for instance… to europe…
or to an island colonized by france…
if… I plan ahead… and start to study french…
this knowledge… would give me conditions…
to be able to communicate with people…
from the french-speaking countries...
in other words… knowledge allows us to have access to people…
places… etc…
in a fulfilled way… in a profound way…
but this doesn’t mean…
that we have to know all the knowledge of the world…
this is… obviously... impossible…
but… with my mother’s help…
I started to feel comfortable studying…
I started to feel… that I was able to get a book…
read it… understand it…
and enjoy the lessons apprehended from the book…
as time passed by… I realized… also… that not every book is good…
it’s important to be able to select… things which deserves our attention…
from the ones that don’t…
I’m stopping here…
with a huge… a very-huge…
super-tight… super-hug…
in both of you…
see you soon…
warm yourself up…
winter is coming…
a big hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
dear son pedro…
my family had just arrived in recife…
at the house of my grandparents in amelia street...
a house… full of trees…
along with the family… it came also... one of my father’s passions:
the adoration for the swimming-sport…
as soon as he arrived in recife…
the first thing he did…
was to enroll… me and ana emilia… in the swimming-team…
at the portugues-club…
a club which was located about one kilometer away from our house…
thereafter… everything changed in my life…
the focus was not directed towards the trees anymore…
I had to go to school in the morning…
and… in the afternoon… to the portugues-club…
to practice swimming…
in spite of all these activities…
life remained calm…
to swim in the northeast-part-of-the-country…
was much more pleasant than to do it in rio-de-janeiro…
the water in rio… was much colder…
whereas in recife… the water was really nice…
and… on the warm days…
the swimming turned out to be a real pleasure…
my sister ana emilia… was already signalizing that she had a good potential…
to be a champion in swimming…
this passion for swimming which my father involved us… wasn’t something new…
way before we moved to recife… still living in rio…
ana emilia and I used to swim already at botafogo-club…
and… I remember well the first day that my father…
took us there... to introduce us to the swimming coach…
there were two coaches…
one... was the argentinian coach… called “Carranza”…
and… the other... was the coach for the beginner’s team…
( a team which didn’t have too much future… in terms of championship…)
… his name was “Rui”…
so… my father took me and my sister there… to botafogo-club…
he talks with the coach Carranza…
my sister and I… jumped into the water…
we did a little swimming… so that he could evaluate us…
and then… Carranza speaks to my father…
… “ it’s obvious… she… (ana emilia )… it’s going to stay with me” …
and… at this point… a doubt remained… naturally… in the air…
“… and… how about him…? ” … somebody asked…
then… Carranza responds…
he… ( it’s obvious…) goes to Rui…
--- --- ---
a sort of an awkward mood floated in the air…
after all… what was the main difference between me and my sister…?
maybe… because I had a pair of legs too thin…?
I don’t know…
things were handled in a way… as if there was no doubt…
“ ana emilia… obviously… is going to be my athete…
but him… ( this little-mouse…)… it’s obvious… he will go to Rui”…
nothing was said as above… of course…
but… the way he talked…
“ him…?... he goes to Rui…”
the way he talked… did have this kind of meaning…
which is:
I obviously didn’t have the necessary conditions to become a champion…
therefore it would be “foolish”… it would be a waste…
to consider that I could be someday a champion…
but… I didn’t take anything of that… very seriously…
I went to Rui…
my sister went to Carranza…
we used to practice everyday…
still in rio… at the botafogo-club…
one or two years before we moved to recife…
in a super-cold weather…
it was like a torture to deal with such cold conditions…
specially during the time of the “speed-drills”…
when we used to swim the 25-meter-lap… at full-speed…
then we had to get out of the pool… to wait in line…
then… jump in the water again for another lap at full-speed…
get out of the water… wait in line… etc…
and… in this process of getting-out-of-the-water… and get-back-in-line…
that’s when the cold really reached us… because of the wind…
so… re-focusing this story from the “frozen” swimming-pool…
of the botafogo-club in rio-de-janeiro…
to the swimming-pool of the portugues-club in recife…
with that super-nice and pleasant temperature…
which only could be found in a swimming-pool…
located in a region like the northeast-part-of-the-country…
so… in this case… oh boy… that was good…
the swimming-activity in recife was something good… something pleasant…
--- --- ---
my mother decides to buy an used piano…
she accommodates it in the house at amelia street…
she taught me how to play an italian song…
I enjoyed it… very much…
sometimes… on saturday afternoon…
there was a dance-party at the portugues-club…
we used to go there… we used to dance with other people…
from the swimming-team… it was nice…
one day… a girl started to kiss me…
my father saw it… and gave me a rebuke…
( I felt a little-bit embarrassed…)
years later… when my father was already doing psychotherapy…
he asked me to tell stories from the past between me and him…
when I told him the portugues-club episode…
in spite of not remembering it…
he became very surprised at himself…
without understanding why he would had given me such a rebuke…
( feeling as if he had done something of great stupidity )…
my contacts with my father…
didn't occur very often…
this was due to the fact that he used to work a lot…
he was always working very much…
and… when he arrived home..
he was usually… very tired…
but… with respect to my mother… things were different…
during all my life…
we had always a lot of things to talk about…
besides the habit of being constantly telling me many stories…
she knew how to teach… in a way…
that I could rarely forget the subject of the lesson…
she taught me basic mathematics…
how to solve math problems…
portuguese… geography… english…
she used to sit with me in front of a record-player…
while we listened to some beatles songs…
she would translate them to me…
the record was the sargent pepper’s lonely heart club band…
while I was reading the lyrics (in english) printed on the back-cover of the
“long-play”…
she would explain to me... its meaning in portuguese…
in the song… “a day in the life…”
at the point where they sing…
“ I read the news today oh boy
About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to laugh “…
she explained to me that the expression “made the grade”…
was… in such context… meaning… “he was able to pass”…
in the sense of “he was able to pass to another dimension”…
in other words… “he died”…
and… so… I was always receiving from her… all these teachings…
in a natural and calm way…
learning… not only english…
but several other subjects…
after receiving this initial “jump-start” from her…
from that point on… I used to be able to do the learning… by myself…
in this way… I started to feel pleasure studying…
I felt comfortable studying…
also… because… I realized…
that the studies… are like a key…
which gives us access to new horizons…
for instance…
nowadays… I know fairly well the portuguese-language… and english…
but… if someday… I decide to go… for instance… to europe…
or to an island colonized by france…
if… I plan ahead… and start to study french…
this knowledge… would give me conditions…
to be able to communicate with people…
from the french-speaking countries...
in other words… knowledge allows us to have access to people…
places… etc…
in a fulfilled way… in a profound way…
but this doesn’t mean…
that we have to know all the knowledge of the world…
this is… obviously... impossible…
but… with my mother’s help…
I started to feel comfortable studying…
I started to feel… that I was able to get a book…
read it… understand it…
and enjoy the lessons apprehended from the book…
as time passed by… I realized… also… that not every book is good…
it’s important to be able to select… things which deserves our attention…
from the ones that don’t…
I’m stopping here…
with a huge… a very-huge…
super-tight… super-hug…
in both of you…
see you soon…
warm yourself up…
winter is coming…
a big hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...6.1... taue's reply...
Hi dad:
I liked your letter very much, keep sending them, you write very well....
I think you have a lot of wisdom , a man with knowledge… a fact that makes me very proud of…
I’m always making good comments of you to everybody… I would like to be a father to Evy, like you are to me...
Hugs,
Taue.
I liked your letter very much, keep sending them, you write very well....
I think you have a lot of wisdom , a man with knowledge… a fact that makes me very proud of…
I’m always making good comments of you to everybody… I would like to be a father to Evy, like you are to me...
Hugs,
Taue.
...6.2... you are already...
dear son taue...
when you said...
“ I’m always making good comments of you to everybody... I would like to be a father to Evy, like you are…”
… I should tell you that you are already an excellent father to Evy…
in both of my trips to boston when I went there to visit you…
I saw… how such a good father you are…
how such a good husband you are…
how such a good friend you are…
how such a good worker you are…
how such an excellent person you are…
towards yourself…
and… towards everyone who is near you…
and… regarding Evy… you are a super-daddy…
super-good…
super-loving…
keep being like that… my son…
you are a good person…
with a good-heart…
and… Evy feels all that…
and… she probably adores you for being like that…
me too… I’m very proud of you…
I’m always thanking God…
for giving me this happiness…
to have a son like you…
thankyou very much for your letter…
it was very beautiful…
I was moved…
I’ll see you soon…
a tight hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
when you said...
“ I’m always making good comments of you to everybody... I would like to be a father to Evy, like you are…”
… I should tell you that you are already an excellent father to Evy…
in both of my trips to boston when I went there to visit you…
I saw… how such a good father you are…
how such a good husband you are…
how such a good friend you are…
how such a good worker you are…
how such an excellent person you are…
towards yourself…
and… towards everyone who is near you…
and… regarding Evy… you are a super-daddy…
super-good…
super-loving…
keep being like that… my son…
you are a good person…
with a good-heart…
and… Evy feels all that…
and… she probably adores you for being like that…
me too… I’m very proud of you…
I’m always thanking God…
for giving me this happiness…
to have a son like you…
thankyou very much for your letter…
it was very beautiful…
I was moved…
I’ll see you soon…
a tight hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
...7... philosophising part seven... ( 7 out of 18 )...
dear son taue…
dear son peter…
as I described…. on my previous email…
how much thankful I am to my mother…
for being so kind and careful… to the point of motivating me…
to be a person who loves to study …
as I was describing that… I forgot to say…
that during the process of “becoming a person who loves to study”…
there exists a fase-of-transition… a fase in which…
there’s a kind of “pain-feeling”…
a fase where the child suffers…
as he realizes how difficult it is… to conform himself…
with the idea of letting-go the innocent life of a child…
and to move on towards an acceptance of the discomfort…
typical of the earliest stages of a process-of- learning…
such transition happened exactly at the time we are talking about…
at age ten… on amelia street…
where I was enjoying so much the opportunity…
to walk barefoot on the dirt… among all those trees…
of my grandmother’s house…
( as opposed to a life inside an apartment…
…where we used to live in rio-de-janeiro…)
my parents and my brothers had arrived from rio to amelia street…
in recife… right in the middle of the big-summer-vacation…
( that is:… december, january, february…
since summer here on the south-hemisphere happens…
in an opposite-period of the north-hemisphere-summer…)
my family had arrived right in the middle of summer vacation…
and… since my mother realized that I used to stay all day…
doing nothing…
she decided to put me to study… on summer-time-vacation…
she told me to sit on the living-room table…
she gave me a note-book… pencil… and an eraser…
and told me that I was supposed to… everyday…
do about fifty or seventy math exercises…
from a book of math… called “Ary Quintella”…
( which was the author’s name…)
I couldn’t believe on what was happening…
me…?... would I have to spend my vacations studying…
… all these boring exercises…?
oh… what a torture… what a crazy idea…
I sat on that chair in front of that notebook… of that book…
I felt so bad…
I felt like complaining…
why… it has to be me…?
why… I have to study…?
right on vacation…?
my mother noted my anguish…
and… calmly… got a scratch-paper…
and… started to explain to me… how to do the exercises…
and… from those explanations…
I realized that I would be able to do them by myself…
so… what seemed first… to be a torture…
turned out to be something good… to be a pleasure…
I found myself doing the other exercises…
like I was doing something fun…
a game… an amusement…
in short… that is the magic of the pleasure-of-studying…
once the student gets a “jump-start” from somebody…
after that… the student realizes that he’s capable…
of standing- on- his- own- two- feet…
and… this feeling of independency…
makes him feel good…
gives him a desire to keep moving on…
to keep developing himself…
--- --- ---
in those days the structure of the brazilian- school- system was:
1… the primary-school… from age 6 to 10…
2… the gymnasium-school… from age 11 to 14…
3… the scientific-school… from age 15 to 17…
usually… at age 18… the student was making an effort to pass…
the “vestibular” exam… in order to get into college…
since it was a very hard exam…
usually… the students used to enroll themselves…
in the famous “little-schools”… which offered preparatory courses…
specialized on getting everybody “in shape” for the “vestibular”…
--- --- ---
well…
but… why am I talking about all that…?
because on those days… since I was ten-years-old…
I was right on the border between the primary and gymnasium schools…
well… depending on the educational-prestige of the gymnasium-school…
where the student was intending to apply…
if... the school was good… with a high educational level…
then… the interested student was required to take an entrance-exam…
which was… usually… very hard…
( it was like a sort of a… “little- vestibular”…
but… in this case… from the primary-school to the gymnasium-school…
instead of… from the scientific-school to college )…
so…
one day I saw some kids passing by on the street wearing an uniform…
it seemed like they were masqueraded as little-soldiers…
in a light-brown uniform…
… two red-vertical-stripes along the outer-vertical-line of the trousers…
… a little red hat… ( the famous “cap” of the stewardesses…)
matching with the red stripes of the trousers…
I found it… superb…
children…
masqueraded as true little soldiers…
I asked my mother which uniform was that…
she explained to me that they were students from the “colegio-militar”…
a good school… with an good educational-system…
she asked me if I would like to apply there…
and to try to take the entrance-exam to this school…
I said… yes…
very happy to know… that I was about to enroll myself…
in a school… where the uniforms of the students…
looked like the little-soldiers of the real-world…
and from this point on…
a new trajectory in my life… just initiated…
where… later on… I begin to feel an enormous regret…
for having this (unfortunate) idea of enrolling myself…
in a school… where the students masquerade themselves…
as little-tin-soldiers…
… with the red cap…
we stop here…
my dear sons…
stay with God…
all-the-best…
super-hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
dear son peter…
as I described…. on my previous email…
how much thankful I am to my mother…
for being so kind and careful… to the point of motivating me…
to be a person who loves to study …
as I was describing that… I forgot to say…
that during the process of “becoming a person who loves to study”…
there exists a fase-of-transition… a fase in which…
there’s a kind of “pain-feeling”…
a fase where the child suffers…
as he realizes how difficult it is… to conform himself…
with the idea of letting-go the innocent life of a child…
and to move on towards an acceptance of the discomfort…
typical of the earliest stages of a process-of- learning…
such transition happened exactly at the time we are talking about…
at age ten… on amelia street…
where I was enjoying so much the opportunity…
to walk barefoot on the dirt… among all those trees…
of my grandmother’s house…
( as opposed to a life inside an apartment…
…where we used to live in rio-de-janeiro…)
my parents and my brothers had arrived from rio to amelia street…
in recife… right in the middle of the big-summer-vacation…
( that is:… december, january, february…
since summer here on the south-hemisphere happens…
in an opposite-period of the north-hemisphere-summer…)
my family had arrived right in the middle of summer vacation…
and… since my mother realized that I used to stay all day…
doing nothing…
she decided to put me to study… on summer-time-vacation…
she told me to sit on the living-room table…
she gave me a note-book… pencil… and an eraser…
and told me that I was supposed to… everyday…
do about fifty or seventy math exercises…
from a book of math… called “Ary Quintella”…
( which was the author’s name…)
I couldn’t believe on what was happening…
me…?... would I have to spend my vacations studying…
… all these boring exercises…?
oh… what a torture… what a crazy idea…
I sat on that chair in front of that notebook… of that book…
I felt so bad…
I felt like complaining…
why… it has to be me…?
why… I have to study…?
right on vacation…?
my mother noted my anguish…
and… calmly… got a scratch-paper…
and… started to explain to me… how to do the exercises…
and… from those explanations…
I realized that I would be able to do them by myself…
so… what seemed first… to be a torture…
turned out to be something good… to be a pleasure…
I found myself doing the other exercises…
like I was doing something fun…
a game… an amusement…
in short… that is the magic of the pleasure-of-studying…
once the student gets a “jump-start” from somebody…
after that… the student realizes that he’s capable…
of standing- on- his- own- two- feet…
and… this feeling of independency…
makes him feel good…
gives him a desire to keep moving on…
to keep developing himself…
--- --- ---
in those days the structure of the brazilian- school- system was:
1… the primary-school… from age 6 to 10…
2… the gymnasium-school… from age 11 to 14…
3… the scientific-school… from age 15 to 17…
usually… at age 18… the student was making an effort to pass…
the “vestibular” exam… in order to get into college…
since it was a very hard exam…
usually… the students used to enroll themselves…
in the famous “little-schools”… which offered preparatory courses…
specialized on getting everybody “in shape” for the “vestibular”…
--- --- ---
well…
but… why am I talking about all that…?
because on those days… since I was ten-years-old…
I was right on the border between the primary and gymnasium schools…
well… depending on the educational-prestige of the gymnasium-school…
where the student was intending to apply…
if... the school was good… with a high educational level…
then… the interested student was required to take an entrance-exam…
which was… usually… very hard…
( it was like a sort of a… “little- vestibular”…
but… in this case… from the primary-school to the gymnasium-school…
instead of… from the scientific-school to college )…
so…
one day I saw some kids passing by on the street wearing an uniform…
it seemed like they were masqueraded as little-soldiers…
in a light-brown uniform…
… two red-vertical-stripes along the outer-vertical-line of the trousers…
… a little red hat… ( the famous “cap” of the stewardesses…)
matching with the red stripes of the trousers…
I found it… superb…
children…
masqueraded as true little soldiers…
I asked my mother which uniform was that…
she explained to me that they were students from the “colegio-militar”…
a good school… with an good educational-system…
she asked me if I would like to apply there…
and to try to take the entrance-exam to this school…
I said… yes…
very happy to know… that I was about to enroll myself…
in a school… where the uniforms of the students…
looked like the little-soldiers of the real-world…
and from this point on…
a new trajectory in my life… just initiated…
where… later on… I begin to feel an enormous regret…
for having this (unfortunate) idea of enrolling myself…
in a school… where the students masquerade themselves…
as little-tin-soldiers…
… with the red cap…
we stop here…
my dear sons…
stay with God…
all-the-best…
super-hug…
your father…
…luis antonio…
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