Biography of an Everyday Couple: Turning Ordinary Into Inspirational

By Lorrie Parise

Biography of an Everyday Couple leads you through the everyday lives of Alice and Fidel Flores - their romance and inspiration. The sentimental journey depicts a story of family togetherness in a time of need with plenty of anecdotes along this realistic approach to life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jun 21, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543939316

Book preview

Prologue

My Mother and Father’s Love Story

Let me start by saying I use the single word biography because this story is dedicated to my Mother, Alice, and Father, Fidel, whose lives were truly intertwined. It was as if there was only one memoir - their love story.

Often, my Mother would invite family and friends to come over and join she and my Father around the kitchen table. My Mother would prepare a feast, even if she considered it just a meal, and share stories of their lives. She spoke vividly, and I always felt as if I was there, reliving the memory. She was a true storyteller. Her mind was as sharp as a tack. She had a personality larger-than-life and was always the life of the party. God knows, she loved to party! It was probably because she loved being around people. She especially loved children and helped influence and shape many of their lives.

When we learned the diagnosis of Mom’s condition, brain tumor, it was hard for the family to fathom. The diagnosis of a brain tumor and my Mother’s once-sharp mind seemed like an oxymoron.

At one point in ICU after the diagnosis, my Mother understood only Spanish and then only English. The neurologist thought her mind was jumping in time – perhaps to different periods in her life. Although I do not know her exact thoughts, I was able to understand what she may have been thinking based on her past recollections of their lives.

We were fortunate that she did not pass away right away as the neurologist speculated. This, of course, was just like my Mother; she was not going to let anyone tell her what to do especially when to die except, of course, if it were divine. What she did is give her family and friends a chance to say goodbye and unite them even closer. She fought hard and tried with all her might to come back, but the brain tumor won. Still, she was a true inspiration.

My Father was a quieter man. He read the newspaper almost every day and on occasion, he read math books…especially Algebra books. Who does that? Okay, I know math majors probably do read the books. Also, don’t get him started on a topic that he truly believed in. He would stand by his words and never budge on his thoughts even if you were his close friend and disagreed with him. Perhaps that is how he felt about my Mother. He loved my Mother and believed in her so much that he was her biggest fan. They both inspired each other through a life of 64 years together. She was his motivation to achieve what he thought could not be done. He was always her knight-in-shining armor. My Father was the synonym for chivalry.

Let me share with you a poem I wrote for my Mother’s Memory Card. It shares the type of personality she had with my Father by her side.

Around the Kitchen Table

Mom’s favorite place

Was the round kitchen table.

She told stories from the heart,

Some truths and some fables.

The oak table seemed simple for dining,

Holding six people to eight.

Mom worked her magic –

Twenty people sat and served plates.

Beans and tortillas

Were always found here.

Mom had her margaritas

And Dad his Lone Star® beer.

Mom wanted everyone she knew

To join her if they were able –

To share her love

Around the kitchen table.

Throughout their lives, Alice and Fidel turned ordinary into inspirational. Similar to my Mother and Father, so many people believe that they only lead ordinary, everyday lives and believe they do not really make a difference. They do. They are extraordinary people. They just may not realize it.

I.

Meet Mom and Dad

October 2015

She is far from ordinary. She is Alice. Her dark curly hair amidst patches of gray contrast her pale complexion and bring out the features of a stunning woman. A stunning woman who happens to be my Mother. And her eyes. Many doctors have commented that eyes are never supposed to be truly black in color, yet hers are black. The twinkle of her smile can melt a person away, and her smile accents her rosy cheeks. She is 88. I remember celebrating her 88th birthday in late September 2015. Although she loved parties, she was tired of celebrating her special day. She allowed company to come over to eat but not to bring any birthday presents. This year, she could not reverse her age. When she turned 81, she jokingly was excited to be 18. 88 though is 88.

It was a cool, early October morning about one week after her birthday. Waking up later than usual, Alice sat on the edge of her king-size bed waiting for her husband to help her. He was always there for her, assisting her every step of the way. This morning, he had gone to the kitchen to start the morning routine, letting her sleep in. His ritual consisted of first going outside to get the newspaper, then brewing the coffee in their percolated, six-cup glass coffee pot and carefully timing it to perfection.

Alice prepared herself for the day and decided she could walk alone from her bedroom to the kitchen and did not call out for his assistance. She grabbed her walker, near the bed. She called it her horse. The silver horse had yellow tennis balls at the bottom to help the walker move at a slower pace, so it wouldn’t slip out from under her. She put her right hand on the top of the walker and went to lift her body.

Ugh, she grunted. She slowly pulled herself up with a slouched back. The woman, who defied her age, hardly showing any wrinkles, thought to herself, Why does my right hand hurt so much? Have to keep using my left. She shrugged it off to the right hand needing carpal tunnel surgery. A couple of years back, she had surgery on the left that helped alleviate the carpal tunnel on that hand. Alice had been having pain in her right leg too and had recently seen an orthopedic surgeon. She thought the pain had to have been from her past knee surgeries. The surgeon found nothing wrong with her two knee replacement surgeries from previous years. He suggested a neurologist to her who she had seen and had run tests the day before. Results were expected within one week.

I still think that doctor messed up my right knee. Why’d I have to have surgery in both knees? One after another, she thought. I just had to rush it and then have a ministroke. Good Lord, I’m fallin’ apart.

Contemplating with a sigh, she continued her epilogue to herself, Oh well, I’ll have answers soon.

As Alice began to walk, she took a glance around the room. It was a large bedroom with a sitting area, small restroom and a large closet. The pale blue walls and the curtains with beige and an olive green paisley design were a tale from the 70s. Alice was proud of the room and the house, which she and her husband built from beginning to finish.

She slowly made her way down the long bedroom hall. As she walked, again relying more on her left hand, her wedding ring clanged against the walker while her right leg dragged. The hall seemed a long walk. Photographs of her children and kids she babysat through the years filled the hall.

Highlighting the hall was a long and narrow painting that she had owned for years – Summer Solitude by Rico Tomaso. It portrayed a woman alone in a wooded-setting in the summer. As she slowly walked by, she pondered, What’s the woman holding? Oh well, it doesn’t matter. That’s how I feel sometimes alone."

She kept walking slowly with her ring clanging against the walker. I love that painting.

Finally, Alice reached the steps of the sunken den. She stepped down with a grunt. Yes, she could have walked the long way around and never have stepped down, but she wanted the exercise. As she approached the kitchen, she had to step up. The kitchen, too, was as if you were stepping back into the past – into a time of wallpaper that portrayed seasonings for cooking in red and gold, linoleum flooring with a large braided rug in its center and a Formica backsplash with matching specs of gold. It reminded her of a simpler time in life. Many people commented how they loved walking back into a different era at their house and how comfortable they felt in the home. Perhaps, they just felt the love that the home carried as its essence.

As Mom made her way into the kitchen, filled with the aroma of fresh brewed coffee, she saw him. Mom looked down at her walker. She knew she was mainly holding on with her left hand, yet she was beginning to need her right hand for support. She felt her right fingers were beginning to shake as they desperately tried to clutch the walker.

Alice glanced up again. There was my Father, Fidel, a thin man with a ruddy complexion and salt and pepper hair. The man she had married 63½ years ago. He, too, hardly aged. I think they discovered the Fountain of Youth and didn’t tell us. Well, my brother and I always said our parents never taught us Spanish, so they could converse about us in what seemed like their own private language. We would never blame ourselves for not learning a language – that would be too simple. Well, if they had discovered the Fountain of Youth, rest assure they spoke about it in Spanish.

She went to approach my Father, Hello hon. What ya doin’? He greeted her with a kiss. It was not just a simple kiss. It was a chain of instantaneous smacks.

Makin’ coffee, Dad proudly said with his Spanish accent. Although at times his pronunciation of the English language was harsh, his mastery of the language had advanced so much during the last six decades with Mom.

Dad had learned Spanish as his first language yet spoke English too. He spoke both languages with a slight stutter in his youth but had lost the speech impediment with age and with the confidence of Mother. Interestingly, Dad now felt more comfortable speaking in English rather than Spanish. In fact, you would rarely hear him speak Spanish anymore unless it was to someone fluent in the language.

As Mom turned to make her way towards her chair, she began to lose her balance. Her left hand grasped for the chair. In an unusual mishap, the wedding band from her ring was caught on the chair backing. It broke as she began to fall backwards. Dad went to grab for her hand with his hand and lost his balance as they both fell. For an instant while falling, Dad’s mind went back in time.

The time was 1945 on the newly purchased 100-acre Flores’ farm or ranchto as they affectionately referred to it. In the early 1940s, Fermin and his wife, Carmen, had once lived rent-free at a ranch on the edge of Floresville, Texas - owned by the Rodriguez family - as payment for taking care of the farm. For extra income, the Flores family also sold hundreds of dozens of tamales annually on the 15th and 16th of September, in honor of Mexican Independence Day, at the Center Dance Hall near downtown Floresville.

Ironically, the Flores’ ancestry was not from Mexico but rather the Canary Islands. King Philip V of Spain sent two sets of our Canary Islander ancestors to help found the first civil government and introduce Christianity to San Antonio, Texas.

The livelihood of the Flores family in the 1940s mainly consisted of baling hay for themselves and others. Fermin and Carmen also made their living selling peanuts, watermelon and corn, which the family all planted. These sources of income helped Fidel’s parents buy eight acres of additional land in Floresville for their three oldest children. The couple had 11 children, and Fidel would later say that his parents had so many children to have free help on the farm.

Fermin brought his livestock including cows, chickens, pigs and horses to their new ranchito. Fermin could now afford to buy a row crop tractor to add to his collection of farming equipment – a baler and a thrasher.

Willie Solis had made his way to the Flores’ farm. He was the Deputy Sheriff of Wilson County and a farmer. He had not come for official business, though, just hay and to visit. He was in his wooden, horse-drawn wagon. Yes, cars were used. For items like hay and in a small-town, wagons were in use. Who knows if his true name was Willie? The story was that his first name was Medarde, and he was born in the nearby town of Karnes City. Back when he was born in the late 1890s, the birth certificates were very informal. When his parents finally baptized him, his parents listed his name as Willie, named after a neighbor who had similar mannerisms.

Along with being tall, Willie was a stout man, and you knew he was serious. Willie walked in the field towards Fermin.

As Willie reached towards Fermin to shake his hand, he got the word out, Buenos. Before he could finish saying Dias, Willie tripped in a hole, which was almost invisible in the field. With quick instincts, Fermin reached to grab his hand and yelled, Willie! As he grabbed the Deputy Sheriff’s hand, he lost his balance, and they both went down.

Sorry! Willie apologized.

Fermin too was a heavy-set man who enjoyed the cooking of his wife and his daughters that took turns with the duties. Carmen was the opposite of Fermin in stature. She was a petite woman who worked on the land beside her husband and children. Although miniscule, she was a tough woman